Title search results
Showing 1061 - 1080 of 2619 items
Political and Military Leadership in the World Wars: The Closest Concert (Routledge Studies in Modern History #78)
By Carl Cavanagh Hodge. 2021
This book approaches the World Wars and the decades between them as a single unit in modern history. It is…
impossible to understand either the cause or conduct of the 1939–45 war without an appreciation of the issues not wholly answered in the conflict of 1914–18. Bridging the World Wars was the establishment, revision, and ultimate collapse of the Versailles settlement and the League of Nations system between 1919 and 1939. The 1919 settlement was contested in the 1920s by Fascist Italy and began to unravel irreparably in 1931 with Japan’s incursion into Manchuria. The strategic thought of the interwar years is therefore especially instructive in assessing the prosecution of WWII, as the military ventures of these two revisionist powers pointed toward future developments even before Germany thrust a new way of war upon Eastern and Western Europe. Meanwhile, Britain, France, and the United States began an incremental conversion to new approaches to war in the air and on the sea in particular. The interwar decades are best understood as a period of calibrated rearmament by all the powers based on assumptions about the probability of a future war and the nature of its prosecution.War and the Future: Italy, France And Britain At War (The World At War)
By H. G. Wells. 1912
Excerpt: "One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the Tour of the Front. After some months of…
suppressed information—in which even the war correspondent was discouraged to the point of elimination—it was discovered on both sides that this was a struggle in which Opinion was playing a larger and more important part than it had ever done before. This wild spreading weed was perhaps of decisive importance; the Germans at any rate were attempting to make it a cultivated flower. There was Opinion flowering away at home, feeding rankly on rumour; Opinion in neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tangles of misunderstanding and incorrect valuation between the Allies. The confidence and courage of the enemy; the amiability and assistance of the neutral; the zeal, sacrifice, and serenity of the home population; all were affected. The German cultivation of opinion began long before the war; it is still the most systematic and, because of the psychological ineptitude of the Germans, it is probably the clumsiest. The French Maison de la Presse is certainly the best organisation in existence for making things clear, counteracting hostile suggestion, the British official organisations are comparatively ineffective; but what is lacking officially is very largely made up for by the good will and generous efforts of the English and American press. An interesting monograph might be written upon these various attempts of the belligerents to get themselves and their proceedings explained."Millions of men volunteered to leave home, hearth and family to go to a foreign land to fight in 1914,…
the start of the biggest war in British history. It was a war fought by soldier-citizens, millions strong, most of whom had volunteered willingly to go. They made up the army that first held, and then, in 1918, thrust back the German Army to win tYateley in the Great War (Your Towns & Cities in the Great War)
By Peter J. Tipton. 2018
There were fewer than 500 houses in Yateley in WWI but with Aldershot, Farnborough, Camberley and Sandhurst close by, this…
Hampshire villages response to the call to arms was more prepared than most, and punched above its weight.Using contemporary evidence from many sources researched by our local history team, the Yateley Society recreates the impact of the War on our predecessors. The story of the men who left Yateley to fight -- territorials, regulars, volunteers and conscripts -- is told alongside that of the battalions of Kitcheners New Armies training in trench warfare on Yateley Common. At the same time, in the three private houses forming the Yateley Military Hospital, Yateley women of all ages were tending wounded soldiers.With its intimate glimpses into village life, this book, will fascinate anyone with Yateley connections. The names of many families in the village of 100 years ago are here, while for recent newcomers with perhaps a Victorian or Edwardian house there may be clues to the history of your homes.With its many illustrations and maps, this exploration of the social network, and social consequences of the Great War on a small community in North East Hampshire has interest for historians and general readers alike.Sniping in France: Winning the Sniping War in the Trenches
By H. Hesketh-Prichard. 2013
Available for the first time in years, this is a new edition of the classic account by the adventurer and…
big game hunter who developed and ran the British Army sniping programme in the First World War. When the war started in 1914, Germany's edge in the sniping duel on the Western Front cost thousands of British casualties. Sniping in France explains the methods Hesketh-Prichard used to reverse the situation and help win the sniping war. A glossary of terms and a photograph of the author have been added.Seaford and Eastbourne in the Great War (Your Towns & Cities in the Great War)
By Kevin Gordon. 2014
How the experience of war impacted on the town, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German kaiser in…
time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Seaforth and Eastbourne were committed to as the war stretched out over the next four years. A record of the growing disillusion of the people, their tragedies and hardships and a determination to see it through. The Sussex seaside towns of Seaford and Eastbourne were closer to the action than most places; the sound of naval battles could be heard from the coast (and sometimes witnessed by those with a good pair of binoculars). When the wind was in the right direction the rumble of artillery from France bought the frontline into the streets. At the start of the Great War, Eastbourne was an elegant and blossoming resort and did its best to maintain its tourist trade despite the arrival of soldiers, aeroplanes, refugees and the wounded. Seaford was a much smaller resort with a population of under 4,000 however thousands of troops from all over the Empire were billeted in the area either at private homes or in two massive camps. The Seaford camps were the venue for training, parades, fighting, murder and even rioting. Nearby Newhaven became an important port in which provisions were transported to the front. Conscientious Objectors, some under threat of the death penalty worked on the docks and the nearby roads. In his book Seaford and Eastbourne in the Great War local historian, Kevin Gordon tells the story of how the conflict affected, not only these seaside towns but also of the soldiers (many of them teenagers) who answered the call to battle. It is a story of spies, schoolchildren and sacrifice; a story that, for many, ended in the cemetery at Seaford which today is one of the largest Commonwealth War Graves in the South of England.Manchester in the Great War (Your Towns & Cities in the Great War)
By Joseph O'Neill. 2014
How the experience of war impacted on the town, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German kaiser in…
time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Manchester were committed to as the war stretched out over the next four years. A record of the growing disillusion of the people, their tragedies and hardships and a determination to see it through. Manchester was more profoundly involved in the Great War than any provincial city. Manchester men volunteered in greater numbers than any others; its women, hardened to the rigours of factory life, flooded into munitions and engineering workshops and toiled long hours while contending with cruel shortages. Children's lives were disrupted as schools became hospitals and the city developed into a major centre for treating the wounded. A great port, an industrial powerhouse, the region's commercial and distribution centre, Manchester overcame hunger and deprivation to become the engine that drove an exhausted and impoverished nation to an unlikely victory.Airfields & Airmen: Somme (Battleground Europe)
By Mike O'Connor. 2002
The latest volume in the Airfields and Airmen series covers the Arras area. It includes a visit to the grave…
of Albert Ball VC and the graves of Waterfall and Bayly, the first British fliers killed in action. There is a visit to the aerodrome from which Alan McLeod took off from to earn his VC and to the grave of Viscount Glentworth, killed while flying with 32 Squadron. The German side is well covered with visits to their cemeteries and aerodromes. This well researched book relives the deadly thrills of war in the air over the battlefields of the Western Front.Temporary Heroes: Lieutenant Norman Cecil Down
By Richard Van Emden. 2014
This is a short book based on the letters written between 1915 and 1916 by an officer serving with the…
1/4th Gordon Highlanders. Second Lieutenant Down wrote regularly to his girlfriend/fiance throughout his time in France, letters which were published in 1917 after he was wounded and discharged from the army. Cecil Down is a superb writer, but more than that he has a natural wit that translates easily to the page, making this one of the most enjoyable books I have read on the war.I have chosen this book because it is so different from anything else I have read. He captures life in France with great accuracy while remaining steadfastly upbeat and humorous. Nevertheless, there are moments when he is serious, and that makes his words poignant and attention-grabbing.Norman went to France in February 1915, serving continuously until July 1916. He died on 14 March 1984 aged 91Eighth Army's Greatest Victories: Alam Halfa to Tunis 1942–1943
By Adrian Turner. 1999
To read many accounts, it would appear that the Eighth Army's victory at El Alamein was quickly followed by its…
triumphant arrival at Tunis. Adrian Turner, the experienced authority on the period, redresses the imbalance by describing brilliantly the progress of this legendary fighting force and describing the ferocity of such battles as that for the Mareth Line. The author deftly handles strategic level thinking, the tactical battles and individual contributions. Aviation readers will be thrilled by recognition of the Desert Air Force's contribution, too often neglected.On 8 September 1944 the first of over 1,000 V2 missiles aimed at southern England exploded in west London. It…
had been launched from a wooded street corner in Den Haag in the Netherlands. Fighter Command was responsible for defending Britain from air attack and thus Air Marshal Roderic Hill countered the threat by using six squadrons of Spitfires from 12 Group bases in Norfolk to discover and then dive-bomb the mobile V2 launch sites scattered throughout the Dutch towns and countryside. This was no easy task as the missiles were well camouflaged and often positioned adjacent to dwellings occupied by civilians. The RAF was under orders to cause minimum damage to Dutch property and life, therefore precision bombing became a necessity. This is a full account of the campaign including discussions of the strategy and tactics employed and the equipment used and it also considers the effect upon Dutch civilians. It draws upon the experiences of sixteen Allied pilots, ground crew and the Dutch who were at the receiving-end of the attacks.Tutta la nostra gioventù
By Mathieu Legendre. 2021
L'odissea del barelliere Tabouret. Dal 1914 al 1919, seguite Camille Tabouret sui principali teatri operativi del fronte francese. Adattando l'originale…
diario di guerra di Camille Tabouret, Mathieu Legendre ne ha fatto un racconto dinamico e moderno e ci fa scoprire la Der des Der in un modo originale. Accompagniamo Camille nella sua missione di recuperare i feriti e i morti vicinissimo alle linee nemiche, nell'inferno delle trincee e degli spostamenti del suo reggimento. Sopravvivendo a questo conflitto, Camille ci ha lasciato una testimonianza notevole, ora accessibile a tutti.Combat Over the Trenches: Oswald Watt, Aviation Pioneer
By Chris Clarke. 2017
'Father of the Flying Corps' and 'Father of Australian Aviation' were two of the unofficial titles conferred on Oswald ("Toby")…
Watt when he died in tragic circumstances shortly after the end of the First World War. He had become the Australian Army's first qualified pilot in 1911, but spent the first 18 months of the war with the French Air Service, the Aronautique Militaire, before arranging a transfer to the Australian Imperial Force. Already an experienced combat pilot, he rose quickly through the ranks of the Australian Flying Corps, becoming a squadron leader and leading his unit at the battle of Cambrai, then commander of No 1 Training Wing with the senior AFC rank of lieutenant colonel.These were elements in a colorful and at times a romantic career long existing interest and attention - not just during Watt's lifetime but in the interval since his death nearly a century ago. His name had been rarely out of Australian newspapers for more than a decade before the war, reflecting his wealthy lifestyle and extensive and influential social and political connections. But this focus has enveloped Watt's story with an array of false and misleading elements verging on mythology. For the first time, this book attempts to establish the true story of Watt's life and achievements, and provide a proper basis for evaluating his place in Australian history.Eyewitnesses at the Somme: A Muddy and Bloody Campaign, 1916–1918
By Tim Cook. 2017
In 1915, news of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landing and the slaughter at Gallipoli stirred tens of…
thousands of young men to go to war.They answered the call and formed battalions of the Australian Imperial Force. By the time the new recruits were combat ready, the campaign at Gallipoli had ended. Their battlefields became the muddy paddocks of France and Belgium.Based on eyewitness account, Eyewitnesses at the Somme traces the story of one of these battalions, the 55th, from its birth in the dusty camps of Egypt through three years of brutal, bloody conflict on the bitter western front.When the Great War ended in 1918, over 500 of the 3,000 men who served in the 55th had been slain and another 1,000 wounded. Eyewitnesses at the Somme, shares personal stories of Australian men as they stared down the horrors of war with determination, courage and comradeship. With chapters devoted to the significant battles at Fromelles, Doignies, Polygon Wood, Pronne and Bellicourt, this book tells the story of one battalion, but in doing so it encapsulates the experiences of many Australians on the Western Front.Carnage: The German Front in World War One (Images of War)
By Alistair Smith. 2012
These amazingly well preserved photographs originate from German collection. They cover the full gamut of the dreadful conditions that all…
troops involved in that ghastly war experienced between 1914 and 1918. The collection portrays life and conditions in the German trenches, the carnage of the wrecked villages and buildings in which they lived and fought and views of the destruction wrought by the Allied offensives. Many of the photos show downed British and French aircraft and often with their crew, dead or alive. Captured British and French troops are seen being held before shipment to PoW camps well behind the lines. The utter destruction of the country surrounding the Front is difficult to comprehend.This is not a book for the feint hearted since it clearly portrays the true horror of World War One as experienced by the German Army.Authors: Jon Sutherland has written extensively on military history and warfare. Much of his previous work has concerned the American involvement in the European in World War I and the European theater of World Wars I & II. Diane Canwell has written works on European history and is much involved in the research for this book.Combatants and Civilians in Revolutionary Ireland, 1918-1923 (Routledge Studies in Modern History)
By Thomas Earls FitzGerald. 2021
This book is based on original research into intimidation and violence directed at civilians by combatants during the revolutionary period…
in Ireland, considering this from the perspectives of the British, the Free State and the IRA. The book combines qualitative and quantitative approaches, and focusses on County Kerry, which saw high levels of violence. It demonstrates that violence and intimidation against civilians was more common than clashes between combatants and that the upsurge in violence in 1920 was a result of the deployment of the Black and Tans and Auxiliaries, particularly in the autumn and winter of that year. Despite the limited threat posed by the IRA, the British forces engaged in unprecedented and unprovoked violence against civilians. This study stresses the increasing brutality of the subsequent violence by both sides. The book shows how the British had similar methods and views as contemporary counter-revolutionary groups in Europe. IRA violence, however, was, in part, an attempt to impose homogeneity as, beneath the Irish republican narrative of popular approval, there lay a recognition that universal backing was never in fact present. The book is important reading for students and scholars of the Irish revolution, the social history of Ireland and inter-war European violence.Originally published in 1957, the original blurb reads: ‘From these studies of the secret diplomacy surrounding the entry of Turkey…
and Italy into the First World War, emerges a picture of the complex machinery behind the obvious wheels of international politics. The activities of statesmen and diplomats are related to the ramifications of big business, banks, oil and armament companies. The story of each move and counter-move, told mostly in the actors’ own words and with many quotations from actual memoranda and dispatches, is based on sources which are quite new. The Russian collections of confidential correspondence, which include foreign diplomatic dispatches intercepted and deciphered in Russia, and the latest Documenti Diplomatici Italiani are practically unknown to the British public. This material has been integrated with that taken from all the available collections of British, French, German, Austro-Hungarian and American diplomatic documents, official publications, contemporary periodicals and economic and financial data, and such mines of information as the diaries, recollections and private letters of those involved. This unusual combination of source material allows some general conclusions to be drawn as to the laws and logic of the diplomacy of power politics. The most striking fact, perhaps, is the diplomatic war among allies. The book brings out the deep-seated conflicts of interests in the German-Austro-Hungarian coalition, and those dividing Britain, France, Russia and Italy in the Near East, the Balkans and the Mediterranean. Another point of special interest is the inter-group and party struggle inside the countries for or against war; and another is the genesis of some of the fateful Secret Treaties which bedevilled the peace settlements of 1919-20.’ Today it can be read and enjoyed in its historical context.The St. Mihiel Offensive: 12 to 16 September 1918 (Battleground The Americans 1918)
By Maarten Otte. 2020
An account of the American Expeditionary Force’s attack and “an excellent guide to trace the locations of one of the…
last great battles of the Great War” (On the Old Barbed Wire).The St. Mihiel Offensive, which took place between the 12th and 16th September 1918, was the first full-scale attack that was under the direct command of the Americans, in the person of General J. Pershing. He combined his command of the First (at the time the only) American Army with that of Commander in Chief of the AEF, a tremendous burden.The American attack (with the assistance of a French Corps) was an outstanding success and the Germans were forced into a rapid withdrawal to the Michel Line, a strongly defended position that formed the Hindenburg Line in this area. On the other hand, the success was in part assisted by the fact that the Germans intended to withdraw from the exposed position of the Salient back to this line, the only question being the timing of such a move. Historians argue about whether the move had actually begun or not; but the reality is that senior German officers knew that it was imminent and certainly some heavier artillery had already been pulled back.It is probable that relatively easy success here led to overconfidence among some that the next offensive, the Meuse-Argonne—to the north and scheduled to begin on the 26th, would have a similar outcome. If so they were in for a rude awakening.This book is profusely illustrated with contemporary photographs and numerous maps, the narrative supplemented by a number of firsthand accounts; the whole is supported by several walking and car tours.The King's Men: The Sandringham Company & Norfolk Regiment Territorial Battalions, 1914–1918
By Neil R Storey. 2020
&“An absorbing account of the Norfolk Territorials who fought at Gallipoli and created a legend&” from the author of Beating…
the Nazi Invader (Firetrench). The 4th and 5th Battalions, the Norfolk Regiment were formed in the early days of The Great War as part of the Territorial Force and deployed with 54th (East Anglian) Division to Gallipoli in 1915. Most significantly the 1/5th Battalion was unique in that it contained The Sandringham Company, the only unit to be raised entirely from a Royal Estate. Tragically the Company, along with King George V&’s Agent Captain Beck, disappeared without trace on 12 August 1915, presumed to have been overcome by their Turkish adversaries. The Battalion was rebuilt and saw out the ill-fated Gallipoli Campaign being evacuated to Egypt in December 1915. Thereafter the Norfolks served with distinction in Palestine as part of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. The author has compiled a fascinating history of these Battalions&’ distinguished service using contemporary records and personal accounts illustrated with a splendid selection of photographs. The result is a fitting tribute to the memory of these brave volunteers.&“Brilliant local (Norfolk) social historian Neil Storey tells the story of the Norfolk Regiment and its campaigns during and after the Great War. Beautifully illustrated and full of amazing and fascinating facts, this is social and military history at its very best.&” —Books Monthly&“Neil Storey manages to compose a very interesting and passionate book, which once again demonstrates the effort and war contribution of small British communities during the Great War tragedy.&” —On the Old Barbed WireThe dispatch of an Ottoman Army by Australian-led Imperial air power in the Wadi Fara on 21 September 1918 occurred…
just five years after the advent of military aviation in Australia. In 1914, the fledgling Australian air service operated the flimsy Bristol Boxkite; four years later it was flying the far more advanced Bristol F2B Fighter. This leap forward represented a profound progress in technology that has typified the technical development of aviation, particularly in Australia ever since. Ironically, on 21 September 2014, 96 years after the events of the Wadi Fara, Australian squadrons were again deployed to the same part of the world where they would remain for more than three years on operations against extremist terrorism. Armageddon and OKRA contrasts these events, a century apart, in the context of the development of Australian air power. The book tracks the history where Australia has maintained a balanced air service compelling high technical, logistics and engineering standards, and effective training and command and control systems, for more than 100 years. These processes were as applicable a century ago as they are today. By examining these operational events, the author establishes the connection that access to the technology associated with air power is intrinsically linked to Australia&’s enduring foreign and defence policy – more so, that military power is a means to an end, and never an end unto itself.