Book On G. Washington Wins $50K Mount Vernon Prize

MOUNT VERNON, Va. (AP) -- A European author's take on the father of our country has won the $50,000 annual George Washington Book Prize.

Stephen Brumwell's book, "George Washington: Gentleman Warrior," focuses on the earlier years of Washington's career as a frontier fighter in the French and Indian War and an officer who relied on British models of military organization in molding the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.

Brumwell, a former newspaper reporter who was born in England and lives in Amsterdam, received the award Tuesday night at Washington's Mount Vernon estate in northern Virginia.

The book prize honors the year's top work about America's founding era. It is sponsored by Washington College in Chestertown, Md., the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History and Mount Vernon.

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