About this item
The forgotten story of how the U.S. Army was created to fight a crucial Indian warWhen the Revolutionary War ended in 1783, the newly independent United States savored its victory and hoped for a great future. And yet the republic soon found itself losing an escalating military conflict on its borderlands. In 1791, years of skirmishes, raids, and quagmire climaxed in the grisly defeat of American militiamen by a brilliantly organized confederation of Shawnee, Miami, and Delaware Indians. With nearly one thousand U.S. casualties, this was the worst defeat the nation would ever suffer at native hands. Americans were shocked, perhaps none more so than their commander in chief, George Washington, who saw in the debacle an urgent lesson: the United States needed an army.
About the Author
William Hogeland's forthcoming book is "Autumn of the Black Snake," to be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux on May 17 , 2017.
Born in Virginia and raised in Brooklyn, New York, William Hogeland is the author of four books on founding U.S. history, "Autumn of the Black Snake" (FSG) "The Whiskey Rebellion" (Simon and Schuster) , "Declaration" (S&S) , and "Founding Finance" (University of Texas Press) , as well as a collection of essays, "Inventing American History" (Boston Review Books/MIT Press) . Hogeland's work in history represents an unusual blend of dramatic narrative and critical interpretation. He has also written about history, music, and politics for "The Atlantic Monthly," "AlterNet," "Salon," "The New York Times," "Boston Review," and "The Huffington Post." His essay "American Dreamers" appears in Da Capo's "Best Music Writing 2009," edited by Greil Marcus. Hogeland also contributed the chapter on insurrections to "A Blackwell Companion to American Military History."
Hogeland's blog is at http://www.williamhogeland.com. He has an online self-publishing venture at http://www.hogelandpublishing.com. He posts at http://twitter/WilliamHogeland, and his Facebook author page is http://www.facebook.com/pages/William-Hogeland/108281879206433.
