Imperial Echoes

Author: Giddings> Robert  

Publisher: Pen and Sword‎

Publication year: 1994

E-ISBN: 9781783836109

P-ISBN(Paperback): 9780850523942

Subject: K562 Ireland

Keyword: 爱尔兰

Language: ENG

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Description

The years between the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 and the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 are sometimes described as 'The Long Peace', the there were in fact British Soldiers fighting somewhere in the world throughout the whole of that period, usually in an effort to restore order in some far-flung parts of the Empire 'upon which the sun never set.' Although these campaigns have been well documented by numerous historians, Robbert Giddings, well known as author, journalist and writer for radio and television, here adopts an entirely new approach and relies largely on first-hand accounts to show not mealy what happened but what it was actually like to be there. His sources are many and varied and not confined the the soldier's own records. Nothing, for instance, could surpass in vividness Florentia Sale's brilliant account of the terrible retreat from Kabulin 1842. Due respect is also paid to the courage of the opposition. As Lieutenant Charles Townshend wrote after Omdurman in 1898, 'The Valour of these poor half-starved Dervishes...would be graced by Thermopylae.' The book continues eye-witness accounts from the following campaigns and minor wars: Maratha, Gurkha, Burmese, Ashanti, opium, Afghan, Maori, Sikh, Kaffir, Persian, Abyssinian, Zulu, Boer, Egyptian, Sudanese and Matabele. The list alone shows how busy the British Soldier was throughout the nineteenth century. The text itself brilliantly recapture the nature of soldiering in that era.

Chapter

INDIA AND THE RAJ 1799–1858

1. Wellington in India 1799–1803

2. A Bloody Campaign (The Gurkha War 1814–16)

3· The destruction of Maratha Power (The Third Maratha (and Pandari) War 1817–18)

4· A Splendid Tenacity (The First Sikh War 1845–46)

5· The Punjab Annexed (The Second Sikh War 1848–49)

6. The Indian Mutiny 1857–58

PAGODAS, PALACES AND PAHS

7· Crushing an Expansionist Policy (The First Burma War 1824–26)

8. Hong Kong the Prize (The First Opium War 1839–42)

9· A Fair if Savage Fight (The First Maori War 1843–48)

10. A Subaltern's War (The Second Burma War 1852–53)

11. Burning the Summer Palace (The Second Opium War 1856–60)

12. A formidable Foe (The Second Maori War 1860–70)

THE EASTERN QUESTION

13. An Expensive and Dangerous Garrison (The First Afghan War 1839–42)

14. Their's Not to Reason Why (The Crimean War 1854–56)

15. Victory in the Gulf (The Persian War 1856–57)

16. With 'Bobs' to Kandahar (The Second Afghan War 1873–74)

AFRICA 1824–1902

17. The King's Drinking Cup (The First Ashanti War 1824–31)

18. The Loss of the Birkenhead (The Eighth Kaffir War 1850–53)

19. The March to Magdala (The Conquest of Abyssinia 1867–68)

20. Sir Garnet and King Koffee (The Second Ashanti War 1873–74)

21. Raids, Ambushes and Skirmishes (The Ninth Kaffir War 1877–78)

22. Tragedy and Triumph for the 24th Foot (The Zulu War 1879)

23. The Transvaal Revolt (The First Boer War 1880–81)

24. War on the Nile (Egypt and the Soudan 1881–98)

25. The Death of a Noble King (The Matabele War 1893)

26. Prempeh Deposed (The Third Ashanti War 1895–96)

27. And so, Rhodesia … (The Matabele Uprising 1896)

28. The Last of the Small Wars (The Second Boer War 1899–1902)

Epilogue

Select Bibliography

Index

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