“The Naval Battle That Won the American Revolution” by Nathaniel Philbrick

Bestselling author Nathaniel Philbrick will return to the Society to discuss his latest book, In the Hurricane’s Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown, which will be published this October. This book recounts the final year of the Revolution and how Washington’s leadership masterminded the Battle of the Chesapeake, during which the French fleet intercepted and defeated the British Navy, preventing them from evacuating Lord Cornwallis and his army from the Yorktown peninsula.

Philbrick is an award-winning, bestselling author and an AAS member (elected 2002). Philbrick’s works include, among others, In the Heart of the Sea (2000), which won the National Book Award for nonfiction and was the basis of the 2015 movie of the same title directed by Ron Howard; Mayflower (2006), which was a finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize in History and the Los Angeles Times Book Award, won the Massachusetts Book Award for nonfiction, and was named one the ten “Best Books of 2006” by the New York Times Book Review; Bunker Hill: A City, a Siege, a Revolution (2013), which was awarded both the 2013 New England Book Award for Non-Fiction and the 2014 New England Society Book Award, as well as the 2014 Distinguished Book Award of the Society of Colonial Wars; and Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution (2016), winner of the 2017 George Washington Book prize, the James P. Hanlan Book Award, and the Harry M. Ward Book Prize. Philbrick’s writing has also appeared in Vanity Fair, The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Boston Globe. He has appeared on the Today Show, the Morning Show, Dateline, PBS’s American Experience, C-SPAN, and NPR.