Did you know that Washington had a great sense of humor? What is the real story behind his teeth? What was in the love letter he wrote to his best friend’s wife, while he was engaged to Martha? How did he help start a war in the 1750s? How was he going to be brought back to life after his death? As President, why didn’t Washington like to shake hands? What gift did he accept from Spain that changed American farming forever?

Did you know that, at one time, Washington was the leading moonshiner in the country? How did he treat his slaves? Was he always for independence? How did he feel about religion? Why did he sentence an innocent man to death? Why did he curse and threaten his soldiers at times? Why was Washington considered a great general when he lost the majority of his battles? Why did he not free his slaves, and why did Martha finally free them? When Washington became president, what title did he really want used? What form of harsh punishment did he use on his soldiers?

George Washington traveled out of the North American continent only once—do you know where? Why is it believed that the Washingtons had no children of their own? What other eligible women did Washington pursue prior to his marriage? How did Washington win election to the Virginia House of Burgesses in 1757?

These are just a few of the things you will learn about George Washington. There are dozens more of these little-known anecdotes that were told by the people who knew him personally, and these tales will give you a better understanding of what this great man was really like.

About the Author: Jack Darrell Crowder is a retired teacher and administrator with forty plus years in the classroom. He holds B.A. and master’s degrees from Texas Christian University and has written twelve books on the American Revolution. He gives talks on the Revolutionary War to school classes, historical societies, and Daughters of the American Revolution chapters.

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In The Story of Yorktown, Revolutionary War expert Jack Darrell Crowder provides a day-by-day account of the Siege of Yorktown as told by the participants in their journals, diaries, memoirs, pension applications, and letters, as well as in contemporary newspapers. The soldiers write of their fears, hopes, and impressions of these culminating experiences, as well as the destruction that took place. They describe the fortifications, the artillery, life on the battlefield, and the death of friends.

Mr. Crowder begins his coverage with a description of the town of Yorktown and the start of the siege. The narrative continues with the preparations made on both sides, the role of the artillery, the British failed attempt to escape, and their ultimate surrender. Besides the numerical superiority of the Franco-American armies and navy, as the Hessian soldier Johann Conrad Dohla makes clear, the British grossly underestimated the capacity of the Patriot artillery: “At night . . . the enemy began to fire on our left wing, then against our entire line, to fire bombs, cannon, and howitzers. This removed the belief, which we held previously that they had only their regimental cannon there and could not bring up heavy weapons because of the many forests and swamps.”

The Story of Yorktown concludes with the author’s endnotes, a bibliography, and a detailed index to persons and places. Clearfield Company is pleased to add it to its collection of Revolutionary War titles written by Jack Darrell Crowder.

About the Author: Jack Darrell Crowder is a retired teacher and administrator with forty plus years in the classroom. He holds B.A. and master’s degrees from Texas Christian University and has written twelve books on the American Revolution. He gives talks on the Revolutionary War to school classes, historical societies, and Daughters of the American Revolution chapters.

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Each chapter in Victory or Death provides a summary of specific events that were key to the War’s outcome. At the conclusion of every chapter, the author reviews the decisions, for good or ill, that led to the result. For example, he shows that England’s pyrrhic victory at Bunker Hill both raised the morale and preserved the numbers of American combatants, while exposing the danger of British overconfidence.  Making good use of illustrations of the people and places of the American Revolution, Mr. Crowder focuses on these momentous choices made by leaders on both sides:

• Selection of George Washington as America’s Commander-in-Chief
• Britain’s frontal assault on Bunker [Breed’s] Hill
• America’s ill-fated siege of Quebec
• General Howe’s reluctance to finish off the Americans in New York
• Washington’s attack on Trenton
• Britain’s miscues at Saratoga
• Significance of Washington’s Spy Ring
• How decisions about African Americans affected the outcome
• Choices made at Valley Forge to preserve the American army
• The Battle of King’s Mountain
• Appointment of Nathaniel Greene as Commander of America’s Southern army
• Yorktown

Victory or Death concludes with the author’s endnotes, a bibliography, and a detailed index to persons and places. Clearfield Company is pleased to add it to its collection of Revolutionary War titles written by Jack Darrell Crowder.

About the Author: Jack Darrell Crowder is a retired teacher and administrator with forty plus years in the classroom. He holds B.A. and master’s degrees from Texas Christian University and has written twelve books on the American Revolution. He gives talks on the Revolutionary War to school classes, historical societies, and Daughters of the American Revolution chapters.

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Over 420 African Americans who were born free during the colonial period served in the American Revolution from Virginia. Another 400 who descended from free-born colonial families served from North Carolina, 40 from South Carolina, 60 from Maryland, and 17 from Delaware. At least 24 from Virginia and 41 from North Carolina died in the service. Over 75 free African Americans were in colonial militias and the French and Indian Wars in Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. Although some slaves fought to gain their freedom as substitutes for their masters, they were relatively few in number. By the same token, those who were not serving under their own free will are not included in this list. It was simply not their fight.

While the information on each of the free black veterans of the War for Independence varies, in most cases the author has provided the individual’s name, state and county, unit served in, military theater, some family information, often a physical description, pension applied for or received, sometimes other information, and the source. The case of Isaac Brown of Charles City County, Virginia, is illustrative of many of the descriptions found in the volume:

Isaac Brown was born in Charles City County and enlisted there in the Revolution for 1-1/2 years on 12 September 1780: complexion black, 5’2-1/2″ high, a farmer [Register & description of Noncommissioned officers & Privates, LVA accession no. 24296, by http://revwarapps.org/b69.pdf (p.45)]. He was taxable in Lower Westover Precinct of Charles City County in 1786 [PPTL, 1783-7], head of a Charles City County household of 10 “other free” in 1810 [VA:959] and 4 “free colored” in 1820 [VA:13]. He applied for a pension in Charles City County at the age of 69 on 19 May 1829, stating that he enlisted in Charles City County in the fall of the year 1780 and served in Captain Sanford’s Company in Colonel Campbell’s Regiment for 18 months. He was in the Battle of Guildford Courthouse, the Siege 14 of Ninety Six, and the Battle of Eutaw Springs. He owned 70 acres in Charles City County [NARA, S.39,214, M804, Roll 366, frame 240 of 893; http://fold3.com/image/11713004].

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Following is a partial list of the main families covered by Mr. Stark: Amory, Apthorp, Auchmuty, Barnes, Bernard, Boutineau, Bowes, Brattle, Brinley, Browne, Byles, Caner, Chandler, Chipman, Clark, Clarke, Coffin, Copley, Cunningham, Curwen, Cutler, Deblois, Draper, Erving, Faneuil, Flucker, Frankland, Gardiner, Gay, Geyer, Goldthwaite, Gore, Gray, Hallowell, Harrison, Hatch, Hingham, Hooper, Howe, Hutchinson, Jeffries, Johonnot, Joy, King, Lechmere, Leonard, Lewis, Lillie, Loring, Lyde, Lynde, Malcomb, Marston, Murray, Octherlony, Oliver, Paddock, Pagan, Paine, Paxton, Pepperrell, Phips, Pote, Putnam, Quincy, Richardson, Robie, Royall, Ruggles, Russell, Saltonstall, Sayward, Sewall, Sheaffe,Thompson, Vassall, Walter, Winslow, Winthrop, Wiswell, and Wyer.

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Soldiers deserted from all theaters of the Revolution, although roughly as many deserted during the first two years of the war as in the period after June 1777, as the Patriot army became more professionalized. When soldiers ran away, a designated officer placed an advertisement in the local newspaper describing the deserter in considerable detail and offering a reward for his capture. Those advertisements comprise the basis for Mr.Boyle’s new two-volume series, which is nothing less than a complete transcription of all the desertion notices found in 38 newspapers published from Massachusetts to North Carolina from 1775 to 1783.

Each notice in “He Loves a Good Deal of Rum” describes the individual by physical features, his place of birth or last residence, occupation, company served in, date missing, and other characteristics. The index at the back of each volume lists every full name given in the notices, or roughly 7,500 names in all. Following is a notice that may be considered representative for the work as a whole:

“Deserted from my company, in Col. Craft’s battalion of colony train of artillery, Michael Carrick, 31 years of age, about 5 foot 8 inches high, with a cut over his right eye brow, well set, black hair, and buck skin breeches. He had on a grey out side jacket and striped waist coat, a new cotton shirt, and carried away with him a French musket and bayonet.–Any person who shall stop said deserter and thief, shall have a reward of FOUR DOLLARS, and all charges paid by JOSEPH BALCH.” The Boston Gazette and Country Journal, July 22, 1776; July 29, 1776.

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Mr. Boyle’s informative Introduction traces the service of the New Hampshire and Rhode Island regiments before and after they joined General Washington in November 1777. The New Hampshire units, for example, fought opposite portions of General Burgoyne’s army at Hubbardton, Vermont; and, later, under General Benedict Arnold at the Battle of Freeman’s Farm. For their part, the Rhode Island regiments participated in the American defeat of a Hessian assault on Fort Mercer, New Jersey, in October of the same year. During the Valley Forge winter of 1778, however, “virtually half the New Hampshire units were destitute of any kind of shoes or stockings to their feet.” Their Rhode Island counterparts “at this Sevear Season of the year, are, the greatest part of them almost Stark naked, Destitute of Every necessary of life . . . .” Despite these privations, the New Hampshire regiments would later fight victoriously at the Battle of Newtown in 1779. At the Battle of Rhode Island, in August 1778, “The first Rhode Island distinguished itself, and the bravery of the Black soldiers was praised by a number of officers.”

Like the other two books, the core of “Death Seem’d to Stare” consists of an alphabetical list in excess of 2,500 New Hampshire and Rhode Island soldiers abstracted from Revolutionary War muster and payrolls. Each patriot is identified by name, rank, date, and term of enlistment or commission, names of regiment and company, and a variety of supporting details, such as date of furlough or discharge, when wounded, when and where promoted, etc. In support of the abstracts, the author has prepared a detailed glossary of terms found in the rosters, an explanatory list of locations referred to in the entries, and a lengthy, up-to-date bibliography.

Like its predecessors, “Death Seem’d to Stare” is a significant contribution to our understanding of one of the most critical moments in the American past.

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