NORTHCOM Battle Knowledge Centers

Every year more than 5 million people visit America's battlefields. Here in maps, text, and illustrations is all of the history, lore, heroism, and tragedy of those sites. Organized chronologically by conflict and the battles within each, American Battlefields is illustrated with two-color maps re-created from actual battle plans and archives as well as many photographs and period drawings. Each entry includes descriptions of the battle's underlying causes and strategic objectives, its notable commanders and pivotal turning points, and its historical importance. Full coverage of every battle in each region of the country, appendices that include a state-by-state guide to the battlefields, and lists of commanders and troop strengths make American Battlefields both a reference standard and a perfect travel book.

Throughout history, individual battles have inspired the birth of nations, the devastation of cultures and the triumph of revolutions. Yet while some battles rise up as the cornerstones of history, others fade in our cultural memory, forgotten as minor skirmishes. Why is this so? What makes a battle "important"? Celebrated veteran and military expert Michael Lee Lanning offers a provocative response with The Battle 100: The Stories Behind History's Most Influential Battles. Lanning ranks history's 100 greatest battles according to their influence, both immediate and long-term. Thought-provoking and controversial, Lanning's rankings take us to the heart of the battles and reveal their true greatness.

The British assault on Breed's Hill and the burning of Charlestown were the first major battles of the American Revolution; after the events at Boston there was no turning back. This detailed text by Brendan Morrissey explores the opposing commanders and forces involved, whilst describing how the sparks at Lexington and Concord ignited the smouldering resentment of the Colonists into the flame of a rebellion. Colonist militia were pitted against British Redcoats in a series of struggleswhich led the British to evacuate Boston and to George Washington taking command of the fledgling American army.

From the bestselling author of the Liberation Trilogy comes the extraordinary first volume of his new trilogy about the American Revolution, Atkinson has long been admired for his deeply researched, stunningly vivid narrative histories. Now, he turns his attention to a new war and, in the initial volume of the Revolution Trilogy, he recounts the first twenty-one months of America's violent war for independence.

Using firsthand accounts--journals, letters from British officers in the field, reports from colonial governors in the colonies--Michael Pearson has provided a contemporary report of the Revolution as the British witnessed it. Seen from this perspective, some of the major events of the war are given startling interpretations: For example, the British considered their defeat at Bunker Hill nothing more than a minor setback, especially in light of their capture of New York and Philadelphia. Only at the very end of the conflict did they realize that the Yankees had lost the battles but won the war. From the Boston Tea Party to that day in 1785 when the first U.S. ambassador presented his credentials to a grudging George III, here is the full account of "those damned rebels" who somehow managed to found a new nation.

Besides reexamining in fresh perspective such well-known figures as Paul Revere, Nathan Hale, Benedict Arnold, and John André, the author, a former general staff intelligence officer in World War II, reveals the exploits and tribulations of scores of other spies: Ann Bates, the Tory agent who spied at Washington's headquarters and who, when fleeing for her life, paused to count American artillery; the high-ranking traitor Dr. Benjamin Church, the Continental Army's Director General of Hospitals, caught as a result of a careless mistress; Sergeant Major John Champe, who posed as a deserter from the rebel army in order to capture Benedict Arnold; and many others. From the plot to kidnap George Washington to the fall of Yorktown, here are the clandestine activities of the spies, counterspies, and double agents who risked life and honor in a silent, anonymous shadow war.

In this gripping chronicle of America's struggle for independence, award-winning historian John Ferling transports readers to the grim realities of war, capturing an eight-year conflict filled with heroism, suffering, cowardice, betrayal, and fierce dedication.

A tactical history of America's various military involvements. Chapters address: issues and events; political objectives; military objectives and strategies; political considerations; military technology and techniques; and military conduct. This second edition is revised and updated.