Originally published in 1889 in 13 volumes, this brilliant, unequalled work by the most famous American historian of the age has now been skillfully edited into a single edition. The wonderfully readable result retains its sharp focus and wonderfully graceful style, while eliminating repetitions and archaic phrases. Playing out in the dramatic account is the struggle for a continent, and the brilliant men who dominated the conflict: Champlain, La Salle, Washington, Howe, and others. By ousting the French from the land, the British unwittingly set the stage for their own later defeat.

At once a grand tour of the battlefields of North America and an unabashedly personal tribute to the military prowess of an essentially unwarlike people. • "[A] magisterial narrative history, enriched by an authorial voice."--The Washington Post Fields of Battle spans more than two centuries and the expanse of a continent to show how the immense spaces of North America shaped the wars that were fought on its soil.

In the summer of 1754, deep in the wilderness of western Pennsylvania, a very young George Washington suffered his first military defeat, and a centuries-old feud between Great Britain and France was rekindled. The war that followed would be fought across virgin territories, from Nova Scotia to the forks of the Ohio River, and it would ultimately decide the fate of the entire North American continent—not just for Great Britain and France but also for the Spanish and Native American populations. Noted historian Walter R. Borneman brings to life an epic struggle for a continent—what Samuel Eliot Morison called "truly the first world war"—and emphasizes how the seeds of discord sown in its aftermath would take root and blossom into the American Revolution.

This volume reveals how the Seven Years’ War reshaped the geopolitical map of North America and the everyday lives of the peoples within it. The introduction surveys the war as both an international struggle for empire and an intercultural conflict involving Native Americans, French and British soldiers, and the ethnically and religiously diverse population of British North America. A rich collection of primary-source selections recaptures the experience of the war from multiple perspectives and is organized by key cultural, military, and diplomatic themes. Document headnotes, a chronology, questions to consider, and a bibliography enrich students’ understanding of this momentous conflict.

An intriguing study of the revolutionary army as a powerful and yet contested symbol of nascent national identity among the American colonies.

Detailed maps supplement descriptive narratives of more than 350 battles, from battles of Spanish conquest in 1517 to Mexican border raids in 1916, providing information on each battle's context, important leaders, and outcome. Reprint.