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Armchair General brings British history to the reader by making a battle the focal point of an easy read 700 word per day narrative. Each day of the calendar year is the anniversary of a British battle or siege, Viking through to the War on Terror, 393 battles fought on all 366 days of the year on all five continents. The date is pivotal to that battle or siege ie the first or final day. The book is presented in calendar days with all the great battles included and many lesser known, always British but often in conjunction with the Commonwealth and our other allies. Many people will have heard of Bannockburn, Agincourt, Yorktown, Waterloo, Spion Kop, Passchendaele, El Alamein etc but do they know why they were fought? Do they know why September 15th is Battle of Britain Day? Armchair General explains why and is consequently much more than just a series of battles. Politics, economics, geographics and strategies are all included with relating extra points of interest.The reader can cover the 1214 years between the 793 Sack of Lindisfarne and the 2007 battle of Musa Qala in chronological order and is suited for all audiences from a casual reader to a history buff, covering the basic points of the battle and the consequences. Armchair General should have its place in every British household and every British classroom, certainly every public house and probably every coffee shop.

There are many books about Great War heroes. Relatively few are written about survivors and even fewer detail their whole lives or the wider context of their service. In this approach to the Great War, Richard Cullen takes the reader through history, led by the medals of five who served, each decorated for distinguished service; to wide-ranging political and military contexts, the personal side of their lives in war and peace, and the untold contributions that they made. What do the medals tell about the people who wore them? Where did they serve? How full were there lives? What wider historical and tactical contexts surrounded them?Readers will learn of aspects of service, battles and ways of making war that they might otherwise not have found in one place; philanthropy, volunteering, care for the injured, supplying an army, the dangerous monotony of the trenches, the Allied Intervention in the Russian civil war. Each of the subjects covered here led diverse lives. They served on land, in the air, and later at sea. Their stories are untold and open our eyes to the struggles that so many faced without formal recognition. In these varied and multi-layered accounts are tales of sadness, power struggle, modesty and compassion, bravery and a fulfilled post-war life.

Soldiering is a serious, frequently bloody business. That aspect has been documented endlessly. But behind the blood, thunder and de-humanising aspects of conflict are people – people in uniform and people supporting them. All of them have personal feelings and aspirations and they experience the humdrum assortment of daily occurrences that closely match those of their counterparts in civil society. Those aspects of their lives are not widely reported, or appreciated, and it is on those that this book has its focus.‘Life Wasn’t Boring’ relates the life, times, successes, failures and, most importantly, the personal inter-actions and loves of a professional infantry officer and his family, over more than a third of the century that was his service. Some parts are as serious as can be expected of a military account. Other parts might surprise, entertain and even amuse the reader. Together they hold up a mirror to reveal the human side of being a soldier.

The postcards in It’ll All Be Over By Christmas paint a picture of the First World War as experienced by those at home, at the front, in training, in hospital and in convalescence. These personal messages were sent from fathers to their wives and children, sons to family, friends and loved ones – sharing their thoughts, hopes and worries as well as the lighter side of life. There are cards from those at sea, in prisoner-of-war camps and those of the Central Powers.   Featuring over 150 illustrations, including some rare examples, the book also demonstrates how the postcard was ulitised to enlist volunteers and boost morale through humour, sentimentality and propaganda. Postcards encouraged support of the war effort through fundraising, sending ‘comforts’ to those on the front line and promoting practical roles for women.This fascinating book offers a profound insight into the experiences of war through postcards, as well the part that they played in promoting it.

The complete set of Eagle comic strips which tell the story of Winston Churchill's life - his birth at Blenheim, his education at Harrow and Oxford, his time in the army as well as his appointment to government and eventually to his stint as War Leader.

The Twisted Florin details the incredible wartimebravery, amazing ingenuity and coincidences withdaring and courage long associated with WW2 escapeand evasion. It also offers fresh perspectives on thedevastating personal effect of the war on servicemenand civilians, on both the home front and in occupiedEurope.

There could be no truer witness to the enormity of the First World War, and its terrible cost in lives, than the memorials and war cemeteries along the old Western Front. In Canada, no less than in the other Dominions of the British Empire, the war left a conflicting legacy of pride and sorrow that endures to this day. The soaring Vimy Memorial, the Brooding Soldier, and the monuments honouring Canada’s significant contribution to the Allied victory symbolize the spirit of shared sacrifice and nationhood that emerged from the crucible of the war; but alongside this official commemoration there exists a poignant, strangely overlooked, record of the grief and search for consolation among the Canadian populace in the years after the Armistice. This has come down in the personal inscriptions which the Imperial War Graves Commission invited next of kin to have engraved on the headstones of the fallen. Simple, heartfelt, often gems of compression, these farewells preserve the voice of Canada’s bereaved, the parents, the wives, the children, who were left to mourn and to seek meaning and comfort in their loss. This book offers an anthology of epitaphs drawn from the war cemeteries where Canadian soldiers lie buried in Flanders and France. Photographs and war art will transport readers to the sites, and each chapter will review the sources and themes of the epitaphs to establish their place in the national memory of the First World War. And while of particular interest to Canadian readers, the close cultural affinity between Great Britain and the English-speaking Dominions should make these epitaphs accessible and relevant to readers whose countries were as profoundly affected by the ordeal of 1914-1918.

Published to coincide with the 60th anniversay of Britain’s first successful thermonuclear bomb testing in the Pacific, H-Bombs and Hula Girls tells the tale of ten young men brought together through National Service in the Royal Navy and taking part in Britain’s top secret tests near Christmas Island. They experience at extremely close quarters what the world is told were three megaton H-bomb explosions, going on to show their country’s flag in Hawaii, then around the South Pacific, and finally round all of South America. Theirs is the only British warship ever to sail directly from Port Stanley to Puerto Belgrano, mooring next to the Argentine flagship General Belgrano. H-Bombs & Hula Girls evokes the Cold War atmosphere of Britain in the 1950s and the race to secure the nation’s place among the thermonuclear powers, but also paints the picture of a heterogeneous group of young men enjoying life-shaping experiences together: learning to be sailors, exploring island paradises, participating in three vast explosions, being their nation’s goodwill ambassadors as they encounter completely different cultures, and here and there experiencing life-threatening moments and even having their hearts broken. This fascinating memoir of the last Royal Navy Gunroom at sea, crafted from journals, letters, and contemporary records, plus the wonders of hindsight, culminates in the surprising realisation that Operation Grapple may not have been quite what it seemed.

Killed in action atGallipoli in the Dardanelles Campaign of 1915, aged just twenty-seven, Henry Gwyn JeffreysMoseley was widely regarded as the most promising British physicist of hisgeneration. His pioneering measurements of X-ray spectra provided a firm basis forthe concept of atomic numberand re-cast the periodic table of the elements into its modern form. Had he survived, he seemeddestined to win a Nobel Prize.This book is acommemoration of Moseley’s life, work, and legacy. Inspired by the exhibition ‘DearHarry… Henry Moseley: A Scientist Lost to War’, at the Museum of theHistory of Science, Oxford, in 2015-2016, and revisiting earlier accounts,thirteen historians and scientists chart his experience of Manchester andOxford; his military service; the reception of his work by the scientificcommunity; and the impact of his work upon X-ray spectroscopy in physics,chemistry, and materials science. For Science, King &Country speaks to those with an interest in history, science, and theFirst World War, and draws upona wealth of archives, artefacts, and recent research on the reward systems of science.Overall, it presents a comprehensive account of a young scientistwhose brief but mercurial careerpaved the way to a new understanding of nature, and to shaping the future of physicalscience.

An account of the battles of Isandlwana and Rorke’s Drift, Zululand, 22nd January 1879, by Capt.Penn Symons, 2nd 24th Regt. The account details the battles of Isandlwana and Rorke’s Drift from a first hand perspectiveand subsequently from the few remaining survivors of both battles who are included in the listof survivors of 1/24th Regt; Pte. Williams, groom to Col. Glynn, Pte. Bickley, band member,Pte. Wilson, band member, Pte. Trainer, rocket battery, Pte. Johnson, rocket battery, Pte. Grant,mounted infantry and officers who escaped to include; Capt. Essex 75 Regt., Capt. Gardener,14th Hussars, Lieut. Cachrane 32 Regt. Lieut. Smith Dorrien, 95th Regt and Lieut. Curling R.A. This unique book has been created in association with the Victoria Cross Trust from a leatherboundoriginal, digitised and carefully updated from hand-written annotations contained in thetyped manuscript for ease of reading.

One day, a small bundle of letters was found in a flea market. Kept together for one hundred years, these few letters tell of one teenage boy, Percy, and his girl, Kitty. This is a story of 1918, and of young people caught up in war, and of the war itself. It is a true story. Percy Edwards was conscripted into the Royal Welsh Fusiliers in 1918. Trained at Sniggery Camp near Liverpool, he was sent to the front, aged just 18. Percy’s letters were few and his words sparse and immature, but they are very powerful. Tragically, he was to die of his wounds three weeks after his arrival.Percy: A Story of 1918 is a unique book. Built around the words of a Young man from Wales, its narrative is constructed from surviving documents, war diaries, accounts of battle, and newspapers. It is an accurate picture of the war of 1918, a true story of one soldier representing the bigger picture. Written by historian Peter Doyle in prose that is accessible to young readers, it is illustrated by Tim Godden, renowned illustrator of the war. What Percy brings is an authentic testimony of the final year of the Great war, through the eyes of one young man. Percy’s story is typical of the last year of the war, when the British Army fielded a conscript army of 18 year olds. It was this army that would go on to win the war.It is also a story of the contribution of Wales to the Great War.

City Boys at War considers a campaign of just eleven months, from September 1939 to July 1940, viewed at the micro level – the perspective of a gunner, his wife, his family and his comrades. In 1938 Alfred Ledger joined the Lloyd’s Battery of the 53rd (City of London) Heavy Anti-Aircraft Regiment, Royal Artillery, a Territorial Army unit based at White City. He was called up in August 1939. This book's narrative is based on letters between Alfred and his wife and the regimental histories. It starts with the so-called Phoney War, the months up to the German attack in the west ending with Operation Dynamo and the escape of the British army from Dunkirk. However, the events described here do not end on the beaches of Dunkirk but with a second, little known, rescue, Operation Ariel (also known as Aerial), the organised escape of allied troops and civilians from ports in Brittany and western France. Ariel was just as successful in its objective as Dynamo, rescuing 190,000 troops.Dunkirk has become part of British folklore. Ariel has been forgotten. As for Haddock Force, the units sent south to defend French military airfields in the event of RAF bombers using them as refuelling bases en route to bombing northern Italian cities, history moves into the realms of mystery. But it is these events that the narrative follows.

Fortunino Matania is the forgotten genius of illustration. He is perhaps best known in his role providing Great War illustrations such as ‘Goodbye Old Man’ for The Sphere. Art ran in Matania's blood - his father Eduardo was a respected artist, and his cousin Ugo also contributed to The Sphere. Matania was blessed with a photographic memory, was able to work at great speed, producing illustrations that were unnervingly photographic in their realism.Matania’s pictures were superbly accurate and authentic. During the war, he often visited the Western Front, often putting himself in danger to gather material for his work. When not able to do this, he would interview eyewitnesses and take along toy soldiers when he spoke to recovering men in hospital to ensure battle positions were recorded faithfully. Back at his studio, he had an enormous collection of uniforms, weapons and other props to ensure every last detail of his finished picture was correct.This is the first time the entire First World War collection of his works has been published and marks not only a prolific career and exceptional body of work in the art world, it captures much that was written about, but could never have been photographed a century ago yet was etched in the minds of a generation.

In war, it is not just the knavish tricks of the enemy but also the home grown unfortunate occurrences that result in disasters. This book chronicles the circumstances surrounding an aging Panamanian freighter, the SS Capira, on her last voyage in convoys PQ 15, QP 13 and SC 97. During the period between November 1941 and September 1942 she witnessed a number of significant losses brought about by allied actions that far outweighed those caused by the enemy. John Chuter tells SS Capira’s story using primary archive material from the UK, USA, Canada, Russia and Germany as well as interviews, letters and previously unpublished contemporaneous eyewitness accounts. He recounts the political, strategic, tactical and technical issues that shaped the events, as well reliving the accounts of the extraordinary sailors who took part in the action.

The Ypres Times was the journal of the remembrance movement, the Ypres League. Founded in 1921, the League was the creation of Henry Beckles Willson and Beatrix Brice. Both Brice and Beckles Willson understood the crucial significance of Ypres to the British Empire, and believed it their sacred duty to maintain the memory of those who had fought and fell in its defence. As the League’s journal, the Ypres Times published a huge range of material. It carried reminiscences of veterans, discussions about the rebuilding of Ypres, the developing work of the Imperial War Graves Commission in the salient, and the erection and unveiling of unit memorials. The Ypres Times reproduced for the first time, in facsimile format and bound in three volumes provides a fascinating insight into the way the British Empire’s central commemorative site was understood and imagined in the twenties and thirties.