An extraordinarily difficult book to define and appraise. I found
it absorbingly interesting reading - not always easy reading - but
always rewarding, rewarding in that, for me at least, it gave
greater reality to the figure of George Washington than any other
book I have ever read. It is fiction only in that the author has
recreated, in his own terms, the man, the man around him, and the
incredible story of the New York campaign, beginning with the
tragic defeat of Brooklyn Heights, the miraculous escape, the
continuous retreat, - New York, Westchester, the fall of Fort
Washington, retreat again to New Jersey, through hostile country, -
Princeton, New Brunswick, Trenton: - defeat, escape, rout,
desertion, famine, cold, betrayal by friend and foe. And finally,
when victory seemed most hopeless, the recrossing of the Delaware
on Christmas night, a "poor, shivering rabble" the sound of whose
feet resound down the years. The thing that dominates the book is
the figure of Washington, growing in stature with defeat, beloved
of his few intimates, but always alone, simple, selfless,
idealistic, rising above his weaknesses to magnificence,
unwittingly. There is tragedy in the picture, but there is
conviction. And there is - for today, comfort in the thought that
our wars, from the start, began with defeat. Howard Fast handles
history as one who is so wholly steeped in the facts that the story
and the characters emerge fully developed, he recounts history with
the fire of fiction. (Kirkus Reviews)
Originally published in 1942, The Unvanquished is the story of the
Continental Army and George Washington in the desperate early
months when the American Revolution faced defeat and
disintegration. The book begins with the retreat across Manhattan's
East River that saved the Continental Army after the Battle of Long
Island. It ends with Washington's recrossing of the Delaware in the
daring 1776 Christmas Eve raid on the Hessian camp at Trenton.
General
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