The American who emerged from the Revolution with a military reputation second only to that of George Washington was a Quaker with a physical affliction that had caused him to be rejected as an officer by the men in his militia company. Nathanael Greene’s career was a curious interplay of such contradictions, with the result that his fortunes seemed always at the flood or the ebb, never fully resolved. Raised a Quaker, he never lost the deep sense of piety he learned at meeting, but could not go along with the doctrine of pacifism, which he regarded as impractical under such circumstances as the “business of necessity” in which the colonies found themselves in 1775. A big, husky man, Greene had a powerful frame that came from years at his father’s forge in Coventry, Rhode Island, but his robust appearance camouflaged chronic ill health. Asthma plagued him, inoculation against smallpox left a spot in his right eye that pained him frequently, and a stiff right knee caused him to limp noticeably. None of these ailments kept him from being something of a lady’s man in his younger days, but the gimpy leg frustrated his first attempt to become an officer. In 1774, when the men of the Rhode Island Kentish Guards were choosing officers, they refused to have Greene even though he was thought to be the best qualified; what kind of volunteer company, the men asked, wanted a captain who limped across the parade ground? The word that he was “a blemish to the company” mortified Greene, who was sensitive about his leg and about how it would seem for a successful, thirty-twoyear-old man to serve as a private. But he swallowed his pride and let it be known that he was willing to carry a musket in the ranks.

At daybreak on the morning after the battles at Lexington and Concord the Kentish Guards were on the march toward Massachusetts. It turned out that the company was not needed near Boston just then, but the Rhode Island assembly voted to raise a i,5oo-man brigade known as the Army of Observation to preserve “the liberties of America”—somewhat ironically in the name of His Majesty King George in. And when it came time to select a commander, no one could think of anyone better qualified than Nathanael Greene, who was given the rank of brigadier general. During nine years of service with the Continental Army Greene’s career was a series of ups and downs, a frustrating blend of military defeats or personal disappointments leavened with moments of triumph. His first and worst defeat came with the fall of Fort Washington in November, 1776, which Greene had stubbornly insisted on defending despite the better judgment of Washington. It was one of the most costly losses of the entire war, but from it Greene learned never again to rely on raw, inexperienced troops to withstand a heavy assault by disciplined British regulars. At the battles of Trenton, Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth, and