The Road to Valley Forge: How Washington Built the Army that Won the Revolution

by John Buchanan

"The fact is that their army is broken all to pieces, and the spirits of their leaders and their abettors is also broken . . . one may venture to pronounce that it is well nigh over with them." -Lord Rawdon In the late fall of 1776, few people on either side would have disagreed with this young British officer's assessment of the Continental Army-least of all, the commander of that army, George Washington. After four months of disastrous defeats, narrow escapes, and punishing marches, Washington knew only too well that his rag-tag assemblage of inexperienced officers, poorly trained regulars, and hastily gathered militiamen was no match for a professional army of more than thirty thousand seasoned, well-equipped British and Hessian troops. Yet General William Howe had missed three golden opportunities to crush Washington's army and thus end the rebellion. With each reprieve, Washington became a wiser, craftier, more prudent commander, one capable of turning an undisciplined rabble into a capable fighting force...

Genres: History, American Revolution

368 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2004

Reviews

[Stephanie Miller]

Not one of my favorite history books. You can tell that Buchanan is not a trained historian (he's a museum man). He does go into deep detail in regards to military maneuvers, but his informal tone and judgment of historical figures shows he was not trained to be a historical writer. Also, if he is going to go into such detail about movements of the army, he would have benefited from providing the reader more maps than just for the Battle of Germantown.

Also, the title of the book alludes the reader to believe the bulk of the book will deal with Valley Forge and how the Continental Army found itself there. Instead the book deals with the Washington's campaigns of 1777-78, and spends half a chapter dealing with Valley Forge. There are better works that cover this time period and better works that explore Valley Forge.

[Andrew Scholes]

Contained a lot of information about Washington that I had not heard. He did point out a lot of areas in which Washington was not all that he has been described over the years, especially in history textbooks.

[Carl T.]

Fascinating and a great read. Buchanan makes the main characters come alive, and he’s terrific on military strategy and tactics.

[Austin Gisriel]

An excellent analysis of George Washington's development as a field commander and how, as the title suggests, he built the army that won the Revolution. Buchanan is very objective in his assessment of Washington, neither sugar-coating his weaknesses, nor downplaying his strengths.

Buchanan writes directly to the reader and so The Road to Valley Forge often reads like a a pleasant and interesting conversation. He is not afraid to write in the first person, to ask us to contemplate certain historical questions, or to offer dispassionate criticism of other historians' conclusions.

Buchanan assumes a fairly high level of Revolutionary War knowledge on the reader's part. While it can be enjoyable and educational without such a background, the reader will benefit from having it.

[Jim]

This history takes you from the loss of New York City to the British through the Battle of Monmouth Courthouse. The author keeps broaching topics in the early part of the book and then quickly says something like "but we'll talk about that later", which gets kind of irritating. He refutes some stories (like Patrick Ferguson passing up a chance at taking a shot at George Washington during the Battle of Brandywine Creek because Washington had his back turned to him) that have been passed along as fact in some other histories. Overall, this book is worth reading. I find myself wanting to read more about the role Baron Von Steuben played in training the Continental Army at Valley Forge.

[R.]

Not a great book. There was something about the writing style/ the level of detail the writer goes into that killed it for me. I felt like he went into minute detail in the areas that I cared nothing for and then glossed over all of the stuff I wanted to hear more about. There are better books that cover this subject. For a barely 300 page book, it took me months to read. That pretty much says it all since I can usually cover that in 2 -4 days if the book is good.

[George Kasnic]

Nice narrative and analysis of the embryonic Continental Army and the travails it faced.