Military Miscellany II: Manuscripts from Marlborough's Wars, the American War of Independence and the Boer War

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This excellent volume, under the general editorship of the late Dr. David G. Chandler, provides the reader with English/British soldiers' accounts from Marlborough's wars in the early eighteenth century, from Ireland and North America during the tumultuous 1770s, and from the Second Boer War in South Africa during the martial watershed at the conjunction of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.The first section, edited by Chandler with the assistance of Christopher L. Scott (formerly Head of Education for the British Royal Armouries), consists of the journal of Sergeant John Wilson, who enlisted in the 15th Regiment of Foot in 1694. He served in the English contingent that fought in Flanders in the late 1690s and throughout "Marlborough's Wars"—the War of Spanish Succession. Wilson claimed to have fought in Marlborough's four great battlefield victories: the "bloody and cruell battell" of Blenheim, 1704; Ramillies, 1706; Oudenarde, 1708; and "the desperate and bloody" battle of Malplaquet, 1709. In around 1715, Wilson was able to transfer to the Horse Guards, and he was apparently serving as a senior noncommissioned officer in the Life Guards when he completed his journal in 1736. While there are a number of shortcomings in Wilson's account, as identified and fully described by the editors, it is one of only a handful of extant "lower ranks" accounts of early eighteenth century warfare. As a result, through his journal, Wilson—"an Old Flanderkin Serjeant"—"gives us yet another window into the mindset of the professional soldier of Marlborough's wars."Captain Hon. William Leslie served in the British Army from 1770 until he was killed at the 1777 Battle of Princeton during the American Revolution. His letters from Ireland and North America, edited by Dr. Marianne M. Gilchrist, comprise the second section of this volume. Serving in Ireland from 1770 to 1775, Leslie described in his letters his regimental and social life, and he recounted attacks by Protestant tenant farmers and the suppression [End Page 1122] of riots caused by economic depression. Leslie arrived with his regiment, the 17th, at Boston in early 1776. Details of the 22 August 1776 Battle of Long Island, other engagements, British strategy, Hessian performance, relationships torn apart by the "American Cause," and family concerns fill his interesting letters from North America.The last section of the book consists of the Second Boer War diary of Private Robert E. Cross, 1st Battalion, the Leicestershire Regiment. Born in 1878, Cross added two years to his actual age and enlisted in the British Army in 1895. He began his diary on 24 September 1899, weeks before the actual outbreak of war, when his battalion was posted at Ladysmith, Natal. Cross fought at the Battle of Talana Hill, was besieged in Ladysmith, served on garrison duty, and slogged with his fellow infantrymen across the South African veldt. Cross's diary, edited by Robin Jenkins, reveals a literate soldier-author who was a keen observer and chronicler of a battalion at war in South Africa.Military Miscellany II maintains, in terms of value and relevance of the primary source material, editing expertise, and production quality, the high standards established by previous Army Records Society volumes. Each of the three sections in this book contains an introduction that provides contextual and historical background to its subject, well researched and insightful endnotes, and a comprehensive index. Title: Military Miscellany II: Manuscripts from Marlborough's Wars, the American War of Independence and the Boer War Author Name: Chandler, David Location Published: Sutton Publishing: 2005 Binding: hardcover Book Condition: As New Pages: 271 Categories: European Colonial Wars, Biographies & Memoirs, European Wars 1700s Seller ID: 1421

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