Grand Forage 1778: The Battleground Around New York City by Todd W. Braisted
Grand Forage 1778: The Battleground Around New York City by Todd W. Braisted
After two years of defeats and reverses, 1778 had been a year of success for George Washington and the Continental Army. France had entered the war as the ally of the United States, the British had evacuated Philadelphia, and the redcoats had been fought to a standstill at the Battle of Monmouth. Intelligence from British-held New York indicated that a massive troop movement was imminent. British officers were selling their horses and laying in supplies for their men. Scores of empty naval transports were arriving at the city's harbor. British commissioners from London were offering peace, while spies repeatedly reported British officers were discussing leaving.
To George Washington, and many others, it appeared the British would withdraw from New York City, and the Revolutionary War might be nearing a successful conclusion. Then, on September 23, 1778, six thousand British troops suddenly erupted into neighboring Bergen County, New Jersey, followed the next day by three thousand others surging northward into Westchester County, New York. Washington now faced a British Army stronger than Burgoyne's at Saratoga the previous year.
What, in the face of all intelligence to the contrary, had changed with the British? Using period letters, reports, newspapers, journals, pension applications, and other manuscripts from archives in North America and Europe, Grand Forage 1778 by historian Todd W. Braisted is the first publication to properly narrate Britain's last great push in the North as a single major campaign. Linking the battles, skirmishes, and maneuvers in the lower Hudson Valley, the author explains how George Washington and Sir Henry Clinton played a deadly game of chess as the British raided the countryside for supplies to support their upcoming invasion of the Southern colonies.
Westholme, Hardcover, 1st Edition, 1st Printing, 2016
THIS IS A BRAND NEW BOOK.