i read in gore vidal’s ‘burr’ that george washington lost every real battle in which he was involved and if he did win anything it was merely a skirmish. of course, it was written from a hostile aaron burr’s point of view and it was a novel. so, where can i check any of these facts out. (i know, google is my friend…however, like so many of my other friends, it takes hours and hours to get to the point). is there a standard reference for washington’s battles with a win-loss column? or did any of his real biographers enumerate which ones he won and which ones he lost.
thanks
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You could just go to your local library and get a book on Washington. You could probably get everything you need from one of the thousand or so biographies of Washington.
One thing to remember about Washington and the whole Continental Army’s strategy in the Revolution was to AVOID getting into a full-fledged battle with the British Army. The British were better equiped, trained, and fed.
I read an excellent book, “Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution Through British Eyes,” Christopher Hibbert (recommended). Hibbert notes that the British, indeed, won most of the battles, but the wins were largely meaningless. Here’s why.
The victor in a battle would be the one considered in possession of the field after the battle was over. So a large British force would move out of the confines of a city. A bunch of ragtag militiamen and part-time soldiers would try to ambush them. The better-trained, better-equipped British would prevail, probably inflicting more casualties than they took. But the end of the battle left them in possession of a wheat field. They were the official victors, but they didn’t want to hold a wheat field. So they moved on. More militiamen fired on them and broke and ran under heavy BBritish fire. Another British victory. And on and on, with the British losing more and more men. The problem for the British was that reinforcements were an ocean away, while additional troops for the Yanks was, say, in the next county. Eventually, the militiamen would overwhelm the weakened British force if they didn’t get back to the city.
So sure, the British won more battles. Spartacus won every battle, too – except the last one.
This might not answer your question on Washington – who did pull off some decent maneuvers. But it shows that number of battles won does not equate to winning the war.
I know for sure from my history book that he surrendered Fort Necessity to the hated French in the French and Indian War. However, he was a young soldier at the time(this was in 1754).
Considering Washington was in charge of the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War and the Americans won, I would not say he was a bad general at all. I believe the bigger and more common question was whether or not he was that great of a president.
Washington was a brilliant general in that he understood the need to maintain a functioning army as a credible military threat while at the same time avoiding actual combat as much as possible (combat favored the British who had a logistic advantage). It was a difficult balancing act and Washington carried it off.
I asked this question once before after having read a history book describing Washington’s less-than-stellar tactics in several engagements. Unfortunately, I got hammered by patriots, and didn’t get an objective answer. I’m legitimately curious.
Brilliant is an overstatement, IMHO. Subedei was brilliant, Washington wasn’t bad. Washington was by inclination a “regular” commander, not a guerilla leader, and constantly had to fight his own inclination to give battle on the open field. When he lost that fight with himself, he generally lost the battle, because his largely militia forces simply weren’t up to the caliber of most of the British troops they encountered.
Washington was more a “good enough” general and his good qualities came into play at the right times. He was a reasonably charismatic leader who was good at maintaining army cohesion and he recovered well from setbacks. A semi-decent parallel, perhaps, is the mercenary general Ernst von Mansfeld in the earlier stages of the Thirty Years’ War, who was highly respected not for his tactical ability ( which was adequate, but nothing special ) or his strategic sense, but rather for his considerable skill at maintaining an army in the field at minimal cost to his employer.
- Tamerlane
Well, the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese army lost just about every serious battle they ever fought against the Americans- does that make Giap a “terrible” general?