A fully revised and updated third edition of the most established and innovative historical analysis of the Continental Army and its role in the formation of the new republic.* Written by two experts in the field of early U.S. history* Includes fully updated coverage of the military, political, social, and cultural history of the Revolution* Features maps, illustrations, a Note on Revolutionary War History and Historiography, and a fully revamped Bibliographical Essay* Fully established as an essential resource for courses ranging from A.P. U.S. history to graduate seminars on the American Revolution

List of illustrations ixPreface x1 Of Lexington and Concord, and the Myths of the War, 1763-1775 1Lexington and Concord 1Of Standing Armies (Power) and Militia (Liberty) 5Ideological Transmission 9The Provincial Militia Tradition 14The Tyranny of Standing Armies 19Notes 272 The Republican War, 1775-1776 29A Republican Order as the Goal 29Regulars Versus Republicans: The British at Bay 33The Adoption of a Continental Army 39The British Military Counterthrust 47The New York Campaign 52Success and Failure 61Notes 643 Toward an American Standing Army, 1776-1777 66The Nature of the Continental Army 66A New Model Rebel Army 70William Howe's Campaign of 1777 78The Saratoga Campaign 83The American Search for Manpower 87The Old Myth and the New Soldiery 97Notes 994 On and Off the Road of Despair, 1777-1779 102Valley Forge 102Mounting Anger in the Officer Corps 106Tables Turned: New Life for the Cause 113The British Dispersal of 1778 120Growing Internal Division: Army and Society 127Notes 1365 Moral Defeat and Military Turnabout, 1779-1781 139Dispersed Warfare 139Patriot Naval Exploits 146Financial Morass on the Home Front 151The War in the Southern States 157Treason, Pensions, and Mutinies 164Sudden Turnabout: The Road to Yorktown 171Notes 1766 Of War, National Legitimacy, and the Republican Order, 1781-1789 179The Yorktown Campaign 179Formulating a Peace Settlement 187The Newburgh Conspiracy 194Transition to a Postwar World 202Myth and Tradition: A Political/Military Settlement 210Notes 217A Note on Revolutionary War History and Historiography 219Index 232