3 Review(s)

There were once two enemies who were both named George - George Washington and George III. They were very much alike in some ways, and they were both beloved by their people. But wars alter perceptions of people and interpretations of events. Because the winners tend to tell the tale, very few people in the United States have ever considered the British side of the American Revolution. In George vs. George, Roz Schanzer deftly shifts her perspective and includes primary source quotes from people on both sides of the Atlantic and both sides of the conflict. (There were loyalists in the Colonies and people who supported American independence in England.) The book compares the two Georges, who turn out to be remarkably similar men; talks about what life was like for people in England and in the Colonies on the eve of the Revolution; explains how the government of England worked and also how the Colonial governments worked; and then begins the story of the Revolutionary War. After the Stamp Act, the tax on tea, the boycotts, the Boston Tea Party, and the Boston Massacre, come the early battles.The book includes a wonderful description of what led up to the Battles of Lexington and Concord. From the British point of view, the famous British crossing of Boston Harbor and march to Concord immortalized in "Paul Revere's Ride" were pre-emptive strikes against a weapons stockpile amassed by dangerous rebel insurgents. Coverage of the war includes spreads about the composition of the British and Colonial forces as well as the Declaration of Independence. The book ends with the stories of what happened to the two Georges after the American Revolution. As the main text and pictures tell the main story, small paintings of historical figures in the margins comment on the events in their own words, which are drawn from primary sources.