Military

The result of the Seven Weeks’ War in 1866 subordinated the Austrian Empire to Prussian ambitions. Brian Bond describes the last lightning victory in the Napoleonic manner, until Hitler’s blitzkrieg of 1940.

A.W. Palmer describes how the troubled politics of Serbia played a large part in precipitating the first World War. By a policy of violence and assassination, a group of army conspirators, known as the “Black Hand,” laid a fuse to the Balkan powder-keg.

General and trooper alike, Napoleon's cavalry brought a superb panache to the drab business of war. James Lunt describes how, for fifteen years, there was “hardly a village in Europe between Moscow and Madrid” through which these dashing horsemen did not ride.

F.J. Hebbert and G.A. Rothrock introduce the greatest military engineer of his age, Vauban, who served Louis XIV with unflagging devotion.

William Allan introduces the Napoleonic military genius; in Napier’s words, ‘the best loved Frenchman England ever fought’.

The supreme direction of the First World War has remained a matter of controversy; in this essay, John Terraine contrasts Lloyd George’s hopes with the manner of their realization.

Thomas Pakenham describes the ill-fated but remarkable efforts of a tiny French naval expedition to help conquer Ireland for the rebels during the 1798 Rising.

John Raymond offers the picturesque records of an amiable spendthrift who lived through the greater part of one of the most eventful centuries of English history.

Raymond A. Mohl describs how the nineteenth century history of Anglo-Russian conflict in Central Asia is marked by gradual Russian advances and gradual British retreats.

M.J. Sydenham describes how, returning from the Colonies “with a most dreadful antipathy towards the government and nation”, this one-time highwayman conceived the scheme of striking a dramatic blow for America”.