Historical View of the American Revolution - Hardcover

Greene, George Washington

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0804606544 ISBN 13: 9780804606547

Publisher: Kennikat Press, 1970

Synopsis

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1865. Excerpt: ... LECTURE VIII. CAMPAIGNS OF THE REVOLUTION. "riHE success of a war," says one of the great-L est masters of the art, "depends in a great measure upon the ability of the general, upon his knowledge of the country, and the skill with which he takes advantage of the ground, both by preventing the enemy from taking favorable positions, and by choosing for himself those which are best suited to his designs." "The talent of a general," says Jomini, "consists in two things very different in themselves: to know how to judge and combine operations; and to know how to carry them out." And thus the history of a war becomes, to a certain extent, an individual history,--the history of the genius and success, or of the errors and failures, of successful and unsuccessful generals. In the second Punic war Hannibal fills more than half the canvas. In the Seven Years' War we pass hastily over every other name to concentrate our attention upon Frederic. And in the long European wars from 1796 to 1815,--from the battle of Montenotte to the battle of Waterloo,--we instinctively refer every great event to the genius and the ambition of Napoleon. The war of our Revolution forms no exception to this tendency of the human mind to make individuals the representatives of ideas and events. As the page of our history fills up, names that were once familiar are cast into the shade; and acts in which the concurrence of many hands and many minds was required, gradually become associated with the master minds which inspired and directed them all. Washington is the first name that occurs to us in connection with our military history, as it is the first in our civil history; and wherever our history comes in as a chapter in that of the world, it will, for the period to which it belongs, be ...

Edition details

• Publisher: Kennikat Press
• Publication date: 1970
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804606544
• ISBN 13: 9780804606547
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 469