August 18, 2022
Red by John Dickson
Professor Calloway’s book is exceptionally well researched and a corrective to the long ingrained and overly sympathetic image of George Washington most Americans have held since childhood. Calloway convincingly confirms that Washington’s early military exploits were debacles, and that he was a land speculator with few compunctions over prevailing treatment of the various Native Americans who had long claimed dominion over such territory. The book however would have benefited from a more rigorous editing, as Calloway’s full, and near full, page paragraphs suggest a prolixity in need of curbing. Calloway repeatedly recounts certain themes in the book, such as (I) Washington’s dual postures of promising peace with the Indians while at the same time threatening extirpation of the Indians if peaceful methods failed, and (I) the ambivalent attitude Washington held toward Native Americans, i.e., that he like many of the English and Colonists didn’t trust them and thought little of their honesty and trustworthiness. Not that this was a hindrance to the colonists and the British in their recruitment of friendly or neutral tribes to assist in ousting the French from lands claimed by the British colonists, and of course the Native Americans.