230th Anniversary of the Royalton Raid marked by a new, definitive book
We Go As Captives: The Royalton Raid and the Shadow War on the Revolutionary Frontier, by Neil Good
win
BARRE, VT: The date: Vermont, October 16, 1780. The place: Royalton, Vermont. With no warning and in almost complete silence, a war party of 265 Canadian Mohawks and Abenakis, led by five British and French-Canadian soldiers, materialized from the forest at dawn. They moved so fast and so quietly there was no time for anyone to escape and spread the alarm. Prisoners were taken, and the town of Royalton was burned to the ground.
A commemoration of the Royalton Raid will be held on October 16th at 2:00 pm on the green in South Royalton, Vermont. The event will feature Neil Goodwin, author of a newly released book about the raid, and will serve as a launch for We Go as Captives. Goodwin will lead a discussion at the event and will be available to sign copies of We Go as Captives. In the event of rain, the program will take place at the Vermont Law School. Attendees are advised to bring chairs if the program is held outside.
The Vermont Historical Society is also presenting a “Meet the Author” book-signing on October 26th, from 4:30-6:30 at the Vermont History Museum in Montpelier.
“This is the first book of its kind on the Royalton Raid,” noted Mark Hudson, executive director of the Vermont Historical Society, the book’s publisher, “which was the last such raid to occur in New England.”
The narrative the book is based on is one of the longest and most detailed of all Revolutionary captivity narratives, and one of the most extensive documents written about the prisoner of war experience in British Canada. The author, Neil Goodwin, worked hard to understand the perspectives of the Abenaki and Kahnawake Mohawks as well as the British and Vermonters caught up in the endgame of the Revolution. By using the narratives, letters, and diaries of Zadock Steele and other captives from the raid, Goodwin has written a deeply researched, vivid story of attack, capture, imprisonment, and escape.
The newly released book, We Go As Captives: The Royalton Raid and the Shadow War on the Revolutionary Frontier, is a fast-paced, action-packed history that situates the raid in the broader context of Vermont’s role in the Revolutionary War and the complex relationships among the British and French empires in North America, various Indian nations seeking their own paths through the conflict, and independent-minded residents trying to establish their identity within the emerging American republic.
We Go As Captives revolves around the story of Zadock Steele, a young man who was captured in the attack on Royalton and subsequently wrote about his harrowing experience as a prisoner, first of the Mohawks and then of the British. Barefoot, ill-clothed, at the mercy of people whose language, customs, and tendency toward mayhem were utterly incomprehensible to them, Steele and the other captives were hustled north to imprisonment in Canada. After two years, as Steele’s resignation turned to despair, he and a few comrades, unaware that the war was about to end, executed a daring escape from the infamous Prison Island in the St. Lawrence River.
Much more than a riveting adventure story, We Go As Captives provides fresh insight into the Royalton Raid, the American Revolution on the northern frontier, and the motives and machinations of the European, Indian, and American players in this epic drama.
Published by the Vermont Historical Society, to purchase a copy, please click here.
ISBN: 978-0-934720-57-1 Paperback $24.95
Review copies available upon request.
Public appearances, presentations and readings
Fort Ticonderoga, New York, June 19 at 2:00 pm
Sharon Historical Society, July 18 at 6:00 pm
Bennington Museum, Bennington, VT, September 18 at 2:00 pm
The author Neil Goodwin is actively seeking ways in which to present this book to the public and will be available for readings, talks, presentations and book-signings at various events and in bookstores, libraries and local historical society gatherings. He can be reached most easily at the following email address and phone number:
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ; telephone: (617) 529-4056
