Brothers at Arms: American Independence and the Men of France and Spain Who Saved It

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29236373-brothers-at-arms?from_search=true&from_srp=true&qid=87qNBTZ1rw&rank=1

 

This book I had to read for my graduate level course in Historiography at Adams State University. This was a very dry book and not a page turner. As part of our research on the book we had to also research the author. Just having to read this book I would never had thought about it as anything but a common history book. Then I found out that both the author’s education and work experience was in engineering. It made me question how reliable of a writer he would be on history. I can only hope that he did enough research to teach himself the topic before he wrote the book. 2 stars out of 5. Below is an in depth book review I had to do for the class.

Splitting off from a mother country is never easy, and sometimes the help is not always acknowledged. Brothers at Arms: American Independence and the Men of France and Spain Who Saved It by Larrie Ferreiro is another tale about the American Revolution, but instead of focusing on the war from the American side it looks at it from the perspective of other European countries. The main players it focuses on are France and Spain, and how it was both their financial support and supplies that were key in helping the colonists defeat the British. Even though the main event is the American Revolution, Ferreiro builds his story with France and Spain watching the hostilities grow and then trying to find a way to use the situation to their advantage as they try to rebalance the power in Europe while getting revenge for the 7 years’ war. The book digs deep into how this European help directly impacted the outcome of the war. Impact is not only what this book is about, but also how it was written.

The research that Ferreiro had access to had a positive impact on his book. His notes were interesting in that he not only pointed out his source material, but included a short not as to the info he pulled from the source. From his bibliography it can be seen that he made use of both archives and libraries in France and Spain. This helped to give him access to primary source material that was not controlled by either America or Britain. Source material from these two countries could have been set them up to look good, but Ferreiro was smart and also pulled information from both America and Britain as well. His secondary source material was vastly larger than his primary sources. His primary sources were able to catch the perspectives of what was going on leading up to and during the revolution. His secondary sources span from the 1800s to the 2000s which gave him access to different historical perspectives through time. Having access to all of these perspectives opened him up to many different ways he could have approached writing Brothers at Arms. Any book can take a variety of directions, but some times more personal things to an author can shape how it turns out.

Larrie Ferreiro’s background may have impacted how he addressed the American Revolution. First, his degrees are all focused on architecture and engineering which are considered very rational degrees since science is their base and even his PhD focused on the history of these topics.[1] This means that his knowledge base is very limited and it has not focused on any people centered topics. This could explain why he followed historical norms of focusing on big names and events for his book. His graduate work was also done in London which could have helped him to pick on a more European centered version of the historical events.[2] He actually has very little historical experience besides teaching it at one school with most of his work experience being in engineering according to his LinkedIn account. Ferreiro actually seems like the last person someone would expect to be writing on the American Revolution unless it is about engineering achievements during the war. Taking this into account it does call into question the material he presents even if it is all entirely correct.

In a way Ferreiro could be seen as a post-modernist in his attempt to change the American Revolution conversation form an American perspective to one of the other European countries. This also relates to relativism with this same approach showing that there can be different interpretations to the events or story around the Revolution. In America most books on the Revolution are told with the colonists being the key players, whereas Ferreiro as changed this normal narrative to say that without help from France and Spain that the colonist movement would not have been successful. In America this book could be seen as a paradigm shift from one that focuses on a protonational view to a more Atlantic view. Ferreiro shows this best when he states, “Across the Atlantic France and Spain weighed their options….A new war, on the side of te rebellious Americans, could redress their old humiliations – or plunge them into ruination.”[3] At the same time this shows how his approach was limited when compared to what other historians are moving to. An example of this is when Peter A. Coclanis has talked about expanding past the Atlantic World and expanding into a global view[4]. Coclanis was talking about this expansion way back in 2006, which is 10 years before Ferreiro wrote his book. This creates questions as to if he was impacted by these views to move to a Eurocentric view for covering American history or if he was unaware of this movement in historical perspectives.

Some see the answer to this question as Ferreiro expanding American history to international perspectives. One such person is Kevin J. Delamer who writes for the Naval War College Review. In his opinion “Ferreiro has added depth and breadth to our understanding of the American War of Independence, particularly the global dimension of that struggle”.[5] This review makes sense in that the book was from the European viewpoint and not the American viewpoint. Most of the other reviews I read followed this same train of praising the book for expanding to this ‘global’ perspective. Many of those reviews come from military or related journals/magazines. I was only able to find one review that pointed out how limited a view this actually was. Hyun Wu Lee pointed out that the “book barely explores the Native Americans and people of African descent, both free and enslaved, who fought for Spain and France.” [6] This goes with the classical historical tradition of focusing on major players and not the common people. This could be seen as following old school principles and not up to date on current historical trends. Personally I thought it was a good book, but then I compared it to the perspective Coclanis it made me think about the quality of the book and then I looked at Ferreiro’s background. I cannot deny that he is an expert in his field, but I feel that with this book he was trying to expand his historical background and it negatively impacted his book in relation to being up to date on currently historical trends. This book is great for the masses and has interesting information in it, but as a modern historical text it is lacking in its global perspective and just fits into the Atlantic mindset.

Is there any impact or significance of Brothers at Arms? Yes and no. Yes, because he left traditional approaches to the revolution to look at how other countries impacted the war. No, because while he ‘expanded’ the topic he still stayed with a classic Atlantic approach to the subject by focusing just on European countries and talking about major names while not digging deeper into how the general populace of these countries impacted what happened. I think that the significance that this book will have is that it may help build interest in history in people. It was well written and done in a way that general readers could be pulled into the story of what happened.

Overall, impact was achieved with this book. To some it expanded how American history could be looked at. To others like Lee and myself it impacted us by showing that there is still a long way to go before global views can shape the study of history. The research on this book also personally impacted me by reminding me that it is always important to know not only what information goes into books, but also to take the time to research the authors of books you read. This can help to bring a stronger understanding to topics past what is just written on the page.

 

Bibliography

Coclanis, Peter A. “Atlantic World or Atlantic/World?” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no.4 (2006): 725-742.

Delamer, Kevin J. “Brothers at Arms: American Independence and The Men of France and Spain Who Saved It.” Naval War College Review 73, no.1 (2020):163-165.

Ferreiro, Larrie D. Brothers at Arms: American Independence and The Men of France and Spain Who Saved It. New York: Knopf, 2016. 

Ferreiro, Larrie D. “Larrie Ferreiro.” LinkedIn. Accessed May 28, 2020. https://www.linkedin.com/in/larrie-ferreiro-20aa20b/.

Lee, Hyun W. “Brothers at Arms: American Independence and The Men of France and Spain Who Saved It.” The Journal of Southern History LXXXIII, no.4 (2017): 942-944.

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[1] Ferreiro, “Larrie Ferreiro.”

[2] Ferreiro, “Larrie Ferreiro.”

[3] Ferreiro, Brothers at Arms, XXV.

[4] Coclanis, “Atlantic World or Atlantic/World?” 725-742.

[5] Delamer, “Brothers at Arms,” 164.

[6] Lee, “Brothers at Arms,” 944.