Bedford Public Library

Valiant ambition, George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the fate of the American Revolution, Nathaniel Philbrick

eng

Includes bibliographical references (pages 375-403) and index

collective biography

platesmapsillustrations

index present

non fiction

Valiant ambition

bibliography

Nathaniel Philbrick

George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the fate of the American Revolution

An "account of the complicated middle years of the American Revolution that shares lesser-known insights into the tragic relationship between George Washington and Benedict Arnold."--NoveListIn September 1776, the vulnerable Continental Army under an unsure George Washington (who had never commanded a large force in battle) evacuates New York after a devastating defeat by the British Army. Three weeks later, near the Canadian border, one of his favorite generals, Benedict Arnold, miraculously succeeds in postponing the British naval advance down Lake Champlain that might have ended the war. Four years later, as the book ends, Washington has vanquished his demons and Arnold has fled to the enemy after a foiled attempt to surrender the American fortress at West Point to the British. After four years of war, America is forced to realize that the real threat to its liberties might not come from without but from within. Valiant Ambition is a complex, controversial, and dramatic portrait of a people in crisis and the war that gave birth to a nation. The focus is on loyalty and personal integrity, evoking a Shakespearean tragedy that unfolds in the key relationship of Washington and Arnold, who is an impulsive but sympathetic hero whose misfortunes at the hands of self-serving politicians fatally destroy his faith in the legitimacy of the rebellion. As a country wary of tyrants suddenly must figure out how it should be led, Washington?s unmatched ability to rise above the petty politics of his time enables him to win the war that really matters

Preface: The fault line -- Part I: The wilderness of untried things -- Chapter One: Demons of fear and disorder -- Chapter Two: The mosquito effect -- Chapter Three: A cabinet of fortitude -- Chapter Four: The year of the hangman -- Chapter Five: The dark eagle -- Chapter Six: Saratoga -- Part II: Secret motives and designs -- Chapter Seven: The bite of a rattlesnake -- Chapter Eight: The knight of the burning mountain -- Chapter Nine: Unmerciful fangs -- Chapter Ten: The chasm -- Chapter Eleven: The pangs of a dying man -- Chapter Twelve: The crash -- Chapter Thirteen: No time for remorse -- Epilogue: A nation of traitors