Respectable Army

James Kirby Martin is Hugh Roy and Lillie Cranz Cullen University Professor of History at the University of Houston. He has written seven books, including Ordinary Courage: The Revolutionary War Adventure of Joseph Plumb Martin (4th edition, 2012) and Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary Hero: An American Warrior Reconsidered (2000). In addition to his scholarly work, Martin has advised and appeared on television programs airing on the History Channel and has recently begun a successful foray into feature film scriptwriting.Mark Edward Lender is Professor Emeritus of History at Kean University. He is the author or  editor of several books, including “This Honorable Court”: The United States District Court for the District of New Jersey, 1789–2000 (2006) and Drinking in America: A History (with James Kirby Martin, 2nd edition, 1987). Lender is the recipient of the McCormick, Cincinnati, Keller, and Booth Prizes, as well as the Richard J. Hughes Award, the highest honor granted by the New Jersey Historical Commission.

• List of illustrations ixPreface x1 Of Lexington and Concord, and the Myths of the War, 1763–1775 1Lexington and Concord 1Of Standing Armies (Power) and Militia (Liberty) 5Ideological Transmission 9The Provincial Militia Tradition 14The Tyranny of Standing Armies 19Notes 272 The Republican War, 1775–1776 29A Republican Order as the Goal 29Regulars Versus Republicans: The British at Bay 33The Adoption of a Continental Army 39The British Military Counterthrust 47The New York Campaign 52Success and Failure 61Notes 643 Toward an American Standing Army, 1776–1777 66The Nature of the Continental Army 66A New Model Rebel Army 70William Howe’s Campaign of 1777 78The Saratoga Campaign 83The American Search for Manpower 87The Old Myth and the New Soldiery 97Notes 994 On and Off the Road of Despair, 1777–1779 102Valley Forge 102Mounting Anger in the Officer Corps 106Tables Turned: New Life for the Cause 113The British Dispersal of 1778 120Growing Internal Division: Army and Society 127Notes 1365 Moral Defeat and Military Turnabout, 1779–1781 139Dispersed Warfare 139Patriot Naval Exploits 146Financial Morass on the Home Front 151The War in the Southern States 157Treason, Pensions, and Mutinies 164Sudden Turnabout: The Road to Yorktown 171Notes 1766 Of War, National Legitimacy, and the Republican Order, 1781–1789 179The Yorktown Campaign 179Formulating a Peace Settlement 187The Newburgh Conspiracy 194Transition to a Postwar World 202Myth and Tradition: A Political/Military Settlement 210Notes 217A Note on Revolutionary War History and Historiography 219Index 232