Settle, John Carter. Virginia Continental Line in the Revolution’s Southern Campaigns. Charleston, SC: History Press, 2025.

Book Review

After five years of destructive, highly kinetic Revolutionary warfare, Virginia, the largest and most prosperous state, experienced significant difficulties recruiting, provisioning, and arming a mere couple thousand soldiers for the Continental Army. First-time author John C. Settle tells the story of Virginia’s troubled contributions to the Continental Army from 1780 to 1783 in his new book. The first-time author asserts that much of the history of the Virginia units in the Continental Army has been forgotten or overlooked. In this volume, he hopes to rectify this omission by historians and demonstrate the positive impact that Virginia soldiers had on the war in the South.

The author begins with brief biographies of ten generals and senior field officers who led Virginia units, most of whom served throughout the war. While the generals, colonels, and lieutenant colonels stayed relatively constant, the units they commanded changed significantly. Due to shrinking ranks, commanders constantly reformed units into fewer operational groups. The shifts in command and reorganized regiments are dizzying and, at times, challenging to follow in the book’s narrative. Remarkably, unit cohesion and combat effectiveness remained quite strong despite the turnover of officers and changes in units.

Next, Settle outlines the recruiting process, which was challenging during the last three years of the war. Washington and state leaders removed senior commanders they believed had followership from the front lines and assigned them to recruiting and training missions back home. Although these efforts encountered limited success, Virginia managed to muster a few thousand troops during the final years of the conflict. However, there was a constant need for replacement soldiers due to deaths from disease, casualties in battle, and desertions back home and to enemy forces. Notably, the author highlights desertions to the British Army even when the prospect of peace was on the horizon. Settle points out that recruiting was vital and challenging, especially in war-weary Virginia, an observation sometimes overlooked by Revolutionary War historians.

The author provides an interesting summary of Virginia’s Continental Line. He estimates that over the last three years of the war, approximately twenty-four hundred soldiers served in Virginia’s Continental Line, with no more than thirteen hundred fit and ready for duty at one time. The average age was twenty-four, three years older than the average Continental from other states, which indicates that many younger soldiers had enlisted in the previous five years. Most recruits hailed from Virginia, but many were immigrants or came from out of state. Black soldiers represented approximately four percent of the force and were an average of seven years older than white recruits (page 31).

In describing the battles and campaigns, the author toggles back and forth between two theaters of action for the Virginia Line: the Deep South and its home state. In 1780, Virginia sent its regiments southward to South Carolina, where most of the state’s officers and soldiers surrendered with Major General Benjamin Lincoln’s army to the British in Charleston. The loss of its expeditionary regiments greatly burdened the state to replace these captured soldiers. At the same time, the British conducted raids into Virginia, which required the Virginia Continental Line and militia forces to defend the homeland. Decisions on allocating soldiers and supporting resources became difficult. Eventually, Virginia divided its forces to support both theaters. Arming, clothing, and feeding the recruits remained a constant problem in both regions, and there was continually a lack of resources and pay for the soldiers.

The middle school teacher and contributor to the Journal of the American Revolution predominantly explores primary sources to support his narrative. A key strength of Settle’s work is his use of soldiers’ pension records, making the narrative a more realistic and insightful alternative to an armchair general’s perspective. At times, the plethora of data is an overdone strength. The author sometimes provides so many details that it can be challenging to follow the storyline. Nevertheless, readers looking to uncover information about their ancestors or specific Virginia units will find this meticulous information valuable. The book’s engaging pictures and well-crafted maps are additional strengths.

Readers who want to gain a deeper understanding of the challenges faced by the Virginia state government in providing and sustaining its share of soldiers for the Continental Army during the final three years of the war will find this book beneficial. Additionally, readers will learn that despite the difficulties in recruiting and provisioning, a few thousand Virginia soldiers were sufficient to support the reconquest of the Carolinas and Georgia, protect the home front, and assist George Washington in defeating Lord Cornwallis’s army at Yorktown. Moreover, the soldiers’ dedication to the war, despite enduring severe hardships from lack of clothing, supplies, pay, and arms, is effectively illustrated.