With Zeal and With Bayonets Only: The British Army on Campaign in North America, 1775-1783

The image is indelible: densely packed lines of slow-moving Redcoats picked off by American sharpshooters. Now Matthew Spring reveals how British infantry in the American Revolutionary War really fought.

This groundbreaking book offers a new analysis of the British Army during the "American rebellion" at both operational and tactical levels. Presenting fresh insights into the speed of British tactical movements, Spring discloses how the system for training the army prior to 1775 was overhauled and adapted to the peculiar conditions confronting it in North America.

Spring first scrutinizes such operational problems as logistics, manpower shortages, and poor intelligence; he then focuses on battlefield tactics to examine how troops marched to the field, deployed, advanced, and fought. By highlighting the army's ability to tailor its tactical methods to local conditions, he demonstrates both the professional competence of officers and their confidence in the men under them to perform tactics far removed from the drill manuals.

With Zeal and with Bayonets Only offers a thorough reinterpretation of how the British Army's North American campaign progressed and invites serious reassessment of most of its battles. After reading this book, no one will picture Redcoats the same way again.