Benjamin Huggins is an associate professor and editor at the Papers of George Washington project at the University of Virginia. He is the editor of three volumes of The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series. He received his Ph. D. in history from George Mason University in January 2009. In addition to his articles for the Journal of the American Revolution, he has written a chapter in A Companion to George Washington, Edward Lengel, ed. (Wiley-Blackwell, May 2012) on Washington as commander in chief in the first years of the French alliance. He is also the author of Willie Mangum and the North Carolina Whigs in the Age of Jackson (McFarland, 2016).
The months leading up to the Battle of Yorktown in October 1781 are often glossed over in histories of the Revolutionary War. But they should not be. They were crucial months of preparation for the campaign to come. The events of late June to mid-August 1781 tell the important story leading up to the most […]
First and Always: A New Portrait of George Washington by Peter R. Henriques (University of Virginia Press, 2020). With so many books already written about the Founding Fathers, some believe there is nothing new to be learned about those men. George Mason professor emeritus and George Washington scholar Peter Henriques shows us in First and […]
George Washington Dealmaker-In-Chief: The Story of How the Father of Our Country Unleashed the Entrepreneurial Spirit in America by Cyrus A. Ansary (Lambert Publications, LLC, 2019) Few writers on George Washington have examined his economic vision for the new American nation. Cyrus A. Ansary sets out to do just that. He argues that Washington, as […]
Book review: Young Washington: How Wilderness and War Forged America’s Founding Father by Peter Stark (HarperCollins, 2018). BUY THIS BOOK FROM AMAZON Peter Stark’s account of George Washington during the French and Indian War from 1753 to 1758 offers an entertaining portrait of Washington during those early years of his military career, but he gives […]
An important facet of Washington’s generalship has gone largely unexplored by historians: his role as a diplomat. For a top-level military leader in a coalition, maintaining good relations with allies is of the first importance. With the signing of the military alliance with France in 1778, Washington had to add this role to his generalship. […]
In June 1780, Gen. George Washington told a lie. In fact, he planned a major deception. But as it was intended to deceive the British high command during the midst of the Revolutionary War, most Americans would likely forgive him. General Washington, with the aid of Major General Lafayette, wanted the British to believe that […]
Book Review: For Fear of an Elective King: George Washington and the Presidential Title Controversy of 1789 by Kathleen Bartoloni-Tuazon (Cornell University Press, 2014) The debate that erupted in the Congress in the spring of 1789 as to whether the delegates should address the president as “His Majesty the President” or “His Highness the President […]
On November 6, 1779, Virginia major Henry Lee, commander of the Continental Army’s 2nd Partisan Corps, addressed a letter to British lieutenant colonel John Graves Simcoe, who eleven days before he had been trying to defeat in battle. “I am happy to hear by your polite reply to an offer dictated by the feelings of […]
“This is a most unfortunate affair and has given me great Mortification as we have lost not only two thousand Men that were there, but a good deal of Artillery, & some of the best Arms we had.” So wrote General George Washington to his brother John Augustine Washington in November 1776.[1] The fall of […]
In early February 1780, General George Washington’s main army was encamped at Jockey Hollow, New Jersey. But the general maintained his headquarters about three miles away in Morristown, at the house of the widow Theodosia Ford. That separation enticed the British high command into undertaking an operation that, if successful, would cripple the Continental Army […]
