WAR WITHOUT MERCY: Liberty or Death in the American Revolution

1-250490

Drawing on vivid contemporary accounts, explores how and why the Revolutionary War descended into a brutal existential struggle. Posits how it was a conflict in which military restraint was more the exception than the rule, a struggle in which combatants believed their very existence was in question. This led to an acceptance of violence against persons and property as preferable to a defeat equated with political, cultural, and even physical extinction. It was war with an expectation and acceptance of ferocity and brutality, anything to avoid defeat. Contains 8-page section of color illustrations.