[John Graves Simcoe] Remarks on the Travels of the Marquis de Chastellux, in North America.

SIMCOE, John Graves Lieut. Col. [1752 - 1806]

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Place Published: London
Publisher: Printed for G. and T. Wilkie
Date Published: 1787
Edition: 1st
Binding: Hard Cover
Condition: Very Good
Book Id: 0855

Description

RARE BOOK RELATING TO THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION BY JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE IN 1787

8vo (212 x 130 mm). 80pp. Contemporary calf, rebacked to style. Condition: Very good, foxing; minor wear, recased. A very rare response to Chastellux, correcting his account of the American Revolution. Simcoe commanded a Loyalist corps during the American Revolution and is best known for his 1787 Journal of the Operations of the Queen's Rangers. This rare 80pp. pamphlet, issued the same year, is a response to statements made relative to military engagements and criticism the British Army made by the Marquis de Chastellux in his 1786 Voyages … dans l'Amerique septentrionale. Among the more controversal statements is a defense of Benedict Arnold's treason. A rare tract, with no copies appearing in the auction records for the last twenty years. Sir John Graves Simcoe, 1752-1806, was the first Governor of Upper Canada. A career army officer, he had served with great distinction during the American Revolution, in the Long Island campaign; the capture of New York; and, the New Jersey campaigns of 1776-1777, being wounded at the Battle of Brandywine. In 1777, Simcoe commanded the Queen's Rangers, a loyalist corps composed of light infantry and cavalry that served throughout the war as reconnaissance and outpost troops. They were in the Pennsylvania Campaign of 1778, and subsequent retreat to New York; in Benedict Arnold's raid on Richmond; and in the Yorktown Campaign. This rare work is a natural companion volume to Simcoe's A Journal of the Operations of the Queen's Rangers, published in the same year. Simcoe's Remarks "accuses the Marquis of misrepresentation and exaggerations, and calls his translator an 'incendiary, a lurking spy, and an avowed rebel to his country [England]'" (Rich 1787:5). Containing a defense of Benedict Arnold; for many years it was thought to have been written by him. Howes S462. Sabin 81137. In this book, Simcoe takes issue with the many statements and observations on the Revolutionary War made by the Marquis de Chastellux, which were published in English translation in 1787, in which the Marquis condemns the British incompetence, their wanton destruction of property, villainous crimes against the Americans, and use of the Indians in the war. From his own first hand knowledge, Simcoe refutes each and every charge made by the Marquis, defends the integrity of the British Army, condemns the atrocities of the Rebels, and points out the treachery and manipulations of the Rebel leaders inflicted on their own brothers, the Loyalists. George Washington, Benjamin Franklin and the Marquis de Lafayette particularly, come under severe criticism from Simcoe.