For the last few weeks I have been reading 1776 by David McCullough. Back when I started travelling in May I needed a book to read. My wife suggested this one, and we already had it so I took it. I will admit that for the first 50 pages or so I was rather bored. There was a lot of information to process. And the author starts tossing around names and introducing people so fast that I was starting to lose track. It was only until his description of George Washington and the battle in Boston that I really got pulled in.
It goes to show how little I knew about the revolution. High school history doesn’t do it justice. July 4th, Independence Day, is celebrated now with much fanfare, but back in 1776, July 4th, and the signing of the declaration was actually the start of a downhill slide for America. One that almost became impossible to pull out of except for the resolve of one man, and a quick turning point during Christmas of 1776. In regards to George Washington, the author sums him up pretty well:
“He was not a brilliant strategist or tactician, not a gifted orator, not an intellectual. At several crucial moments he had shown marked indecisiveness. He had made serious mistakes in judgement. But experience had been his great teacher from boyhood, and in this his greatest test, he learned steadily from experience. Above all, Washington never forgot what was at stake and he never gave up.” - 1776, p. 293
I would highly recommend the book. It made me want to go back to Virginia and tour the historical sites there again. Then I would head north through Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, seeing everything along the way.
Train In Vain
