History Book Club March 2026 | The Compleat Victory: Saratoga and the American Revolution
What is the History Book Club?
The History Book Club is a monthly event series that brings together alumni, faculty, students, and friends of the History Department to engage virtually with our faculty and graduates, and learn about their recently published books.
Do I need to read the book to attend this gathering?
You do not! Our History Book Club gatherings are designed to be enjoyed by any history-lover, whether or not you’ve read the featured book.
About the book
The Compleat Victory: Saratoga and the American Revolution
(Oxford University Press, February 2021)
Winner of the Gilder Lehrman Military History Prize, Winner of the Fraunces Tavern Museum Book Award & Winner of The Society of the Cincinnati Prize.
In the late summer and fall of 1777, after two years of indecisive fighting on both sides, the outcome of the American War of Independence hung in the balance. Having successfully expelled the Americans from Canada in 1776, the British were determined to end the rebellion the following year and devised what they believed a war-winning strategy, sending General John Burgoyne south to rout the Americans and take Albany. When British forces captured Fort Ticonderoga with unexpected ease in July of 1777, it looked as if it was a matter of time before they would break the rebellion in the North. Less than three and a half months later, however, a combination of the Continental Army and Militia forces, commanded by Major General Horatio Gates and inspired by the heroics of Benedict Arnold, forced Burgoyne to surrender his entire army. The American victory stunned the world and changed the course of the war.
Kevin J. Weddle offers the most authoritative history of the Battle of Saratoga to date, explaining with verve and clarity why events unfolded the way they did. In the end, British plans were undone by a combination of distance, geography, logistics, and an underestimation of American leadership and fighting ability. Taking Ticonderoga had misled Burgoyne and his army into thinking victory was assured. Saratoga, which began as a British foraging expedition, turned into a rout. The outcome forced the British to rethink their strategy, inflamed public opinion in England against the war, boosted Patriot morale, and, perhaps most critical of all, led directly to the Franco-American alliance. Weddle unravels the web of contingencies and the play of personalities that ultimately led to what one American general called "the Compleat Victory."
About the hosts
Kevin Weddle (MA ‘86) is Professor of Military Theory and Strategy at the US Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. A West Point graduate, he served in the US Army for 28 years on active duty in command and staff positions in the United States and overseas, including Operations Desert Storm and Enduring Freedom, before retiring as a colonel. At the War College he was the director of the Advanced Strategic Art Program and served as the Deputy Dean of Academics. Dr. Weddle has led dozens of groups to battlefields in the United States and Europe including Gettysburg, Waterloo, Normandy, and many others.
J. David Hacker is a Professor of History with UMN, where he works as a demographic historian with expertise in nineteenth and early twentieth century census data and the use of indirect methods to estimate long-term population trends and differentials. Currently, his research focuses on four topics: the demographic cost and consequences of the American Civil War; the long-term decline of fertility between 1790 and 1940; the demographic behavior of immigrants in the early twentieth century; and the impact of racial residential segregation on child mortality.