The Last Men Standing: The 8th Virginia Regiment in the American Revolution.
Now available for pre-order.
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After years of research, the complete history of the 8th Virginia Regiment will finally be published this spring. Gabriel Neville’s book The Last Men Standing: The 8th Virginia Regiment in the American Revolution is scheduled for release on May 31. This is a book that historians once thought was impossible to write. It is the first of its kind, focused on actual Revolutionary soldiers from their childhoods to their last days on the frontier. Every identifiable man who served in the regiment is listed.
The Last Men Standing is now available for pre-order. The Fort Plain Museum is selling it at a generous discount. The 8th Virginia Regiment was unique in the Continental Army, and its story has never been fully told. George Bancroft called the 8th Virginia "one of the most perfect battalions of the American Army." Major General Charles Lee called them “a most excellent regiment” and chose them first in Virginia for Continental service “in preference to any other.” Two of its men rose from private to general over the course of their full military careers. They fought for many reasons, but one man, Sergeant John Vance, declared, "I fought in our Revolutionary War for liberty."
The regiment is famous for its first colonel, the “fighting parson,” Peter Muhlenberg. However, there is much more to the story than Muhlenberg's well-known final sermon. The 8th Virginia was multi-ethnic, and its very existence tied north with south and east with west in a way that contributed meaningfully to national unity. About 800 men signed up to fight early in 1776. By the end of the war, only a few remained. |
"I fought in our Revolutionary War for liberty." |
The Last Men Standing is different from the usual narrative. These were Western men who cared more about Kentucky and Ohio than the tax on tea. They were the original pioneers, setting cultural precedents that became fixtures in Western movies: fringed shirts, long rifles, migration trails, Conestoga wagons, Indian fighting, dueling, and buffalo hunting. To go west, though, they had to fight first in the east.
The Virginia Convention initially intended the 8th Virginia to be a "German" regiment. It raised several companies in the Shenandoah Valley, where thousands of Germans had migrated along the Great Wagon Road from Pennsylvania. However, thousands of Scotch-Irish immigrants had come the same way, and they enlisted in equal numbers. The actual plan may have been to put reliable German-American officers in command of the "unruly" Irish.
Frequently divided and detached, the regiment’s men served almost everywhere: Charleston, White Plains, Trenton, Princeton, Short Hills, Cooch's Bridge, Brandywine, Saratoga, Germantown, Valley Forge, and Monmouth. They suffered, and many died, from frostbite, malaria, smallpox, malnourishment, musket balls, bayonets, and cruel imprisonment. Their numbers dwindled until only a few remained to help corner Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown. Victorious, those who survived turned west to build the America we know.
The Last Men Standing includes over a hundred color and black-and-white illustrations, twenty maps, and an appendix listing every identifiable man who served. It was written using every available source: diaries, letters, muster rolls, pay rolls, local histories, private collections, and more. It will be published by Helion & Company and is now available for pre-order. It is available at Amazon and other retailers, or from The Fort Plain Museum at a generous discount.
The Virginia Convention initially intended the 8th Virginia to be a "German" regiment. It raised several companies in the Shenandoah Valley, where thousands of Germans had migrated along the Great Wagon Road from Pennsylvania. However, thousands of Scotch-Irish immigrants had come the same way, and they enlisted in equal numbers. The actual plan may have been to put reliable German-American officers in command of the "unruly" Irish.
Frequently divided and detached, the regiment’s men served almost everywhere: Charleston, White Plains, Trenton, Princeton, Short Hills, Cooch's Bridge, Brandywine, Saratoga, Germantown, Valley Forge, and Monmouth. They suffered, and many died, from frostbite, malaria, smallpox, malnourishment, musket balls, bayonets, and cruel imprisonment. Their numbers dwindled until only a few remained to help corner Charles Cornwallis at Yorktown. Victorious, those who survived turned west to build the America we know.
The Last Men Standing includes over a hundred color and black-and-white illustrations, twenty maps, and an appendix listing every identifiable man who served. It was written using every available source: diaries, letters, muster rolls, pay rolls, local histories, private collections, and more. It will be published by Helion & Company and is now available for pre-order. It is available at Amazon and other retailers, or from The Fort Plain Museum at a generous discount.
"...one of the most perfect battalions of the American Army."
—George Bancroft