The inventor, the ladies’ man, the affable diplomat, and the purveyor of pithy homespun wisdom: we all know the charming, resourceful Benjamin Franklin. What is less appreciated is the importance of Franklin’s part in the American Revolution: except for Washington he was its most irreplaceable leader. Although aged and in ill health, Franklin served the cause with unsurpassed zeal and dedication. Jonathan R. Dull, whose decades of work on The Papers of Benjamin Franklin have given...

This book focuses on the gradual deterioration of the British-American relationship that led to the American Revolution.Starting in 1721, the author explores how the relationship between Britain and America changed from one of reciprocal trust to one of mutual misunderstanding and suspicion. It analyses the impact of Britain’s changing relationship with the other great powers of Europe and discusses such matters as British concern about the national debt and French unease about Ang...

The "acclaimed naval historian . . . takes the reader through the intricacies of warship design and construction in both French and British navies." — Historical Novel SocietyIn the series of wars that raged between France and Britain from the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries, seapower was of absolute vital importance. Not only was each nation's navy a key to victory, but was a prerequisite for imperial dominance. These ongoing struggles for overseas...

Although American independence was no miracle, the timing of the country’s independence and its huge scope, both political and territorial, do seem miraculous. In The Miracle of American Independence Jonathan R. Dull reconstructs significant events before, during, and after the Revolutionary War that had dramatic consequences for the future as the colonies sought independence from Great Britain. Without these surprising and unexpected results, Dull maintains, the country would hav...

The Seven Years' War (1754–1763) was a pivotal event in the history of the Atlantic world. Perspectives on the significance of the war and its aftermath varied considerably from different cultural vantage points. Northern and western Indians, European imperial authorities, and their colonial counterparts understood and experienced the war (known in the United States as the French and Indian War) in various ways. In many instances the progress of the conflict was charted by cultural differe...

It had been hundreds of years since humanity and their Witch allies had been forced to retreat to the fortress cities after the disastrous war to eliminate the Magi Clans.Nuclear weapons had burned the skies, and Grand Magic pulled entire continents beneath the seas before the end, but the victory was secured, no Magi was left alive in their slowly recovering world.Or so they thought.Wolfe Noxus was born on the lower levels of a fortress city run by the Morgana Cove...

In 1783 and 1784, some fifty thousand Americans felt that they could not support the revolution against Britain. They were called Loyalists – and there would be no place for them in the new United States.As they streamed into the Canadian colonies to the north, they changed forever the face of settlement there. Their arrival would eventually lead to the formation of the provinces of New Brunswick and Ontario.First published in hardcover in 1984, the bicentenary of the migra...

The first book to appear in the illustrious Oxford History of the United States, this critically acclaimed volume--a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize--offers an unsurpassed history of the Revolutionary War and the birth of the American republic. Beginning with the French and Indian War and continuing to the election of George Washington as first president, Robert Middlekauff offers a panoramic history of the conflict between England and America, highlighting the drama and anguish o...

**The globe's first true world war comes vividly to life in this "rich, cautionary tale" (The New York Times Book Review)The French and Indian War -the North American phase of a far larger conflagration, the Seven Years' War-remains one of the most important, and yet misunderstood, episodes in American history. Fred Anderson takes readers on a remarkable journey through the vast conflict that, between 1755 and 1763, destroyed the French Empire in North America, overturned ...

This book is a narrative history of the many dimensions of the War of 1812 - social, diplomatic, military and political - which places the war's origins and conduct in transatlantic perspective. The events of 1812–15 were shaped by the larger crisis of the Napoleonic Wars in Europe. In synthesizing and reinterpreting scholarship on the war, Professor J. C. A. Stagg focuses on the war as a continental event, highlighting its centrality to Canadian nationalism and state development. The book...

"Altogether superb; a worthy memorial to the victims of two and a half centuries past."--Kirkus Reviews, starred reviewIn 1755, New England troops embarked on a "great and noble scheme" to expel 18,000 French-speaking Acadians ("the neutral French") from Nova Scotia, killing thousands, separating innumerable families, and driving many into forests where they waged a desperate guerrilla resistance. The right of neutrality; to live in peace from the imperial wars waged betwe...

**A NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS' CHOICEA magisterial new work that rewrites the story of America's founding**The American Revolution is often portrayed as an orderly, restrained rebellion, with brave patriots defending their noble ideals against an oppressive empire. It’s a stirring narrative, and one the founders did their best to encourage after the war. But as historian Holger Hoock shows in this deeply researched and elegantly written account of America’...