Tecumseh - Softcover

So there's something quite ironic about the fact that it's taken a British academic, Dr John Sugden, to write the first truly definitive biography of Tecumseh. But then, maybe it was always going to take an outsider to tread an objective path through the mythology that has grown up around the Indian chieftain. American literature is littered with fanciful. fictionalised accounts of his life, but none that comes close to the real man. Maybe, too, there is something fitting about a British person rehabilitating Tecumseh's memory in this country. British history can be extremely parochial, and the fighting in North America in the early 19th century has long since been relegated to the status of irrelevant, historical side-show. Sugden's biography goes a long way towards finally giving Tecumseh the acknowledgement he deserves for his role in British imperialist history. To this day, Canadians honour him as a saviour of their country at the time of the war of 1812.

Tecumseh has been a labour of love for Sugden. The research has taken nearly 30 years and Sugden has already published one book, Tecumseh's Last Stand and has another in the pipeline on Shawnee culture. But one man's obsession is our enlightenment and he presents a rare glimpse into a world that has been shrouded in celluloid reinvention. --John Crace