Redcoats On The Cape Fear

Nestled on the banks of the Cape Fear River, Wilmington, North Carolina, remains famous as a blockade-running port during the Civil War. Not as renowned is the city's equally vital role during the Revolution. Through the port came news, essential supplies, and critical materials for the Continental Army. Both sides contended for the city and both sides occupied it at different times. Its merchant-based economy created a hotbed of dissension over issues of trade and taxes before the Revolution, and the presence of numerous Loyalists among Whigs vying for independence generated considerable tension among civilians. Based on more than 100 eyewitness accounts and other primary sources, this volume chronicles the fascinating story of Wilmington and the Lower Cape Fear during the Revolution.

It has been said that while the famous battles of the American Revolution were fought in the North, the decisive battles were fought in the South. During the Revolutionary War, no place was more important than the southeastern part of North Carolina. Based on eyewitness accounts (many never before published), including journals, diaries, military reports, archaeological studies, and family histories, this is the story of Wilmington and the Lower Cape Fear during the Revolution.

Situated on the banks of the Cape Fear River, Wilmington is awash in unusual tales and legends. A prevalent pirate hideaway, the area harbored the infamous Blackbeard and the cunning Calico Jack Rackham. Since its initial settlement, the region has witnessed an abundance of fantastical lore, including passionately fought duels, explosive train wrecks, Revolutionary and Civil War heroes and some legends that are said to take the form of apparitions. At the local Cape Fear Wine & Beer pub, the ghost of a fallen redcoat can't seem to get enough of a frothy porter brewed from yeast salvaged from an early nineteenth-century shipwreck. Wonder at these and other fascinating and strange tales as local author John Hirchak reveals the legendary history of Wilmington and Cape Fear.

In The Road to Guilford Courthouse, one of the most acclaimed military histories of the Revolutionary War ever written, John Buchanan explored the first half of the critical Southern Campaign and introduced readers to its brilliant architect, Major General Nathanael Greene. In this long-awaited sequel, Buchanan brings this story to its dramatic conclusion. Greene’s Southern Campaign was the most difficult of the war. With a supply line stretching hundreds of miles northward, it revealed much about the crucial military art of provision and transport. Insufficient manpower a constant problem, Greene attempted to incorporate black regiments into his army, a plan angrily rejected by the South Carolina legislature. A bloody civil war between Rebels and Tories was wreaking havoc on the South at the time, forcing Greene to address vigilante terror and restore civilian government. As his correspondence with Thomas Jefferson during the campaign shows, Greene was also bedeviled by the conflict between war and the rights of the people, and the question of how to set constraints under which a free society wages war. Joining Greene is an unforgettable cast of characters—men of strong and, at times, antagonistic personalities—all of whom are vividly portrayed. We also follow the fate of Greene’s tenacious foe, Lieutenant Colonel Francis, Lord Rawdon. By the time the British evacuate Charleston—and Greene and his ragged, malaria-stricken, faithful Continental Army enter the city in triumph—the reader has witnessed in telling detail one of the most punishing campaigns of the Revolution, culminating in one of its greatest victories.

In Down the Wild Cape Fear, novelist and nonfiction writer Philip Gerard invites readers onto the fabled waters of the Cape Fear River and guides them on the 200-mile voyage from the confluence of the Deep and Haw Rivers at Mermaid Point all the way to the Cape of Fear on Bald Head Island. Accompanying the author by canoe and powerboat are a cadre of people passionate about the river, among them a river guide, a photographer, a biologist, a river keeper, and a boat captain. Historical voices also lend their wisdom to our understanding of this river, which has been a main artery of commerce, culture, settlement, and war for the entire region since it was first discovered by Verrazzano in 1524. Gerard explores the myriad environmental and political issues being played out along the waters of the Cape Fear. These include commerce and environmental stewardship, wilderness and development, suburban sprawl and the decline and renaissance of inner cities, and private rights versus the public good.

Freedom of speech was restricted during the Revolutionary War. In the great struggle for independence, those who remained loyal to the British crown were persecuted with loss of employment, eviction from their homes, heavy taxation, confiscation of property and imprisonment. Loyalist Americans from all walks of life were branded as traitors and enemies of the people. By the end of the war, 80,000 had fled their homeland to face a dismal exile from which few would return, outcasts of a new republic based on democratic values of liberty, equality and justice.

The contrarian historian and analyst upends the conventional reading of the American Revolution In 1775, iconoclastic historian and bestselling author Kevin Phillips punctures the myth that 1776 was the watershed year of the American Revolution. He suggests that the great events and confrontations of 1775—Congress’s belligerent economic ultimatums to Britain, New England’s rage militaire, the exodus of British troops and expulsion of royal governors up and down the seaboard, and the new provincial congresses and hundreds of local committees that quickly reconstituted local authority in Patriot hands­—achieved a sweeping Patriot control of territory and local government that Britain was never able to overcome. These each added to the Revolution’s essential momentum so when the British finally attacked in great strength the following year, they could not regain the control they had lost in 1775. Analyzing the political climate, economic structures, and military preparations, as well as the roles of ethnicity, religion, and class, Phillips tackles the eighteenth century with the same skill and insights he has shown in analyzing contemporary politics and economics. The result is a dramatic narrative brimming with original insights. 1775 revolutionizes our understanding of America’s origins.