| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 91.3

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| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 91.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Lone Star Rising: The Revolutionary Birth of the Texas Republic. By William C. Davis. (New York: Free Press, 2004. xii, 354 pp. $27.00, ISBN 0-684-86510-6.)
Lone Star Rising by William C. Davis is a throwback to a time when history books were judged by how well they were written, not how accurately they interpreted the past. Davis writes of heroes, not people; he relies on stereotypes instead of taking the time to deal with complexities. He tosses aside all recent scholarship to recreate a Disney-like interpretation of the Texas war for independence.	1
Throughout the book, Davis makes sweeping statements that are, at best, misleading. For example, "all of the vast empire north and west of the settled area [of Texas in 1800] was the home ground of the feared Comanche" (p. 3). There were many Indian groups in that area, and not all feared the Comanches. Davis displays his complete ignorance of Spanish Indian policy when he declares that "The native population was simply swept aside, eradicated or enslaved" (p. 10). His bibliography of Spanish-era Texas is laughably inadequate—he obviously has not read the award-winning Spanish Texas, 1519–1821, by Donald E. Chipman (1992).	. . .

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