THE TREEGATE SERIES
The acclaimed series chronicling the family Treegate's adventures during the American Revolution and the War of 1812. The books make a great companion to study American history and are recommended by the Seton Home Study Guide for Grade 8.
“Of all the wars of which I have knowledge, I believe that none was as important for the Western World as the War of the American Revolution. Indeed, I regard it as the most important struggle in the history of Western Man.”—Leonard Wibberley
The complete Middle Grade/Young Adult/Historial Fiction series now available on ebooks and new edition paperbacks.
Book 1: John Treegate's Musket
Book 2: Peter Treegate's War
Book 3: Sea Captain from Salem
Book 4: Treegate's Raiders
Book 5: Leopard's Prey
Book 6: Manly Treegate Frontiersman
Book 7: The Last Battle
Bonus Book 8: Apprentice to a Revolution
Note: Each book in the series is complete to itself and can be enjoyed if read in any order. However, for greatest reading pleasure, it’s recommended that the books be read in sequence.
The first seven books of the acclaimed series chronicling the adventures of the generations of the Treegate family from the birth of the Revolutionary War through the War of 1812, ending at the Battle of New Orleans is also available in a 7-Book Bundle exclusively on Kindle.
FREE on Kindle Unlimited
John Treegate's Musket: The Birth of the Revolutionary War (Book 1)
An epic historical adventure that takes young readers from The Boston Massacre to the Battle of Bunker Hill…
The year is 1769, and wealthy merchant John Treegate is a solid citizen of Boston, who is loyal to his British King. John has taught his eleven-year-old son Peter to be loyal too, and wanting nothing more than his father’s approval, Peter always does as told.
But when his father is called back to England on business, Peter is left behind and apprenticed to a maker of barrel staves. Alone and feeling abandoned, Peter experiences the hardships of Boston’s working class citizens for the first time.
When Peter is framed for murder and with no father at home to protect him, Peter is forced to flee Boston on a smuggler’s brig, sending him on a series of adventures on the high seas and across the untamed lands of the Carolinas that will challenge everything his father ever taught him to believe about England, America, and the impending Revolutionary War…
A NOTABLE CHILDREN’S TRADE BOOK IN THE FIELD OF SOCIAL STUDIES
A BOOK OF THE YEAR, CHILD STUDY ASSOCIATION
“A dramatic story which casts a broad view of the various factions at work up to the moment of the American revolution, well told by Leonard Wibberley, prolific writer of adult and juvenile fiction.”—Kirkus Reviews
★★★★★ “…couldn’t put it down until the book was done.”—Goodreads Review
★★★★ “An entertaining look at the beginnings of the American Revolution from the perspective of a young boy growing up as an apprentice in Boston.”—Goodreads Review
Peter Treegate's War (Book 2)
Winner of the Thomas Alva Edison Annual Children's Book Award for Excellence in Portraying America's Past
The second book in the Treegate series picks up right where John Treegate's Musket left off--following both the events of the American War for Independence and 16-year-old Peter's clash of loyalty to his real father, John Treegate, and to his foster father, the Maclaren of Spey (a Scottish clansman).
Peter's two fathers are both jealous and distrustful of each other as well as worlds apart in thought and philosophy, and Peter struggles to be true to both men while also trying to find his own calling.
Peter's personal conflicts are played out against the rich backdrop of the Revolutionary War, where Peter crosses paths with historical figures like George Washington as well as a charismatic new character--Peace of God Manly, a Salem fisherman who has seen the error of his once sinful ways.
For Peter and his foster father, there will be imprisonment and daring escapes, as well as the unraveling of a mystery, which began many years before in Scotland at the 1745 Battle of Culloden.
“Peter tells the story and the reader follows breathlessly along, experiencing the hardships, savoring the moments of triumph, and enjoying the humorous incidents.”—San Francisco Chronicle
“Against a rich historical background in which major events of the revolutionary war are depicted, Peter and the two men who bind him are drawn with sensitivity and imagination. Leonard Wibberley's portrayal of the formidable Scot is remarkably vivid, and his depiction of the Scottish colony in the Carolinas sheds new insight on an obscure but remarkable current in American history.”—Kirkus Reviews
Sea Captain from Salem (Book 3)
*** An American Library Association Notable Children's Book ***
The year is 1777, and America is in danger of losing the Revolutionary War because of the British blockade...
Benjamin Franklin is sent to Paris to seek an alliance with France, but how will he ever be able to convince the French that the American battle is worth joining—especially when the French are still licking their wounds from their own loss to the mighty British Navy?
Franklin's only chance to prove the British Navy is not invincible—and that the American colonists are determined to fight to the end—is to put one unlikely fisherman from Massachusetts named Peace of God Manly (whom we met in Peter Treegate's War) in command of the sloop of war Hornet with orders to attack British ships in their own waters.
In this third book in the Treegate Series, Leonard Wibberley paints an exciting and authentic picture of this neglected but critical chapter in the Revolutionary War, mixing real historical figures such as George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and the Earl of Sandwich with the fiery, cunning, and devout sea captain from Salem.
Readers will learn about the Revolutionary War from the American, British and French points of view.
“No lover of the sea and, for that matter, no landlubber who likes excitement, will put this book down.”—New York Herald Tribune
“I found this book to be one of the most intriguing historical books on the Revolutionary War time period.”—Goodreads Review
Treegate's Raiders (Book 4)
*** William Allen White Children’s Book Award Nominee ***
Peter Treegate has never been stronger, braver, or better with a knife—but he still has to learn humility if he’s going to save himself from the hangman’s noose…
The fourth book in the Treegate Series follows Peter Treegate and the sea captain Peace of God Manly through the final years of the Revolutionary War as Peter—now a grown man—leads a band of Carolina mountain men though a series brutal engagements fought in the southern colonies from 1780 to the final surrender of the British at Yorktown in August 1781.
“The fourth book on the exploits the Treegate family during the Revolutionary War brings an excellent series to a grand finale... A refreshing change from the usual black and white treatment of this subject, the treachery of Treegate’s own men is
never hidden from view.”—Kirkus Book Review
“A great introduction to the American Revolutionary War for both young readers and adults alike!”—Goodreads Review
Leopard's Prey (Book 5)
An epic historical maritime adventure...
In this first of a new Treegate trilogy, we see the Napoleonic War between the French and the English War and the events leading up to the American War of 1812 through the eyes of 12-year-old Manly Treegate, an orphan growing up in the home of his uncle Peter Treegate in Salem, Massachusetts.
Manly, an American citizen, is captured and impressed against his will to serve on the British frigate Leopard in 1807. He experiences the cruelties of life in the British navy and sees action in several battles as a powder boy before falling overboard during a battle against a French warship off the coast of Haiti.
Leopard’s Prey is the fifth in a seven-book series, which makes a great companion to a study of American History.
“Spirited political discussion, seagoing strife from Norfolk to Haiti, and actual incidents of international conflict add pace and flavor to this light historical adventure on the order of the author’s four previous Treegate chronicles.”—Kirkus Review
“The sea battles are exciting and described with expertise, the characters are interesting and real, and a great deal of the history of the War of 1812 is unobtrusively included.”—School Library Journal
Manly Treegate Frontiersman (Book 6)
“Best Books of 1973.”—School Library Journal
“Outstanding book for young readers.”—Junior Literary Guild
In the next book in the Treegate series on American History, the author takes readers to the Battle of Tippecanoe…
While their uncle is in England trying to avert war, 18-year-old Manly Treegate and his 12-year-old brother, Peter, go to the Ohio frontier to prepare for war with the British-backed multi-tribal confederation led by a Native American Shawnee warrior named Tecumseh in what would become known as the Battle of Tippecanoe.
“Nowadays no one writes the kind of boys’ adventures spun by Stevenson and C. S. Forester, but Leonard Wibberley carries on the tradition with tongue in cheek… Each new escapade revives the pleasures of old-fashioned narrative.”—Kirkus Reviews
“…the Treegates’ wonderful escapades—including a ride on Nicholas Roosevelt’s Ohio River steamboat and a hilariously abortive duel—are intermixed with moments of painful truth, as when Manly discovers the bones of a massacred band of Mohawk Indians and sees the signature of manifest destiny firsthand.”—The Washington Post
“Dramatic action, a fine feeling for the frontier and the wilderness, and an excellent sense of history give strength to the novel.”—Horn Book
The Last Battle (Book 7)
In the seventh book in the Treegate Book Series, Leonard Wibberley concludes his epic saga of the Treegate family during the War of 1812…
Manly Treegate has become captain of the brig Wild Duck in the young United States Navy. He has orders to seize any British shipping sighted in West Indian waters—and he does so with the help of his old friend Gubu, leader of a band of pirates. Among Manly’s crew is young Peter Treegate, who often chafes under the discipline of a captain who happens to be his older brother but who is also determined to follow the family tradition of service.
Meanwhile, Major Peter Treegate, uncle of the young Navy men, is meeting with dangers of his own as he experiences the war from the European side, seeking French help for the new government.
The two Peter Treegates are reunited in the decisive Battle of New Orleans.
“The author's historical sense is superior and consistently lively… Certainly few writers nowadays could pull off a high-spirited sea battle with anything like Wibberley’s elan.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Leonard Wibberley concludes his Treegate family saga on a larger scale than the traditional sea story… His characters are spread over two continents, and they all wind up together to get into the Battle of New Orleans in 1814. It’s a good yarn—reading about brave young men under fire. Wibberley gives the landlubber an exciting voyage.”—The New York Times
Apprentice to a Revolution (BONUS Book 8)
In the eighth book in the Treegate Series on American History, the author takes readers back to the beginning—to the Revolutionary War—with another epic adventure with a new young hero...
In this classic coming-of-age story set during the Revolutionary War, 16-year-old Matt Tyler (a naïve cobbler’s apprentice) unwittingly aids a rebel spy and is forced to slip behind British enemy lines to survive—only to be captured by the Continental Army. His only hope to make it home alive is to find a strength he never knew he had.
Along the way, Matt finds himself caught up in major events of the Revolutionary War—from the Crossing of the Delaware and the Siege of Boston to the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.
“Ten years after (the telling of this story), Matt Tyler, now a prosperous Philadelphia cobbler, acts about recording the story of his and his companions’ roles in the Great Liberty War. Lively descriptions of the battle between the Continental Army and the Hercules, clever interpolation of actual and fictional characters, and a strong sense of locale, all act together here to give the young reader a full sense of the times. Matt, the picaresque hero, is likeable, both as a lovelorn apprentice and later, when as a result of his experiences in the war, he emerges a solid and realistic adult.”—Kirkus Review
★★★★★ “Exciting battles on land and sea, generals and spies, a courageous pirate and a cowardly captain, Red Coats and Pennsylvania Riflemen, and a little romance and heartbreak—all figure into this high-spirited tale of America’s struggle for independence.”—Goodreads Review