It read a bit slow. It was good history and well researched written by a local author.
This book reads like one very long newpaper article. There are not any documents recently discovered here.
Bruce Mowday might well ought to be listed as editor of this book rather than its author because much of the time all one finds here is one long quoted passage after another. Worse yet the passages are often repetitive and sometimes drag on for more than a page of text.
The first three chapters of this book are unredeemable. They jump all over the place and completely clutter the narrative; almost as if they are unstuck in time like Billy Pilgrim; or the author couldn't figure out how to index background information and tried to tell you everything about a person in a single paragraph.
September 11 is just not a good day for the United States, but it was somehow comforting to read Mowday's book and realize that bad as things can get, they get better. Americans on September 12, 1777, with Washington defeated and Phildelphia our capitol about to fall to the British, must have felt as alarmed as we did on a later September 12th.
I live in the area and wanted to learn more about the history. This book was very clearly written.
Review in the Oxford Tribune for week of August 25, 2003 by University History Professor Ken Woodward of "September 11, 1777: Washington's Defeat at Brandywine Dooms Philadelphia."Local writer, Bruce Mowday, was doing some research on the Battle of Brandywine and came to find out that there had not been a definite text written on the most important land battle fought in the Revolutionary War.
Mr. Mowday has done a commendable job of bringing a long ignored battle to life.
In this detailed, well researced book on the battle of the Brandywine, Mr. Mowday lyricaly brings alive not only the battle but also the atmosphere of the country during our fight for independence.
This book attempts to be a detailed history of a neglected Revolutionary War battle. Unfortunately it lacks an order of battle and is woefully short on maps which makes a complex battle even tougher to follow.
"For more than two centuries the Battle of Brnadywine has not received the recgonigtion it deserves," writes Bruce Mowday in the beginning pages of September 11, 1777: Washington's Defeat at Brandywine Dooms Philadelphia. Unfortunately, Mowday's book is far short of the recognition the Battle of Brandywine deserves.
This is a wonderful book and an important resource for anyone interested in the Revolutionary War. Until now there has been little information available about this critical phase of the war.
Not quite as detailed as Michael C. Harris's book on Brandywine but still pretty good.
