Europe’s crucial contribution to the achievement of American independence.American independence would not have been achieved without diplomatic, financial, and military support from Europe. And without recognition from powerful European nations, the young country would never have assumed an independent status "amongst the powers of the earth." This collection of essays not only offers new glimpses into the ways in which various European powers and actors enabled American patriots t...

Showcasing French participation in the Seven Years' War and the American Revolution, this book shows the French army at the heart of revolutionary, social, and cultural change. Osman argues that efforts to transform the French army into a citizen army before 1789 prompted and helped shape the French Revolution.

PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A “richly imagined biography” (The New York Times Book Review) of General Alex Dumas, who rose from slavery to command vast armies in the French Revolutionary Wars—and whose exploits were immortalized in his son’s novels The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers“Fascinating [and] entertaining.”—The Wall Street Journal“Remarkable....

This sophisticated and masterful political biography of Napoleon Bonaparte, written by a respected French history scholar who has taught courses on Napoleon at the University of Paris, brings new and remarkable analysis to the study of French history, the French Revolution, and modern history’s most famous general and statesman.Since boyhood, Steven Englund has been fascinated by the unique force, personality, and political significance of Napoleon Bonaparte, who, ...

For some historians and biographers, Maximilien Robespierre (1758–94) was a great revolutionary martyr who succeeded in leading the French Republic to safety in the face of overwhelming military odds. For many others, he was the first modern dictator, a fanatic who instigated the murderous Reign of Terror in 1793–94. This masterful biography combines new research into Robespierre's dramatic life with a deep understanding of society and the politics of the French Revolution to arrive at a f...

A strinking account of the impact of the French Revolution in Paris, across the French countryside, and around the globeThe French Revolution has fascinated, perplexed, and inspired for more than two centuries. It was a seismic event that radically transformed France and launched shock waves across the world. In this provocative new history, Peter McPhee draws on a lifetime's study of eighteenth-century France and Europe to create an entirely fresh account of the w...

Late in 1755, an army of British regulars and Massachusetts volunteers completed one of the cruelest, most successful military campaigns in North American history, capturing and deporting seven thousand French-speaking Catholic Acadians from the province of Nova Scotia, and chasing an equal number into the wilderness of eastern Canada. Thousands of Acadians endured three decades of forced migrations and failed settlements that shuttled them to the coasts of South America, the plantations o...

The first volume of a groundbreaking and innovative popular biography of Napoleon Bonaparte, one of history's most complex and charismatic leaders**'**Remarkable ... a satisfying, psychologically convincing account of Napoleon's early years and ascent to power. Even-handed and authoritative, this fascinating and highly enjoyable book will be an eye opener even to those who think they know the subject well' Sunday Times**'**...

"A mesmerizing account that illuminates not just the Napoleonic wars but all of modern history . . . It reads like a novel" (Lynn Hunt, Eugen Weber Professor of modern European history, UCLA).The twentieth century is usually seen as "the century of total war." But as the historian David A. Bell argues in this landmark work, the phenomenon actually began much earlier, in the era of muskets, cannons, and sailing ships—in the age of Napoleon.In a sweeping, evo...

'Napoleon's legend is so persistent that it confounds the historical reality in the popular imagination. He himself contributed much towards the construction of his own myth, from his youth even until after he fell from power, when, while in exile, he dictated his memoirs to a group of disciples who took down his every word in the hope that his version of history would prevail. Such were Napoleon's skills as a chronicler that much of the legend is still unquestioningly accepted...'

From a pre-eminent Yale historian comes the first popular history of the 1871 Paris Commune, a seminal episode in modern European history.The Paris Commune lasted for only 64 days in 1871, but during that short time it gave rise to some of the grandest political dreams of the nineteenth century -- before culminating in horrific violence.Following the disastrous French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, hungry and politically disenchanted Parisians took up a...

The British victory on the Plains of Abraham in September 1759 and the subsequent Conquest of Canada were undoubtedly significant geopolitical events, but their nature and implications continue to be debated. Revisiting 1759 provides a fresh historical reappraisal of the Conquest and its aftermath using new approaches drawn from military, imperial, social, and Aboriginal history.This cohesive collection investigates many of the most hotly contested questions surrounding th...