Strange and Obscure Stories of the Re..., Tim Rowland
Strange and Obscure Stories of the Re..., Tim Rowland
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Strange and Obscure Stories of the Revolutionary War

Author: Tim Rowland

Narrator: David Colacci

Unabridged: 4 hr 57 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 11/30/2021

Categories: Nonfiction, History


Synopsis

We all know about Washington's crossing of the Delaware and Betsy Ross's stitching together the Stars and Stripes, but how about a little-known, valid reason for the war itself and why General George was able to survive a plague that wiped out many of his fellow countrymen?

History buff Tim Rowland provides an entertaining look at happenings during and surrounding the Revolutionary War that you won't find in history books. He digs into the war's major events and reveals the unknown, bizarre, and often wildly amusing things the participants were doing while breaking away from Great Britain.

For example, conventional wisdom says that "no taxation without representation" was an important reason for the revolution, but not in the way we've been told. Strange but true, the spark that touched off the revolution was in fact a tax cut.

During the French and Indian War and then again in the first year of the revolution, the British were accused of biological warfare. So feared was the disease that soldiers began to illegally inoculate themselves. Washington himself was immune, thanks to a Caribbean trip taken as a young man when his brother Lawrence sought a cure for tuberculosis.

About Tim Rowland

Tim Rowland has authored a number of books, including histories of the Adirondacks and Western Maryland mountains, and the Strange and Obscure series, collections of historical essays focusing on lesser-known aspects of American history. An avid outdoorsman, Rowland has climbed in the Himalayas, hiked the Inca Trail, trekked throughout Europe, and ridden a bicycle across the United States. He has climbed all forty-six Adirondack High Peaks over 4,000 feet. He and his wife Beth live in Jay, New York.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Kathryn on January 25, 2018

This book is a humorous look at some of the personalities and events of the American Revolutionary War. As such, I very much enjoyed my reading of this book, and would recommend it cheerfully. In more or less chronological order, there are chapters about Benedict Arnold (who probably would not have t......more

Goodreads review by Marilyn on November 07, 2019

With a title like that, I anticipated a compilation of short, interesting anecdotes. That's not what I got. The first several chapters were interesting enough -- the effect of smallpox on the American forces, the good that was done by Benedict Arnold vs. the not-so-heroic actions of Ethan Allen, the......more

Goodreads review by Jeri on January 22, 2017

Humorous stories about Revolutionary War events I can't tell you that all of the stories are true, but the more I have read about our War for Independence, the more some of these tales keep turning up. General Howe was probably a womanizer, Charles Lee was probably a snotty little backstabber, and Be......more

Goodreads review by Michael on May 07, 2017

Meh. Entertaining. Informative...if you can trust its accuracy. Within the first few pages, dates were already wrong. At least three other incorrect dates by the end of the book...not to mention myriad errors of grammar and word usage...all of which basic editing should have caught.......more

Goodreads review by Sandra on October 15, 2022

Enlightening stories about the Revolutionary War The official history of America's war for independence seems to have been whitewashed for political and socially acceptable reasons. These wells documented inside stories made me winder how the revolutionary colonists ever pulled it off. Entertaining,......more