Dear Mr Cornwell I have been a fan (for want of a less adolescent word) for many years now. I began, as I am sure many people do, by reading your Sharpe novels in the late 90’s in my early 20’s and moved on to your other books from there. You have given many happy hours of reading so I firstly want to thank you for that. I finished reading The Fort yesterday. I have to admit that I know almost nothing about the British/American wars except the basics of Jamestown etc that I learnt at school. I should point out I was raised in the UK but have been living and working as a teacher in Christchurch New Zealand since 2003. When I began reading The Fort I was amazed to find that I spent a good deal of time in the region you were writing about and those events took place in. In 1999 (aged 22) I worked on a kids summer camp near Sergentville in Maine.. I actually spent the evening of July 4th in a bar in Castine. I never ever realised (and no-one told me) of the events of that town. I wonder now if they all thought, “dont tell the Limey or he’ll take the mickey”, or whether they also were unaware of the regions history. I spent my lunch hour today on Google Earth looking at the area once more. I was amazed to find that Fort George now appears to have a baseball pitch in it! My wife and I met each other working on that summer camp in 1999 and always said we would try to return to Maine one day. I hope to have a look at some of the locations you mentioned in the book when we eventually get there once more. I also wanted to say that I have begun teaching a year 7 (11-12 year olds) social studies (history/geography etc) class this year and one of the topics I had to teach was the Vikings. Yes even over here the Danes get a mention in history class. I spent a couple of lessons reading the class the first chapter of The Last Kingdom and they thoroughly enjoyed it and drew me some great pictures based on the events of that chapter. Most of them drew a picture of Ragnar holding Uhtred’s brothers head near the gates of Bebbanberg. With plenty of use of their red felt pens. The mind of a child is a gory place. I think I may have secured a few new readers for you. Thank you once again and I look forward to your next book.

Chris Grage