Here are 100 books that Devil of a Whipping fans have personally recommended if you like
Devil of a Whipping.
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My passions lean toward American history, Americana, and skepticism. My creed is that "Conventional wisdom is neither." I am a member of the Skeptics Society, and I often litigate and lecture on copyright and celebrity rights issues. I have been a trial lawyer for 45 years and try cases in front of flesh and blood judges and juries. My clientele runs from supermodels to celebrities, photographers, performers, directors, model agencies, photographers, and artists.
America before it was America and how it became America. I consider McCullough our greatest historian and best writer. Pages fly by, and the book reads like a movie. Washington was the greatest American before America was created.
It is essential reading for any high school American History class. It has the action and drama of a movie, not based on real facts because the real events were and remain difficult to believe. America is a one-in-a-million shot.
America's most acclaimed historian presents the intricate story of the year of the birth of the United States of America. 1776 tells two gripping stories: how a group of squabbling, disparate colonies became the United States, and how the British Empire tried to stop them. A story with a cast of amazing characters from George III to George Washington, to soldiers and their families, this exhilarating book is one of the great pieces of historical narrative.
I am an archaeologist and ethnohistorian who has carried out major projects in American Indian and Revolutionary War archaeology and history. I have taught at three universities over the course of more than five decades and have authored or edited 17 books.
The new national Congress of the United States had to invent both a government and a military to defend it on the fly in 1776. Militias had been around for decades, encouraged and supported to varying degrees by colonial, later state, governments. Before and after the creation of a regular “Continental” army, militia units were chartered by the thirteen states. The soon-to-be self-declared fourteenth state of Vermont also had militia regiments, and these also played important roles at Saratoga.
Some members of Congress thought that the creation of a regular army was dangerous and unnecessary, but Washington and his supporters prevailed, and the Continental Army was founded. Chadwick’s book is important not just for the story of the first American army, but for the individual stories of the soldiers who served in it.
This is the first book that offers a you-are-there look at the American Revolution through the eyes of the enlisted men. Through searing portraits of individual soldiers, Bruce Chadwick, author of George Washington's War, brings alive what it was like to serve then in the American army.
With interlocking stories of ordinary Americans, he evokes what it meant to face brutal winters, starvation, terrible homesickness and to go into battle against the much-vaunted British regulars and their deadly Hessian mercenaries.
The reader lives through the experiences of those terrible and heroic times when a fifteen-year-old fifer survived the Battle of…
I am an archaeologist and ethnohistorian who has carried out major projects in American Indian and Revolutionary War archaeology and history. I have taught at three universities over the course of more than five decades and have authored or edited 17 books.
John Luzader was an Army Ranger in World War II, and later park historian at the Saratoga Battlefield National Park. On the only occasion we met, John seemed discouraged about writing this book. Fortunately, I was not the only one who urged him to press on. The result is this fine military history of what was a decisive campaign of the American Revolution. It is likely that no one who has written about the campaign has known more about it.
The months-long Saratoga campaign was one of the most important military undertakings of the American Revolution, and John Luzader's impressive Saratoga: A Military History of the Decisive Campaign of the American Revolution, the first all-encompassing objective account of these pivotal months in American history, is now available in paperback.
British General John Burgoyne's army of 7,800 men intended to capture Albany, New York, wrest control of the vital Hudson River Valley from the colonists, carry a brutal war into the American interior, secure the Champlain-Hudson country, and make troops available for Sir William Howe's 1778 campaign.
While I grew up in New Jersey, the “Crossroads of the Revolution,” with a passion for history, I was ignorant to the amount of fighting that happened in my home state. My decision to write coincided with a renewed interest in the American Revolution: when I realized how many stories of the Revolution remained untold, the die was cast. My passion for history, love for soldiering, wartime experiences, and understanding of tactics and terrain came together to produce something special. Now I can often be found, map, compass, and notebook in hand, prowling a Revolutionary battlefield so I can better tell the story of those who were there.
Rick Atkinson is a master storyteller who approaches writing history with the attention to detail of an investigative reporter. I have had the privilege of meeting Rick, and he took the time to encourage me as I embarked on my own writing career. His personal qualities aside, Rick’s gripping narrative highlights the drama that unfolded in the first years of the war, from Lexington and Concord to Trenton and Princeton. This is the first volume of what promises to be the definitive historical trilogy about the War for Independence.
'To say that Atkinson can tell a story is like saying Sinatra can sing ... A powerful new voice has been added to the dialogue about [America's] origins as a people and a nation. It is difficult to imagine any reader putting this beguiling book down without a smile and a tear.' New York Times
In June 1773, King George III attended a grand celebration of his reign over the greatest, richest empire since ancient Rome. Less than two years later, Britain's bright future turned dark: after a series of provocations, the king's soldiers took up arms against his rebellious…
Although I’ve been an avid reader of histories and biographies all my life, I didn’t become passionate about the American Revolution until moving to South Carolina in 2013. That’s when I began to learn about the South’s rich American Revolution history and become fascinated with Nathanael Greene’s role in it. So far, this fascination has inspired me to write two histories on Nathanael Greene, and I hope to keep going. Today, we tend to think about the American Revolution in terms of its northern battles, but if you want to understand the war’s end game, you need understand what happened in the South. These books are a great place to start.
Anyone who wants to learn about the American Revolution in the South should start here.
Buchanan not only weaves a thrilling narrative of the events beginning with the British capture of Charleston and ending at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, he does it in a literary style, perfectly weaving primary accounts with his own insights and observations.
This book changed my life! Not only did it introduce me to events of the Race to the Dan, it convinced me to write my own version of it. Anyone who wants to compliment me as a writer of histories, please compare me to John Buchanan.
A brilliant account of the proud and ferocious American fighters who stood up to the British forces in savage battles crucial in deciding both the fate of the Carolina colonies and the outcome of the war.
""A tense, exciting historical account of a little known chapter of the Revolution, displaying history writing at its best.""--Kirkus Reviews
""His compelling narrative brings readers closer than ever before to the reality of Revolutionary warfare in the Carolinas.""--Raleigh News & Observer.
""Buchanan makes the subject come alive like few others I have seen."" --Dennis Conrad, Editor, The Nathanael Greene Papers.
Although I’ve been an avid reader of histories and biographies all my life, I didn’t become passionate about the American Revolution until moving to South Carolina in 2013. That’s when I began to learn about the South’s rich American Revolution history and become fascinated with Nathanael Greene’s role in it. So far, this fascination has inspired me to write two histories on Nathanael Greene, and I hope to keep going. Today, we tend to think about the American Revolution in terms of its northern battles, but if you want to understand the war’s end game, you need understand what happened in the South. These books are a great place to start.
Forget about George Washington. Daniel Morgan was the best American battlefield general of the Revolutionary War. And anyone who wants to tell the story of the Race to the Dan has to start with Daniel Morgan’s miraculous victory at the Battle Cowpens on January 17, 1781.
Zambone’s book is by far the best contemporary biography of this important but little-known American hero, not only explaining the genius of Morgan’s Cowpens victory, but also covering how Morgan’s early life in the American frontier prepared him to be the American Revolution’s most significant innovator in military tactics.
A Major New Biography of a Man of Humble Origins Who Became One of the Great Military Leaders of the American Revolution On January 17, 1781, at Cowpens, South Carolina, the notorious British cavalry officer Banastre Tarleton and his legion had been destroyed along with the cream of Lord Cornwallis's troops. The man who planned and executed this stunning American victory was Daniel Morgan. Once a barely literate backcountry laborer, Morgan now stood at the pinnacle of American martial success. Born in New Jersey in 1736, he left home at seventeen and found himself in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley. There he…
Although I’ve been an avid reader of histories and biographies all my life, I didn’t become passionate about the American Revolution until moving to South Carolina in 2013. That’s when I began to learn about the South’s rich American Revolution history and become fascinated with Nathanael Greene’s role in it. So far, this fascination has inspired me to write two histories on Nathanael Greene, and I hope to keep going. Today, we tend to think about the American Revolution in terms of its northern battles, but if you want to understand the war’s end game, you need understand what happened in the South. These books are a great place to start.
To understand the American Revolution in the South, you need to understand what happened in South Carolina in the summer and fall of 1780, after the British captured Charleston that May. And you also need to know about the bitter civil war that divided South Carolina in the years leading up to 1780.
Walter Edgar is a South Carolina treasure, now known primarily for his popular NPR radio show on South Carolina history and culture. But he’s also the state’s preeminent historian, and in Partisans and Redcoats, he expertly introduces readers to the unique conditions and culture in South Carolina that led to this prominent role in the American Revolution.
From one of the South′s foremost historians, this is the dramatic story of the conflict in South Carolina that was one of the most pivotal contributions to the American Revolution.
In 1779, Britain strategised a war to finally subdue the rebellious American colonies with a minimum of additional time, effort, and blood. Setting sail from New York harbour with 8,500 ground troops, a powerful British fleet swung south towards South Carolina. One year later, Charleston fell. And as King George′s forces pushed inland and upward, it appeared the six-year-old colonial rebellion was doomed to defeat. In a stunning work on…
Although I’ve been an avid reader of histories and biographies all my life, I didn’t become passionate about the American Revolution until moving to South Carolina in 2013. That’s when I began to learn about the South’s rich American Revolution history and become fascinated with Nathanael Greene’s role in it. So far, this fascination has inspired me to write two histories on Nathanael Greene, and I hope to keep going. Today, we tend to think about the American Revolution in terms of its northern battles, but if you want to understand the war’s end game, you need understand what happened in the South. These books are a great place to start.
There have been a lot of comprehensive histories of the American Revolution published since, but Christopher Ward’s The War of the Revolution is still the gold standard.
Want me to prove it? Pick up a Ferling or Philbrick or any other historian writing about the American Revolution today and see how many times they use it in their work.
Expertly documented, with clean, concise writing that can be read end-to-end or used as a reference for specific campaigns and battles, this is my go-to source for everything American Revolution.
From the first crack of musket fire at Lexington and Concord to the downing of the British colors at Yorktown, Christopher Ward does not tell the whole history of the American Revolution, but rather, illuminates the history of the war caused by that revolution-the military operations on land in the War for Independence. When The War for the Revolution was first published almost sixty years ago, it was instantly recognized as a modern classic of American historical scholarship, as well as a masterpiece of narrative nonfiction Revolutionary War history. Today it is probably the most cited single work on the…
As a child and then as a secondary school history teacher, I wanted to help people understand each other. I always told my students that it was less important to memorize dates and facts than it was to explore history to help them understand what it is to be a human being. They should know that humans have always faced challenges and found good or bad ways of dealing with them–it is not just in their time. The books I have listed here on the Revolutionary history of the New York area created an even greater passion for understanding the human condition.
Ever since researching and writing my master’s thesis in the 1960s on the treatment of indigenous people in high school American History textbooks, I have tried very hard to learn more about the diverse indigenous nations and how they have been involved and treated in American History.
The title of the book really grabbed me. History texts had always looked at indigenous people as obstacles to national growth, but here was a book about people who were our allies in the war for independence, but they had then been forgotten when settlers wanted their land. The stories of individual people as well as groups were fascinating and tragic.
Tribal, violent, riven with fierce and competing loyalties, the American Revolution as told through the Oneida Indians, the only Iroquois Nation to side with the rebels, shatters the old story of a contest of ideas punctuated by premodern set-piece warfare pitting patriotic colonists against British Redcoats. With new detail and historical sweep, Joseph T. Glatthaar and James Kirby Martin offer a vivid account of the Revolution’s forgotten heroes, the allies who risked their land, their culture, and their lives to join in a war that gave birth to a new nation at the expense of their own.
The relationship between servicewomen and the US military is a complicated one. It’s love, strength, comradery, and also abuse, manipulation, sexual harassment, and soul-crushing institutional betrayal. After leaving the military, I found most books or movies didn’t adequately represent this complex relationship, either ignoring the abuse altogether, or focusing too much on it and erasing the bravery and resilience of women service members. I strive to write books that better represent this conflicting relationship, and I hope this book list helps better reflect women’s experiences in the US military.
This incredibly well-researched and powerfully written anthology does the one thing I always want to remind people: that women have always served and fought for our country. Women are usually invisible when it comes to military representation, especially in a historical sense. Either ignored or forgotten, our existence has continuously been minimalized. Bell and Crow’s anthology, with acute detail, tells stories of women who served from the birth of our nation up to modern day. In excerpts from diaries, letters, oral histories, published and unpublished memoirs, generations of women reveal why and how they chose to serve their country, often breaking the social norms, even to great personal peril. An excellent reference guide to get that one, random guy to shut up when he complains “women don’t belong in the military.”
This inspiring anthology is the first to convey the rich experiences and contributions of women in the American military in their own words-from the Revolutionary War to the present wars in the Middle East. Serving with the Union Army during the Civil War as a nurse, scout, spy, and soldier, Harriet Tubman tells what it was like to be the first American woman to lead a raid against an enemy, freeing some 750 slaves. Busting gender stereotypes, Josette Dermody Wingo enlisted as a gunner's mate in the navy in World War II to teach sailors to fire Oerlikon anti-aircraft guns.…
