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These three books comprise the adventures of Continental cavalryman Stuart Schuyler from 1779 through to the end of the war. As far as I can determine, there are no earlier installments, but the books are so old I can't be sure. So far, I've only tracked down volumes 1 and 3. I'm on the lookout for Morgan's Men.

A better title for the first book than Scouting for Washington, would've been Spying for Washington, but I get the feeling the author was uncomfortable with admitting his hero was involved in that traditionally dishonorable profession. A spy, though, he definitely is. Sent to New York by Washington in late-1779 to gather information on Sir Henry Clinton's activities, through a fluke of circumstances, Stuart Schuyler of the Continental Army finds himself recruited as a groom ("horseboy" as the author calls him) for the British Legion, and as "Jack Stuart," he accompanies Clinton's expeditionary force to the Carolinas. He comes to Ban Tarleton's attention by managing to keep the colonel's personal mount alive during the horrendous sea voyage south, and gains a reputation for his ability to handle tricky horses.

Through the first part of his adventures, he is confined mostly to the Legion encampment, hearing about the war through the talk of returning soldiers, but eventually he ends up in uniform himself, as a soldier in the 63d Regiment. Faced with this more active combat role, he deserts to Sumter's partisan band just before the battle at Blackstock's, taking Tarleton's horse with him. (In his account of Blackstock's, Tarleton mentions "the desertion of a soldier of the 63d," who warned Sumter of his approach, but neglected to mention the loss of the horse. ;-) ) Stuart does retain enough personal loyalty to his former friends and comrades-in-arms to refuse to fire on them during the ensuing battle.

The illos in On Guard! are by Lilian Crawford True.( I suspect her connection to the author had more to do with her getting the job than artistic talent.) Tarleton (left) is shown in regular army uniform throughout. This scene takes place while he's a PoW after Yorktown.

The book is fairly non-rabid in its politics, and its greatest faults lie in True's awkward and amateurish writing style. Like many authors of his day, he has a habit of stepping outside of his internal world view at random times, to make asides to the readers or "modern" analogies, but he just doesn't carry it off well. He also has one of the worst grasps of "point of view" rules of any author I've encountered, and is truly awful at representing regional speech patterns in dialogue. The last is especially unfortunate, since just about everyone in the book speaks in some dialect or other, from Cockney to illiterate backwoodsman. Page after page of dialogue such as, "Wal, p'r'aps I've got the best reason fer rememb'ring. But 't was 'baout three years back, daown in the Jarseys..." grows rather tiresome.

On the "up" side, True's research is better than average for his time, though he does make a few strikingly odd flubs such as placing Lt. Col. James Webster in command of the 63d regiment rather than the 33d. James Wemyss, the 63d's touchy field commandant, would've had much to say about that I'm sure. For that matter, the real Jamie Webster, a Scot, would've been less than pleased to find himself portrayed as an Englishman. (Then again, perhaps he was supposed to be a Scot, and True just had extra trouble representing that accent phonetically...)

In keeping with his relatively non-agenda tone, True presents the reader with an energetic, decisive and non-psychotic Tarleton and steers a similar course with the Legion and the 63d. Stuart quickly finds friends and a mentor, in the person of a veteran sergeant, among the men he's double-crossing. Unfortunately, the story lacks the sophistication to play much with that grayish theme, except in a brief scene after Stuart deserts to Sumter, when he encounters his former mentor during a skirmish and tries to explain the reasons for his actions.

As I say, I haven't yet found a copy of Morgan's Men, but from context it covers the period between Blackstock's and Cowpens, presumably with the latter battle forming its climax. The third volume, On Guard! Against Tory and Tarleton takes up from there, covering the race to the Dan, the campaigning in Virginia, the siege and surrender of Yorktown, and a bit of post-war clean-up. Since it's roughly the same size as the first volume, that means it really has to hurry.

Despite the fact that I seem to have more complaints for it than compliments, I did quite enjoy the first book as a quick, once-through read. Perhaps because I went into On Guard! already inured to True's weaknesses as a writer I enjoyed it considerably more. It's still nothing spectacular, but it is charming and fun in the old-style "spirited adventure" sense.

Okay, so True's hamfisted notions of how to express regional dialects with funny spelling did not improve. In fact this time he has Leslie and O'Hara to add to the list of victims. And I take back my previous comment about him making Webster an Englishman because he didn't know how to spell a Scots accent. Leslie rolls his "R"s for all he's worth. But O'Hara wins the "silliest dialect" contest. True has him talking like a Irish cop from some old radio drama. He never quite says "sure and begorra," but it's mighty close a few times.

Despite which, it's an entirely engaging book. Stuart has found himself a girl somewhere along the lines (presumably in Morgan's Men) and she keeps enough of his attention that he has to give over half of his leading role to a charming young aide-de-camp of Cornwallis's, Lord Egerton, who ends up becoming his brother in law in an unexpectedly amicable ending. Stuart and Tarleton continue their personal cross-lines feud over the horse which Stuart stole when he defected to Greene -- and even more, perhaps, over the horse that he left behind. Saddled with the unlikely name of Muskrat, this ugly, bad-tempered (albeit extremely hardy and useful) creature is as much a character as many of the surrounding humans.

So the first one's okay, but the third one's good. Or if not exactly "good" in any objective sense, at least a lot of fun. Recommended!