War Without Mercy: Liberty or Death in the American Revolution

"Robust and focused" - The Wall Street Journal"History at its insightful and mesmerizing best" - Nathaniel Philbrick Drawing on vivid contemporary accounts, this is a fascinating exploration of how and why the Revolutionary War descended into a brutal existential struggle.This engrossing history conclusively shows that those caught up in it believed they had nothing to lose by fighting without regard for the rules of so-called "civilized warfare." The call to arms "Liberty or Death" was far more than just rhetoric. At its grimmest level, it was a conflict in which military restraint was more the exception than the rule, a struggle in which combatants believed their very existence was in question. This led to an acceptance of violence against persons and property as preferable to a defeat equated with political, cultural, and even physical extinction. It was war with an acceptance of ferocity and brutality - anything to avoid defeat.A number of historians have previously concluded that