- Gordon S. Wood has written many magnificent books on the American Revolution, including The Radicalism of the American Revolution and The Creation of the American Republic, 1776-1787 (called "One of the half dozen most important books ever written about the American Revolution"). His new book is outside the boundaries of this site, but nonetheless, for anyone who wants to know how colonial ideals became American democracy, read Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789-1815. It has received superlative reviews.
More Creation — The Empire of Liberty
More than any other figure who strode across the revolutionary stage, [Joseph] Warren gave his devotion to the American cause simply because he believed in it. Others believed as passionately, of course; but for Samuel Adams political agitation was a profession which had rescued him from a debtors’ prison; James Otis had deep grievances against the royal government because of their mistreatment of his father; John Hancock was a millionaire merchant who made much of his money from smuggling and owed the British Revenue Service over £100,000 in fines; as a lawyer, John Adams was naturally drawn into the political arena. Warren, as a doctor could have remained aloof, as many of his fellow physicians in Boston did. They were the only class in Massachusetts who were not pressured to join the cause.
Now We Are Enemies: The Story of Bunker Hill (1960; reissued 2010)