Book description
Liberty against oppression, right against wrong - a clear message
has come down to us about the origins of the American War of
Independence, one of the founding events of the modern world. As with
so many legends, the truth is somewhat different. In this revealing
account, Robert Harvey overturns most of our assumptions about the
causes of the war. Both Britain and America were divided over the
struggle, America violently so, while in Britain many favoured
independence if it would avoid bloodshed. The war itself was vicious
and confused, and marked by incompetence and bad faith on both sides.
When it was over the Americans pushed out their French allies, while
the British, who had encouraged black slaves to revolt, and Indians to
attack, abandoned both to their fate. Yet after four years of misrule
the Constitutional Convention imposed its own conservative
counter-revolution, and out of bloodshed and suffering, cunning,
idealism and courage, there emerged the infant nation that was to
become the most powerful the world has ever seen. In this
extraordinary and intensely readable book Robert Harvey tells the
whole extraordinary story of its birth.
