Red Coats and Rebels

Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution through British Eyes

Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution through British Eyes is a book on the history of the American Revolution which is written in a unique way. Like the United States, Great Britain has lost only one major war in the last three centuries which makes us look more in depth about it. In this book, the author Christopher Hibbert stays away from the traditional method of favouring the Americans when telling the story of their Revolution. Instead, he talks about the subject with the perspective of the British but in doing so; he does not talk about the events in favour of the British to the point that the reader does not recognize the basic story. While there is nothing radically new in this book, Hibbert succeeds in providing a great insight into the decision making processes and senior leadership on both sides and he points to three reasons for the British defeat: poor leadership, the difficulty of the terrain and the tenacity of the American rebels. I believe that Christopher Hibbert was trying say to the audience through this novel that the American Revolution was more than what most of us have heard or been taught. If this was his goal then he did an amazing job.

The book Redcoats and Rebels avoids treating the British army as being displaying a lack of judgement sense and manned with nothing but mercenaries. He shows that the British army did have several competent officers leading it. His accounting of generals like Carleton and Clinton and their defense of Canada shows that the British officers did have a professional background and were well respected in their day and time. Also he shows that although the British won battle after battle, their leaders seemed to lack the instinct to finish off the Americans when they had the upper hand. The fact that Howe could sit in Philadelphia and not attack Washington's tattered army only 20 miles away at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777-1778 seems almost miraculous. One British officer at the time Captain Mackenzie said that, "Our generals and admirals don't seem to be in earnest about this business. They seemed, indeed, to be more concerned with entertaining the King’s sixteen-year-old son, Prince William Henry, who had been sent out as a midshipman with Admiral Digby in the hope that his presence in New York would raise the morale of the Loyalists."(326). Although Hibbert only touches on the subject of British motivation, it seems evident that most of the senior British leaders had serious doubts about the war and that a certain fatalism crept into their decisions, but his criticisms of British generals, who often seem more concerned with fabulous dinners and women, is not always fair since Howe and Burgoyne both demonstrated a huge amount tactical strength.

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The second factor that determined the defeat of the British, according to Hibbert, was the rugged and expansive nature of the American terrain, which always provided the rebels with places to escape British offensives. There is no doubt that the British army in America was too small for the task; Hibbert notes that the British estimated that they needed 50-75,000 troops to subdue the rebels but never had more than 35,000 troops available at any one time. As the Americans found that the British could control any terrain they occupied but their forces were just too small to fight war on such a huge scale. Previous campaigns against rebels in Ireland, Scotland and England had not had to contend with such major terrain obstacles or distances. Hibbert also credits the tenacity of the Americans particularly George Washington and Greene with protracting the war until British gradually decreased in size, amount and strength.

A major area that Hibbert only skims around is the issue of strategic objectives in America. Did Britain really have a chance to achieve a military victory and if so, what strategy offered the best chances? Hibbert shows the audience that the American generals were not really as good as they were lucky at times. He does however hint at the British strategic complications when he notes Cornwallis' efforts to raise loyalist troops in the south. With limited troops, Cornwallis could either protect the loyalist areas in a defensive strategy or pursue the rebel army in an offensive strategy. Without sufficient loyalist troops, the British effort in America was probably doomed, but a strategic defense that protected loyalist areas would inevitably yield the initiative to the revels. British commanders were split on the horns of these complications; Howe and Clinton were more or less content to hold the loyalist base in New York, whereas the more aggressive Burgoyne and Cornwallis made efforts to catch and destroy the rebel armies. The author also exposes the essentially one-dimensional approach of British strategy in containing the rebellion; the British relied too heavily on their own professional military and under-utilized the enormous political and economic tools at their disposal.

Finally, the question of war mobilization is also addressed in part by Hibbert. Fundamentally, Britain never committed the army and navy resources to achieve a decisive military victory in America, but that does not mean that these resources were lacking. Hibbert notes an interesting point about the King's decision in raising new army formations: enlisted manpower was cheap and readily available but the officers could draw half pay for ten years after their units were demobilized. Instead, the King relied on hiring large numbers of Hessian mercenaries in order to avoid the overhead costs associated with the enlargement of the British Army. Although the British only had to fight the Americans for the first three years of the war, the large army and navy forces were retained in Great Britain in order to prevent the occurrence of a French and Spanish invasion, but this was a failure. Essentially, Britain made a choice from a range of possibilities to fight the war the cheap way but was forced into a gradual military escalation that kept the war going but could not win it.

A reader coming to this book with only a limited knowledge about the American Revolution history will walk away with a new judgement of how difficult a war it was for both sides. Readers will understand how Britain was not united on how to conduct the war or even that it was the right thing to do. Hibbert shows how close George Washington came to losing the war and how the British commanders were in fighting it. This is a compelling story told from a fresh point of view. Hibbert raises the bar with his easy prose and compact storytelling. One of the biggest points of Redcoats and Rebels is that, despite knowing the outcome, I often caught myself rooting for British and wondering if they were going to overcome the rebels.

WORD COUNT – 1138