While Nathanael Greene’s advice on this particular occasion wasn’t the best, we shouldn’t extrapolate that into deciding that Greene was bad at his job.

Far from it, in fact. Greene was regarded by peers and historians as second only to Washington in his skills as a general. It was once said of Greene that he was a master strategist who could see patterns where others couldn’t, and could often get soldiers to do things that others could not. And chances are, the only reason Greene isn’t better known is because he died in 1786 following sunstroke, rather than living to a ripe old age and becoming a prominent politician, or dying in battle. Greene was 43 years old at his untimely death.

In the late 1770s Greene moved to the Southern theater of the war, where he served up several American victories, and a couple of instances where the Americans technically lost but the British losses were substantially larger (which sounds like a common theme around here). As a result of his actions throughout the south, there are numerous municipalities and counties across the US that are named for him, not to mention several Naval ships.

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