Rochambeau

Jean Baptiste Dontien de Vimeur, Compte de Rochambeau, was on the verge of retirement when a courier from Versailles ordered him to report to the King at once. That interview was to have a profound effect upon American history: Rochambeau’s victory at Yorktown administered the coup de grace to the British and made America an independent nation. Arnold Whitridge’s Rochambeau is a deeply engrossing biography of a brae and brilliant soldier whose contribution to the American Revolutionary War and the founding of America has hitherto been neglected. It is also a chronicle of events, strategies and personalities that brings to life a formative, vastly interesting chapter in the annals of our country. “…a very good book, written with the scuple for fact to be expected from Matthew Arnold’s grandson, and with verve as well.” -- New York Herald Tribune …it is indeed refreshing that a book of such discernment and judicious appraisal should be so gracefully written.” -- The New York Times Book Review “Among other excellences, Mr. Whitridge’s book provides moderns with two contrasting studies in rebellion that are extremely valuable, as well as readable.” --The New York Times ARNOLD WHITRIDGE, an American grandson of Matthew Arnold, has taught at Columbia and at Yale, at the universities or Athens and o Bordeaux, and has had a distinguished career in the army in both World Wars.