Customer Reviews

Gooch's Regiment 1740-1742, America's First Marines

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Mr. Offen's book covers a little known military unit in a rarely mentioned war in a way that both satisfies the readers interest in the stated topic, and piques the readers interest in the greater events. He intersperses source material with text seamlessly. Gooch's Regiment holds a unique place in our nations early military history and yet is almost never mentioned.

Plenty of info and detail about this regiment, needs a good editor and proofreader. But its currently the best compilation on this subject available.

First, it is great to see a book about a subject that has not been covered much in colonial military history. I enjoyed reading the many accounts of the campaign, of raising troops for service, etc. The problem is that the book suffers from the mistakes of an amateur writer and a shoddy press. Many of the letters and reports the author provides are poorly interpreted and presented with little context. He also uses anachronistic military terminology (e.g., writing "CPT" for "captain") that comes across as jarring. The claim that these troops were "marines" is also open to debate, but that is not such a big point. The maps provided are so small many cannot be read at all, so why even place them in the volume? The book is of value due to the subject matter, but in that way it succeeds in spite of itself!