The Road To Yorktown Jefferson Lafayette And The British Invasion Of Virginia

In 1781, Virginia was invaded by formidable British forces that sought to subdue the Old Dominion. Lieutenant General Charles, Lord Cornwallis, led thousands of enemy troops from Norfolk to Charlottesville, burning and pillaging. Many of Virginia's famed Patriots--including George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry and Nathanael Greene'struggled to defend the commonwealth. Only by concentrating a small band of troops under energetic French general the Marquis de Lafayette were American forces able to resist British operations. With strained support from Governor Jefferson's administration, Lafayette fought a campaign against the veteran soldiers of Lord Cornwallis that eventually led to the famed showdown at Yorktown. Historian John R. Maass traces this often overlooked Revolutionary struggle for Virginia and details each step on the road to Yorktown.

Few prominent Americans are as associated with a place as Thomas Jefferson is with Virginia. The heart of "Jefferson Country" is his house and plantation at Monticello, but Jefferson traveled the breadth of his home state, from his time at William & Mary in Williamsburg to the new state capital at Richmond and his retreat and plantation at Poplar Forest, near Lynchburg. In the beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains, Jefferson was inspired to write his only book, Notes on the State of Virginia. Laura A. Macaluso demonstrates the many facets of the man, the scholar and the statesman in this guide to the Virginia he loved.

In a narrative both panoramic and intimate, Tom Chaffin captures the four-decade friendship of Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette. Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette shared a singularly extraordinary friendship, one involved in the making of two revolutions—and two nations. Jefferson first met Lafayette in 1781, when the young French-born general was dispatched to Virginia to assist Jefferson, then the state’s governor, in fighting off the British. The charismatic Lafayette, hungry for glory, could not have seemed more different from Jefferson, the reserved statesman. But when Jefferson, a newly-appointed diplomat, moved to Paris three years later, speaking little French and in need of a partner, their friendship began in earnest. As Lafayette opened doors in Paris and Versailles for Jefferson, so too did the Virginian stand by Lafayette as the Frenchman became inexorably drawn into the maelstrom of his country's revolution. Jefferson counseled Lafayette as he drafted The Declaration of the Rights of Man and remained a firm supporter of the French Revolution, even after he returned to America in 1789. By 1792, however, the upheaval had rendered Lafayette a man without a country, locked away in a succession of Austrian and Prussian prisons. The burden fell on Jefferson, along with Lafayette's other friends, to win his release. The two would not see each other again until 1824, in a powerful and emotional reunion at Jefferson’s Monticello. Steeped in primary sources, Revolutionary Brothers casts fresh light on this remarkable, often complicated, friendship of two extraordinary men.

A dramatic, gripping history of the Siege of Yorktown, the last major battle of the American Revolution, told through vastly different perspectives In October 1781, American, French, and British forces converged on a small village named Yorktown—a place that the British would try to forget and Americans would forever remember. In his riveting, balanced, and thoroughly researched account of the Revolutionary War’s last pivotal conflict, author–historian Tim Grove follows the true stories of American, French, and British players, whose lives intersected at Yorktown. Through very different viewpoints—from General George Washington to the notorious traitor Benedict Arnold, from young French hero Lafayette to British General Lord Cornwallis, and an enslaved man named James who became a spy, The World Turned Upside Down tells the story of bold decisions made by famous military leaders, as well as the everyday courage shown by civilians. For every side involved, the world forever turned upside down at Yorktown. Profusely illustrated with archival images, broadsides, and letters, the book includes a timeline, endnotes, bibliography and index.

George Washington was first and foremost a Virginian. Born in the state's Tidewater region, he was reared near Fredericksburg and took up residence at Mount Vernon along the Potomac River. As a young surveyor, he worked in Virginia's backcountry. He began his military career as a Virginia militia officer on the colony's frontier. The majority of his widespread landholdings were in his native state, and his entrepreneurial endeavors ranged from the swamplands of the Southeast to the upper Potomac River Valley. Historian John Maass explores the numerous sites all over the Commonwealth associated with Washington and demonstrates their lasting importance.

Around the North Carolina village of Guilford Courthouse in the late winter of 1781, two weary armies clashed on a cold, wet afternoon. American forces under Nathanael Greene engaged Lord Cornwallis's British army in a bitter two-hour battle of the Revolutionary War. The frightful contest at Guilford was a severe conflict in which troops made repeated use of their flintlock muskets, steel bayonets and dragoon swords in hand-to-hand fighting that killed and wounded about eight hundred men. Historian John R. Maass recounts the bloody battle and the grueling campaign in the South that led up to it, a crucial event on the road to American independence.

A Nation is Born Lexington, Bunker Hill, Saratoga, Washington, Hamilton, Benedict Arnold. All familiar names, but how did they all fit together? How did merchants, lawyers, farmers, and cobblers come together to defeat the British Empire, its powerful navy, and its Hessian auxiliaries? For that matter, who were the Hessians, and what is an auxiliary? Bringing together ten eminent Revolutionary War experts, editor Ed Lengel presents their stirring narratives of the military campaigns that changed history and gave birth to a new nation. These historians guide you through the fateful decade of the 1770s in British America. In 1776, you battle in Brooklyn Heights, then cross the Delaware with Washington. In the late summer and fall of ’77, you bushwhack down the Champlain Valley with Johnny Burgoyne. You struggle through winter with Washington and his beleaguered troops in Valley Forge. When the spring of ’78 turns to summer, you endure the oppressive heat and the massive battle on New Jersey farmland at Monmouth Courthouse. In 1780 your journey takes you south into a bloody civil war—Tory versus patriot, neighbor versus neighbor in Georgia and the Carolinas. Finally, in ’81, you join the patriots as they maneuver north into Virginia, whereWashington and the French navy can trap the British on the Yorktown Peninsula. Complete with maps and suggested further reading, The 10 Key Campaigns of the American Revolution is a short course in one of history’s most consequential wars, explaining how citizens became soldiers and how their dedication, determination, and force of will defeated the world’s greatest power and launched a nation like no other.