By Paul Carrier
John Keegan, who died in 2012, was one of the world’s foremost military historians, the author or co-author of more than two dozen books, including his 1995 study of warfare in North America, Fields of Battle.
Yet Keegan, whose topics in this volume include New France, the American Revolution, the Civil War and the Indian wars on the Great Plains, is far from a dry, detached chronicler. The British historian inserts himself into his narrative, transforming it into a blend of history and travelogue as he hops, skips and jumps his way across the continent, visiting battlefields and nearby sites to give his study a you-are-there feel.
Keegan’s personal approach to his subject becomes clear at the outset. In a 64-page mini-memoir that opens Fields of Battle, the author shares his fondness for America; recalls his boyhood impressions of Americans before and during World War II; muses on our geography, character and people; and reminisces about his first visit to the United States in the 1950s, as well as a followup journey some two decades later.
“I love America for its friendship,” Keegan writes. “Instant friendship, they say, the dawn friendship, is the distinctive American gift to human kinship.” North America “is a land for everyone; it is also a land where the strongest do best. That, I suppose, is the theme of this book.”
Even when Keegan gets to the heart of the matter — a carefully described, well-analyzed look at battles that helped shape the continent — he still provides moving touches that lend his narrative a certain intimacy.
Thus, a chapter entitled “The Forts of New France,” the longest in the book, opens with a recap of his first visit to Québec City, which occurred “on a bitter December day.” That’s just as well, he writes, “for who can understand Canada who has not flinched from the searing cold of its winter?” It is a cold “which the flesh tells the mind will kill if it gets the chance, a message the mind believes with total conviction, for it can think of nothing else.”
Later, after writing that France’s remarkable history of discovery in North America was “as gallant and enterprising as any in the record of the European exploration of the world,” Keegan suggests there is no more dramatic battlefield than the Plains of Abraham in Québec City, where the British effectively destroyed New France in 1759.
“Here occurred what French Canada calls to this day la Conquête,” Keegan writes, clearly moved by his contemplation of New France’s demise. “I came, I saw, I left, conquered by emotion.”
Some of the chapter headings in Fields of Battle are a bit misleading, but the reader is pleasantly surprised rather than disappointed. “The Forts of New France” recaps much of the history of that colony, while “The Fort of Yorktown” examines other aspects of the American Revolution before zeroing in on the decisive 1781 battle. “Flying Fortresses,” an odd topic for the closing chapter of a book on North American battles, devotes more than seven pages to the Wright brothers before turning its attention to the B-17 bombers of World War II fame.
Keegan places considerable emphasis on geography, topography and transportation systems, implying that they were — in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, at least — as significant as other critical factors in warfare, such as troop strength and leadership. Noting that George Washington was a surveyor, Keegan says it is striking “how many of young America’s great men — from (Samuel de) Champlain to Ulysses S. Grant — were mapmakers or geographers . . . .”
There are some eye-opening factual revelations here. For example, the Minutemen of Revolutionary War fame had deep roots in Massachusetts, which created quick-response militia units in the mid 17th century. During the Civil War, much of the Confederacy was completely inaccessible to the Union’s armies — or any armies, for that matter — by water, railway or road. As for George Armstrong Custer’s 7th Cavalry Regiment, 15 percent of its soldiers were raw recruits prior to the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, and a third had been with the regiment for six months or less.
In the final analysis, though, Keegan doesn’t so much add to the historical record as thoughtfully analyze it. He presents his findings in an engaging style that highlights his writing, as well as his hands-on technique for exploring and dissecting history. However, I do wish he had resisted the temptation to describe the 19th-century Plains Indians as "primitives," which is sure to strike many readers as both offensive and grossly inaccurate.
