A comprehensive history of the brutal wilderness war that secured America’s independence in 1777—by an author with “a flair for vivid detail” (Library Journal). With Musket and Tomahawk is a vivid account of the American and British struggles in the sprawling wilderness region of the American northeast during the Revolutionary War. Combining strategic, tactical, and personal detail, historian Michael Logusz describes how the patriots of the newly organized Northern Army defeated England’s massive onslaught of 1777, all but ensuring America’s independence. Britain’s three-pronged thrust was meant to separate New England from the rest of the young nation. Yet, despite its superior resources, Britain’s campaign was a disaster. Gen. John Burgoyne emerged from a woodline with six thousand soldiers to surrender to the Patriots at Saratoga in October 1777. Within the Saratoga campaign, countless battles and skirmishes were waged from the borders of Canada to Ticonderoga, Bennington, and West Point. Heroes on both sides were created by the score amid the madness, cruelty, and hardship of what can rightfully be called the terrible Wilderness War of 1777.

"Using colorful storytelling techniques, Logusz captures the personalities of those individuals who played a pivotal role in the outcome of the Mohawk Valley Campaign...breathes dramatic life into a depiction of the long standing alliances and rivalries that fueled Patriot and Loyalist causes in the region, while describing how neighbors, families, friends and foes were caught up in Burgoyne's doomed play."ÑToy Soldier and Model Figure "Logusz does an excellent job outlining the Battle of Oriskany, where an initial Patriot relief force coming to the aid of Fort Stanwix was ambushed and almost wiped out...fascinating, well documented, and occasionally thought provoking.ÓÑThe Journal of AmericaÕs Military Past

This history of the 1777 Wilderness War in America’s fight for independence chronicles the Patriot defense against British and Iroquois attackers. Continuing his acclaimed history of the battles for New England during the Revolutionary War, Michael Logusz chronicles the British Army’s campaign from Lake Ontario down the Mohawk Valley. This campaign, led by Gen. Barry St. Leger, was perhaps the most terrifying of all, as it overran a sparsely populated wilderness where colonists had long needed to bear arms against the Iroquois Federation. Yet now, the British had made common cause with the Iroquois, forming an even more fearsome enemy. In upstate New York, the Patriot Fort Stanwix held fast, though surrounded by St. Leger’s forces and his Mohawk and Loyalist auxiliaries. Some eight hundred Patriots under militia leader Nicholas Herkimer attempted to relieve the fort, but were ambushed en route in the Battle of Oriskany, the basis for the movie Drums Along the Mohawk. In the end, Fort Stanwix was relieved only when Benedict Arnold marched his troops through and forced the British to give up their western onslaught. In With Musket and Tomahawk Volume II, Logusz captures the terrain, tactics, and terror of this multifaceted wilderness war.