October 2016 Ɩ Issue 73 Ɩ £4.50 www.military-history.org
MEDIEVAL CASTLES Eleventh-century fortiications
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Ɩ Athenian Navy, 429 BC ƖƎ6WRQHZDOOƏ-DFNVRQ Ɩ%DWWOHRI4XHEHF
uld th Anglo-Saxons hav the Battle of Hastings? RED NAPOLEON
THE CHEMISTS’ WAR
The career of the Red Army’s Marshal Tukhachevsky
Chemical weapons of the First World War
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October 2016 Ɩ Issue 73 Ɩ £4.50
MEDIEVAL CASTLES
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Eleventh-century fortiications
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1066 EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD: Martin Brown Archaeological Advisor, Defence Estates, Ministry of Defence
Mark Corby Military historian, lecturer, and broadcaster
Paul Cornish Curator, Imperial War Museum
Gary Gibbs Assistant Curator, The Guards Museum
Angus Hay Former Army Oicer, military historian, and lecturer
Nick Hewitt Historian, National Museum of the Royal Navy, Portsmouth
Nigel Jones Historian, biographer, and journalist
Alastair Massie Head of Archives, Photos, Film, and Sound, National Army Museum
Gabriel Moshenska Research Fellow, Institute of Archaeology, UCL
Colin Pomeroy Squadron Leader, Royal Air Force (Ret.), and historian
Michael Prestwich Emeritus Professor of History, University of Durham
Nick Saunders Senior Lecturer, University of Bristol
Guy Taylor Military archivist, and archaeologist
Julian Thompson Major-General, Visiting Professor at London University
T
he Battle of Hastings – fought 950 years ago this month – was one of the most decisive in British history. It installed a long succession of foreign rulers on the English throne. It dispossessed the entire Anglo-Saxon aristocracy of their estates. It created a bitter division between a French-speaking feudal elite and the English-speaking common people that lasted for centuries: in the 17th-century revolution, radicals still spoke of ‘the Norman yoke’. In our special feature this issue, Hazel Blair analyses the opposing forces and the course of the battle, and Jack Watkins discusses the vital contribution of William I’s programme of castle-building to the Norman consolidation of power. A critical issue arises. Was the battle a triumph of feudal heavy cavalry and the inauguration of a new era in British military history? Or was the defeat of the Anglo-Saxon ‘shield-wall’ really just down to bad luck? But there is much more this issue. Marc DeSantis takes us back to 5th-century BC Greece with an analysis of two battles that confirmed the maritime supremacy of the trireme fleet of the city-state of Athens. Also this time, Michael Freemantle explains why the First World War came to be called ‘the chemists’ war’, while Bill Wenger reports on the military career of ‘the Red Napoleon’ – the interwar Soviet marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky. Finally, Patrick Mercer continues our Regiment series by recalling the exploits of the Louisberg Grenadiers at Quebec in 1759.
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Ɩ Athenian A h ia Navy, N vy, 4299 BC Ɩ Ǝ6WRQHZDOOƏ H OOƏ -DFNVRQ -DFN RQ Ɩ %DWWOH WW RI 4XHEHF X F
uld th Anglo-Saxons hav the Battle of Hastings? RED R NAPOLEON A
THE T CHEMISTS’ WAR A
The career of the Red Army’ r s Marshal a s Tukhachevsky ha h
Chemical weapons of the t e First F r World W l War ar
ON THE COVER: The Normans won a decisive victory at the Battle of Hastings on 14 October 1066. Credit: The Battle of Hastings (oil on canvas), Lovell, Tom (1909-97) / National Geographic Creative / Bridgeman Images
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CONTRIBUTORS THIS MONTH’S EXPERTS MICHAEL FREEMANTLE is a science writer. He is author of The Chemists’ War, 1914-1918 and Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! How chemistry changed the First World War.
PATRICK MERCER is a former soldier, journalist, and MP. He is interested in any action of the British Army or Royal Navy, but has made a special study of the Italian Campaign.
BILL WENGER JACK WATKINS served for 42 years is a writer on in the US Army military history, heritage, and before retirement. He volunteered for conservation. He is multiple tours in the general editor Iraq and Afghaniof the Encyclopedia of Classic Warfare (1457 BC-AD 1815), stan. In civilian life he is a real-estate executive and college instructor. published by Amber.
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MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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er 2016 | ISSUE 73
ON THE COVER
The Norman Conquest Hazel Blair proiles the men who fought at Hastings in 1066 and analyses the battle, while Jack Watkins explores the castles built by William the Conqueror in the years following his invasion.
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Chemists at War
Welcome
3
Letters
7
Chemical weapons, 1914-1918
Notes from the Frontline
8
The First World War made ever-increasing demands on chemistry. Michael Freemantle explores ‘the chemists’ war’.
12
Tim Rayborn on the wartime experiences of poet-musician Ivor Gurney.
War Culture
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10
Maria Earle examines the artistry of masking First World War injuries.
War Composers
Background Warriors Battles Castles Timeline
FEATURES
UPFRONT
Behind the Image
INCLUDES:
Athenian Navy 42 The The Battles of Chalcis and Naupactus, 429 BC Marc DeSantis studies two battles fou by the Athenian navy in its heyday.
14
MHM examines art from the Second World War
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Tukhachevsky The Red Napoleon Bill Wenger examines the little-known career of the Red Army’s Marshal Tukhachevsky.
54 REGIMENT The Louisberg Grenadiers Patrick Mercer recalls the role of the Louisberg Grenadiers in General Wolfe’s decisive victory at Quebec in 1759. 4
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October 2016
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68 MHM REVIEWS Book of the Month | 62 Nick Hewitt reviews Churchill’s Navy by Brian Lavery.
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n View | 66 HM’s round-up of the best ilitary history titles.
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WAR OF WORDS
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
with Marc DeSantis
‘KNIGHT’ The term ‘knight’ has ancient roots in the English language, appearing as early as the 9th century as cniht , meaning ‘boy, youth, or lad’. The word appears in the 10th-century Lindisfarne Gospels, where it meant a boy who was employed as an attendant or a servant. The meaning eventually broadened to include a male servant of any age, and then became attached to the military followers of a king or lord. But the knight, as commonly understood, was more than just a servant. Adhering to a code of chivalry, he was expected to defend the Christian religion and the Church, ight on behalf of his lord, and protect the weak. The knight was also a prominent member of the feudal society of medieval Europe, having been given his land by his lord in exchange for a pledge of military service. This land produced the revenue he required to purchase the horse and weapons necessary to ight. Many years of training were needed before one could become a knight. A boy, perhaps seven years of age, would first live as a page in a wealthy household, serving meals and learning the rudiments of war. Aged 14, the boy would take service with a knight, as his squire, and would care for his horse and armour. After a few years, when his training was complete and he was deemed ready, he would himself be dubbed a knight. Armed with a sword and lance, the knight was terrifying atop his charging warhorse. He was the premier warrior of the Middle Ages. Today, knighthoods are still coveted and have been awarded to diverse igures for distinguished service and other achievements. Such figures include Winston Churchill, mountaineer Edmund Hillary, and musician Elton John.
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L E T T ER OF T HE MON T H THE GREAT DEBATE It has been good to read the two opposing viewpoints outlined in your articles on the historiography of the Somme (MHM 70 and MHM 71), but I do think that, in supporting the ‘war poet’s’ view of the Somme battles and the Great War, Neil Faulkner has been too inluenced by the 20/20 vision of hindsight. In 1916, the British Army was largely inexperienced and the British oicer corps was equally inexperienced. The Somme was a steep learning-curve, but the lessons of how and how not to wage war on a 20th-century industrialised battleield had to be learnt – and they were, but at a terriic cost in life and in the health of people like my grandfather. But what other option was there? German troops had dug in well into French territory, and most of Belgium was occupied and defended. The French and the British either had to attack to drive out the Germans or to accept that the territory was lost to an expanded Germany, and that a new frontier would be formed; ater the humiliation of 1870, that could never have been acceptable to France. New weapons were as yet untried, and their impact was not easily assessed. Nobody could have foreseen how tanks would cause terror at irst, but that the Germans would soon work out efective countermeasures (for example, using ield-guns as anti-tank guns) – but they did. So the scene was set for a giant slugging-match, as the French and British tried to expel the dug-in Germans. But, at the time, was there really any other option? It would seem not.
Bob Britnell Canterbury
GREEK GOLD I would like to point out a possible error in MHM 71 regarding the presentation of the David Brewer’s book Greece: the decade of war. Actually, the error is not yours, but Mr Brewer’s. In your interesting summary of the book’s contents, you refer to its statement that the gold reserves of the Bank of Greece were seized by the German Army. This is completely false. The Germans may or may not have seized minor deposits of regular money, or small portions of gold found in vaults of various bank branches (although, by then, most people would have hidden their valuables). But, although they looked for it, they never found the Bank of Greece’s reserves. As the German invasion of Greece was imminent, the government decided to transfer the gold and foreign currency reserves to Crete. The Greek Navy’s destroyers, Queen Olga and King George, left Athens on
3 March 1941 to transport them. They arrived at Souda naval base in Crete the next day. From there, the reserves were transferred to South Africa and finally to Britain, where they remained for the duration of the war. The gold was finally repatriated after the war, although – and this may be just a rumour – not in its entirety, for unknown reasons. Aris Panagiotopoulos Athens
ILLUSTRATING JUTLAND The painting of HMS Lion on the cover of MHM 70, purporting to show her at the Battle of Jutland, was probably painted after 1918, since the artist has included alterations to the ship that did not take place until after the battle. The searchlight tower in front of the mainmast was installed in 1917, and the cowl on the fore-funnel in 1918 at the earliest. S J Brophy Chester
Please note: letters may be edited for length; views expressed here are those of our readers, and do not necessarily relect those of the magazine.
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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into the hillside during the First World War, but only ive have survived the hundred years since it was fought. The Fovant Home Guard added a further two badges during the Second World War, and another badge was cut in 1970 by the Royal Corp of Signals. All the badges are looked ater by the Fovant Badges Society. The Society has just completed a project to add a new badge to the hillside, in commemoration of the centenary of the First World War. The new poppy-shaped badge is a
tribute to the original badges and was made by volunteers nd students of rchaeology. Researchers are ow focusing on the story of the military mp in the area. Lead chaeologist Kristian rutt of the University outhampton said, ‘Archive plans and photos of the camp show us it was vast – comparable in size to a small town. ‘We hope to establish just how far the site extended across the countryside and will look for hidden clues beneath the ground that help us to understand its footprint and identify the areas that might warrant further investigation.’ The Fovant Badges project and the archaeological research are part of a project inanced by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The new badge will be oicially unveiled later this year.
Professor Pittock thinks that post-conflict propaganda, depicting the battle as a victory for the civilised man over the savage, was later used to justify imperialism. He added, ‘The Jacobite period has been strongly and systematically misremembered in order to emphasise a secure framework for the development of “Britishness”
and the British imperial state. From as early as the 1740s, historians often took their cue from the language of antiJacobite propaganda.’ Culloden has recently been published by Oxford University Press. It is part of the Great Battles series and costs £18.99. Visit http://global.oup.com/academic for more information.
CHALKY CURIOSITIES: THE FOVANT BADGES
Fovant Down in Wiltshire is adorned with a curious group of chalky symbols, cut into the hillside by soldiers waiting to be sent to the Western Front during the First World War. The signs are giant regimental badges. They were made in 1916, in commemoration of friends and colleagues already lost in the war.
What really happened at the Battle of Culloden? Culloden has been frequently presented as a battle fought by an incompetent, ill-equipped, and badly led Jacobite army wielding swords against superior, professional Redcoats armed with muskets. A new book by Murray Pittock, Bradley Professor of History at the University of Glasgow, challenges this consensus. Murray shows that Government forces actually won the battle by blade, while the Jacobites, though few in number, were professionally managed and effective fighters throughout the clash. Professor Pittock said, ‘Arguably no battle out of living memory is remembered so powerfully and so falsely. 8
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
A team of archaeologists from the University of Southampton are investigating the area around the badges. Using advanced geophysical survey techniques, the archaeologists are studying the badges, the site of a First World War military camp, and the location of an Iron Age hill fort.
RIGHT Professor Murray Pittock.
‘On Culloden Moor, what was in some ways the last Scottish army sought to restore the Stuarts to a multikingdom monarchy more aligned to European politics than colonial struggle. They were, in many essentials, a regular army. ‘They were outnumbered but not outgunned, and cavalry proved their downfall. My own archival research and the battlefield archaeology of the site shows that it was not British ball that brought down kilted swordsmen as much as British dragoon blades that cut down Jacobite musketeers. ‘Culloden as it happened is in fact much more interesting than Culloden as it is remembered.’
October 2016
Images: Fovant Badges Society
Our round-up of this month’s military history news
Save HMS President
Images: Silkeborg Museum
10th-century unearthed Archaeologists excavating near the town of Haarup in Denmar have uncovered a larg example, dating from the 10th century, of th mighty Dane axe. These axes were frig weapons. Dane axe-hea made from iron or ste a long wooden shaft. The weapons were heavy and cumbersome, and warriors required great skill in order to wield them effectively in battle. The axe was found in a 13ft by 43ft tomb. It had been placed with the remains of a Viking warrior, who was buried next to a woman some time in the mid 10th century. Another male warrior’s remains were added to the tomb at a later date, along with a second, smaller axe. The feared Dane axe was an elite weapon – most Scandinavian warriors would have
SECRETS OF THE SOMME BATTLEFIELD The 38th (Welsh) Division sufered heavy losses at Mametz Wood during the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The soldiers who fought there were accused of a lack of resolve at the time, and there has been confusion over their defeat ever since. But a new survey of the battleield landscape might help to explain it. Aerial mapping company Bluesky lew over the site and made a 3D laser-scan of the area, which revealed terrain features not visible to the naked eye. Digitally stripping the wood of trees, researchers found that the area is home to two rectangular craters, not depicted on any map from the period. The features were likely part of a quarry constructed before
ght with s and dging covered al, and goods found avation, those e were of some s were inlaid examples found by the archaeologists at Haarup were not decorated. They were made for war. The Dane axe became an increasingly popular weapon in Europe in the 11th and 12th centuries. Harold Godwinson’s housecarls brandished similar two-handed weapons at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. The excavation was led by Kirsten Nelleman Nielsen, an archaeologist from the Silkeborg Museum in Denmark. Her team will continue to research the site to find out more about the 10th-century Haarup community.
the war, and may have been obstacles the troops did not expect to face. Another, less well-deined feature was uncovered, which was also not depicted on contemporary maps. This econd feature may be even more signiicant in terms of e events that unfolded in the area in 1916. Louise Bray of earhug TV, which mmissioned he scan for a ocumentary, said, A series of deep nterconnected trenches was discovered… rable on the entire Somme battlefront.’ She added that the results of the survey ‘might inally allow accusations of lack of determination on the part of the Welsh troops to be put to bed’. The documentary, titled Wales at the Somme: Gareth Thomas and the Battle of Mametz Wood, was aired on BBC One on 4 July 2016.
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First World War battleship HMS President could be restored to her former glory if a £3 million appeal to the Treasury’s Libor Fund is accepted. HMS President Preservation Trust submitted the appeal, having been denied support from the Heritage Lottery Fund. The warship was launched in 1918 as HMS Saxifage, but was renamed HMS President in 1922. She is one of three surviving warships built by the Royal Navy during the First World War. Wearing dazzle camoulage, she hunted German U-boats during the conlict. HMS President was transferred from the Thames to Chatham Dockyard earlier this year, and has most recently been used as a venue for conferences and events. The Trust hopes she can return to London as a loating museum. Visit www.hmspresident.com to ind out more.
MHM FRONTLINE
NEWS IN BRIEF
Planning for nuclear attack: the BBC at war For the irst time in its history, the BBC has given researchers access to emergency broadcasting plans drawn up during the Cold War. The War Book details how the Wartime Broadcasting System would have operated in the event of a nuclear attack. Eleven secret bunkers would have been used to house BBC staf, alongside government ministers. Each bunker had a studio, and the BBC’s headquarters would have been situated in a bunker at Wood Norton in Worcestershire. All broadcasting would have been governmentcontrolled. The BBC recorded hours of entertainment onto cassette tapes for public amusement in the event of a disaster, though these would likely never have aired as people would have been encouraged to preserve their radio batteries.
Rare Sopwith Pup displayed A rare First World War Sopwith Pup aircrat is now on display at IWM Duxford’s Air and Sea exhibition. The aircrat has recently been rebuilt using original and period parts. Sopwith Pup N6161 joined No.9 Squadron on 1 February 1917. It was lown by George Elliot on a photo-reconnaissance mission over Bruges that same day. But Elliot was forced to land ater being intercepted by German pilots Carl Meyer and Bernd Niemeyer. Sopwith Pup N6161 was captured and Elliot was sent to a PoW camp. The aircrat was lown to Nieumunster, photographed, repaired, and repainted with German markings, ater which it was involved in a collision. Some of the aircrat’s original parts were kept by Meyer, and these have been incorporated into the newly rebuilt aircrat. The Sopwith Pup will take to the skies as part of the Duxford Air Show: Meet the Fighters on 10 and 11 September 2016. The aircrat will remain on display until the autumn.
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ARTISTRY & INJURY
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MHM BEHIND THE IMAGE July 1918. A French soldier sits with great dignity in the studio of the artist Anna Coleman Ladd [ABOVE], as he is itted with a prosthetic mask to cover facial injuries sustained amid the mechanised destruction of the First World War. We can only guess at precisely how he came to be disigured – but the groundbreaking work of Ladd and her colleagues at the Paris studio known as the Tin Noses Shop, where mirrors were banned, helped thousands of wounded soldiers return to civilian and family life ater the trauma of a conlict that let 8 million men dead. Born in Philadelphia, Ladd was a sculptor, married to a physician, who followed her husband to Paris in 1917. Once there, she determined to put her artistic talents to practical use, setting up her ‘Studio for Portrait Masks’ in the city’s Latin Quarter under the aegis of the American Red Cross. Developing techniques pioneered in London by the artist Francis Derwent Wood, who stated, ‘My work begins where the work of the surgeon is completed,’ Ladd went further than ever before in matching a subject’s mask to their original features and colouring. In a series of lengthy processes, a mould was taken of the face and then worked on to reconstruct as closely as possible the individual’s features before injury. Using observation and pre-injury photographs, another mould was then made and worked on in detail in order to produce a thin copper mask that could be silvered and enamelled. The inal stage saw the artist employing palette and skill to paint the mask in oils to match the skin tone of the wearer. Though far from perfect, these inely crated masks superseded cruder rubber replacements for noses and ears that had previously been in use, allowing a new generation of wounded veterans to face the future with a conidence they may otherwise have found hard to muster.
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MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
Image: Library of Congress Text: Maria Earle
INJURED FRENCH SOLDIER BEING FITTED FOR A MASK, PARIS, 1918
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Tim Rayborn considers music and the experience of war
MENTAL ILLNESS Gurney had been sufering from mental illness before his service. He may have served in an attempt to alleviate his symptoms, but its efects remained with him for nearly 20 years, until his death in an asylum. Born into a family of modest means in Gloucester, his early interest in music received encouragement, and he became a chorister in the cathedral. As a young man, he heard the new music of Ralph Vaughan Williams and others: he was deeply impressed. Gurney was granted a scholarship to the Royal College of Music in 1911, and dived eagerly into the musical life and education that it ofered. He seems to have sufered from bipolar disorder. He had his irst real breakdown in 1913. He was well enough to take up his studies again in July 1914, but the winds of war were already stirring. He wanted to enlist, but was initially rejected because of poor eyesight. By February 1915, however, the military was easing restrictions on new recruits. He was accepted, joining the Gloucestershire Regiment as a private in the 5th Battalion, where he worked as a signaller. During this time, he began to devote himself to poetry – it was far easier than trying to write music while serving (though he would occasionally compose songs). He sent his poems back to his friend, the violinist Marion Scott, who collected them and eventually had them published. In April 1917, Gurney was shot in the arm, but the wound was not serious enough for him to be sent back to Britain. He remained on the 12
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
front. In July 1917, he was transferred to the 184th Machine Gun Company and, despite his eyesight, took up the position of covering his regiment with a machine-gun. He would later express guilt about killing young Germans – he saw them as no diferent from himself.
Ivor Gurney
GAS ATTACK In September 1917, he was hit by a gas attack. The efects were serious enough for him to be sent to the Edinburgh War Hospital, but he dismissed the severity of the attack during his time of recovery. In a letter to Scott he wrote, ‘Being gassed (mildly) with the new gas is no worse than catarrh or a bad cold.’ While in hospital, he developed a romantic attachment to a nurse called Annie Nelson Drummond, but this did not end well. Gurney did not return to France. He spent time in Seaton Delaval in Northumberland ater leaving the hospital, but he hated it. The combination of gassing, a failed romance, and being in a place that he despised seemed to bring on a new bout of his mental illness. He sufered a breakdown in March 1918, and contemplated suicide on 19 June 1918. He did not go through with it, and was honourably discharged on 4 October 1918. Gurney resolved to return to the Royal College of Music. There he took up studies with Ralph Vaughan Williams, himself a war veteran. Gurney produced some very ine songs during this period and had his poetry published, but his mental state was deteriorating. The diagnosis at the time was ‘delayed’ shell-shock. No doubt his war experiences had contributed substantially to his poor mental health, but he was of course the victim of a long-running disorder. He was not able to complete his studies at the College and withdrew.
Image: The photograph of Ivor Gurney is reproduced with kind permission of the Ivor Gurney Trust
Ivor Gurney is better remembered today as a poet, but he considered himself primarily a composer and only took to writing poems in earnest while in the trenches. His story is especially tragic.
And there is dreadful hell within me. And nothing helps.
“
IVOR GURNEY
BIOGRAPHY Born: Gloucester, 28 August 1890 Period of service: 1915-1918 Died: London, 26 December 1937
ASYLUM Returning to Gloucester, his behaviour became worse. Ater an attempted suicide, his family had him committed to an asylum in September 1922. He spent time in various hospitals over the next 15 years. Their living conditions allowed him to continue to write poems and music, but he oten
found his surroundings conining and distressing. He escaped more than once and, in one incident, turned up at the family home of the Vaughan Williams. The older composer sadly had no choice but to phone the hospital to come and collect him, though he said that he felt ‘like a murderer’ in doing so. October 2016
In the height of battle tell the world in song / How they do hate and fear the face of War.” From the poem To England – A Note
ABOVE British Vickers machine-gun crew wearing PH-type anti-gas helmets, near Ovillers during the Battle of the Somme, July 1916.
IN CONTEXT: GURNEY
Chemical weapons
www.military-history.org
I shot him, and it had to be / One of us ’twas him or me.” From the poem The Target
Image: Pamela Blevins
When chemical weapons were used during the First World War, their deployment was technically in violation of the 1899 Hague Declaration Concerning Asphyxiating Gases and the 1907 Hague Convention on Land Warfare. Nevertheless, both sides tried a variety of options, from tear gas and mustard gas (both intended to disable opponents) to lethal agents such as chlorine and phosgene. There was considerable unease about the idea of such weapons, and the British often justified their use as a necessary retaliation to German gas attacks. By the war’s end, gassing had caused some 1.3 million casualties on both sides, but, as in Gurney’s case, they were rarely fatal after 1915 – both sides were more prepared for them by then. Gurney was probably a victim of mustard gas. Germany had introduced it in July 1917, during the Battle of Passchendaele, where he was wounded.
MHM WAR COMPOSERS
QUOTES FROM IVOR GURNEY
Gurney was eventually diagnosed with delusional insanity. Indeed, he turned to writing new Shakespearean plays and may have believed he was Shakespeare. He died of tuberculosis at the City of London Mental Hospital at the end of 1937. Scott, along with Gurney’s admirers (who included composers Gerald Finzi and Howard Ferguson), endeavoured to promote his works to a wider audience.
ABOVE VAD nurse Annie Nelson Drummond (1887-1959), c.1916.
Dr Philip Lancaster from the University of Exeter will deliver a talk titled ‘Poet of the Great War: Ivor Gurney’ at the British Academy in London on 6 October 2016. He will be accompanied by Gavin Roberts on the piano. æ
Lying in dugouts, joking idly, wearily / Watching the candle guttering in the draught; / Hearing the great shells go high over us, eerily / Singing; how often have I turned over and laughed.” From the poem Photographs Gone out every bright thing from my mind. / All lost that ever God himself designed.” From the poem To God MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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Artwork commissioned by the War Artists Advisory Committee (WAAC) during the Second World War is due to go on display at a new exhibition in London. Established by the Ministry of Information in 1939, and chaired by National Gallery director Kenneth Clark, the WAAC hired some 403 artists to document the conlict. The committee’s self-stated aim was to ‘draw up a list of artists qualiied to record the war at home and abroad’. The exhibition takes its name from an eight-volume pocket-sized pamphlet series called War Pictures by British Artists. The series was published by Oxford University Press to help promote oicial war art at the height of World War II. The original booklets were issued in two batches, each comprising four themed titles. War at Sea, RAF, Army, and Blitz were published in 1942, and Soldiers, Production, Air Raids, and Women were issued one year later.
1.JOHN CECIL STEPHENSON (1889-1965), LOOKING TOWARDS HIGHBURY, CITY OF LONDON IN BACKGROUND... NIGHT OF APRIL 16 1941, 1944. OIL ON CANVAS
Owing to the booklets’ small size and the limitations of 20th-century printing, the artworks were reproduced in low-resolution and without colour. But the irst series was so popular that the initial print run of 24,000 copies sold out in just six months. Many other wartime illustrators drew and painted privately, their works gaining much less exposure. However, these artists added to the richness of the artistic record of the war, portraying it in a variety of styles and mediums, using diferent materials to emphasise the messages of their pictures. This October, in conjunction with Liss Llewellyn Fine Art, the Morley
Gallery in London will showcase many original WAAC pieces alongside unoicial war art from the same period. Housed in Morley College, which was home to a number of beautiful British murals destroyed during the Blitz, the display is a itting tribute to the devastating but not insurmountable damage wrought by the Second World War.
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All images: courtesy of Liss Llewellyn Fine Art, including 5. private collection.
This painting records the heavy bombing of London on the night of 16 April 1941, when 681 German aircraft rained explosives on the city. Fires raged all night and many buildings were damaged, including the Houses of Parliament, St Paul’s Cathedral, and the National Gallery. Stephenson applied weighty, bright-red pigments to his canvas to evoke the power of the blaze, while his use of black and grey underscores the smoky chaos it created. October 2016
MHM WAR CULTURE
3 2. ANONYMOUS, WINGS FOR VICTORY, UNKNOWN DATE. LITHOGRAPHIC PROOF
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Lithography was invented at the turn of the 19th century as a cheap printing technique. It is often used to print images and text in high quantities, and was commonly used to create wartime posters like this one. Wings for Victory fundraisers were held in towns across the country to collect money for new aircraft. The main body of this poster has been left blank so that the details of the next event can be added later.
3. ERIC FRASER (1902-1983), RAF PILOT EJECTING FROM HIS BURNING PLANE, 1942. PEN AND INK Public enthusiasm for flying aces was reinforced by images like Eric Fraser’s comic-book-style depiction of an RAF pilot. Drawn in thick ink, the pilot appears almost superhuman.
4. ALAN SORRELL (1904-1974), SKETCH FOR AN AERIAL VIEW OF A WARTIME AIRFIELD, c.1944. PENCIL, INK, AND GOUACHE ON TRACING PAPER Alan Sorrell joined the RAF in 1940 and his prolific art recorded everyday life in the Forces. Twenty-six of his works were purchased by the WAAC, who liked his modest, exact style. His precise pencil strokes and squaring of the page ensured that he presented this airfield accurately.
4 www.military-history.org
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5. EVELYN DUNBAR (1906-1960), MEN STOOKING AND GIRLS LEARNING TO STOOK, c.1943. OIL ON CANVAS
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Dunbar was the only female war artist to receive a renewable full-time contract with the WAAC. She was commissioned to enthuse women with depictions of their work on the Home Front. This rustic scene screams ordered production, hope, and fertility, but, for some unknown reason, the WAAC rejected it.
6. JOHN BUCKLAND WRIGHT (1897-1954), STALINGRAD, 1942. OIL ON CANVAS Buckland Wright joined the Scottish Ambulance Service during the First World War. He witnessed harrowing scenes in the trenches. His experiences affected him deeply, and this surreal, alien landscape expresses the inhumanity of the Second World War.
7. FRANCIS SPEAR (1902-1979), SAINT MICHAEL KILLING SATAN, UNKNOWN DATE. PEN AND INK, WASH AND WATERCOLOUR ON PAPER Spear was a stained-glass artist and lithographer. This design shows St Michael, the leader of God’s army against Satan, dressed as a soldier. Accompanied by Churchill’s words, ‘Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few’, the image commemorates the saintly sacrifice of RAF crewmen who fought in the Battle of Britain.
GO FURTHER WWII War Pictures by British Artists is on display from 28 October until 23 November 2016 at Morley Gallery in London. Address: Morley Gallery, Morley College, 62 Westminster Bridge Road, London, SE1 7HT Opening times: 11am-6pm Monday-Friday and noon-4pm Saturday Website: www.llfa.gallery Sacha Llewellyn and Paul Liss have edited and published a catalogue and essay collection to accompany the exhibition. 16
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October 2016
Image: WIPL
Chemists at war 1914-1918 The First World War is sometimes known as ‘the chemists’ war’. With chemicals at the heart of almost every action, this is more than hyperbole. Michael Freemantle explains. 18
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October 2016
LEFT Douglas Haig, British Commander-in-Chief on the Western Front. His ‘wearing-out struggle’ consumed unprecedented quantities of chemicals.
Chemists controlled the manufacture of ‘munitions, explosives, metals, leather, rubber, oil, gases, food, and drugs’.
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he industrial-scale slaughter and destruction of the Great War would not have been possible without the industrial-scale production of chemicals. When the belligerents engaged in battle, they spent most of the time firing chemicals at one another, most importantly high explosives, chemical-warfare agents, and incendiaries. To fire these chemicals, they needed another group of chemical materials: propellants. Furthermore, these propellants could not be ignited without the use of yet another group of chemicals. These were the primary explosives that detonated when the gun was fired. Chemicals were not just used for killing: they were also important for the care of the sick and wounded, and for providing protection. Chemists controlled the manufacture of ‘munitions, explosives, metals, leather, rubber, oil, gases, food, drugs’, noted British chemist MAIN IMAGE The modern battlefield is suffused with chemical agents. Here we see a French heavy trench-mortar in action on the Western Front, shrouded in the smoke generated by propellant charges. www.military-history.org
Richard Pilcher in an article published in 1917. He called the war ‘the chemists’ war’. But even with the best efforts of chemists and their chemical-engineering colleagues, the chemicals required for the war effort on both sides of the conflict could not be manufactured without raw materials. Within months of the start of the war, both Germany and Britain were in danger of running out of some of these vital raw materials.
THE NITROGEN PROBLEM In his final despatch as Commander-in-Chief of the British Armies in France, Field-Marshal Sir Douglas Haig observed that the British Army owed a great debt to science and scientists. The despatch, dated 21 March 1919, noted that the rapid collapse of Germany’s military powers in the latter half of 1918 was the logical outcome of the fighting of the previous two years. ‘It would not have taken place but for the period of ceaseless attrition which used up the reserves of the German armies.’ He referred to the war of attrition as a ‘wearing-out struggle’. As the war progressed, it became not just a wearing-out struggle of men but also one
of materials, the materials being the guns and ammunition to fight the enemy, and the raw materials required to manufacture the munitions. The British naval blockade, Haig observed, ‘sapped with more deadly insistence from year to year the strength and resolution of German people’. Germany entered the war with stocks of ammunition and explosives for an intensive campaign of just a few months. By the beginning of 1915, stocks had dwindled and so Germany had to ramp up production. But there was a problem: nitrogen. The manufacture of explosives such as trinitrotoluene (TNT), nitroglycerine, and guncotton (a form of nitrocellulose) relied on supplies of nitrogen-containing chemicals, most importantly nitric acid. Nitrogencontaining chemicals were also needed for the manufacture of the soil fertilisers ammonium sulphate and ammonium nitrate. The country had traditionally imported nitrate minerals from South America as raw materials to supply most of the nitrogen it required for the manufacture of explosives and fertilisers. The blockade put a stop to the imports. Germany had to find other sources of nitrogen. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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It was the first use of a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ in the history of warfare. then be converted into nitric acid, which in turn could be transformed into nitre by its reaction with potash, a mineral abundantly available in Germany. There is little evidence that Hindenburg’s chamber lye directive amounted to much. However, another solution to the nitrogen problem was on hand. Step in German chemist Fritz Haber, one of the most important chemists of the 20th century.
EXPLOSIVES FROM AIR GUNPOWDER FROM ‘CHAMBER LYE’ Urine provided one possible solution to the nitrogen problem. In early 1915, German women were surprised to see a newspaper advert addressed to them and signed by FieldMarshal Paul von Hindenburg. It read: The women of Germany are commanded to save their chamber lye, as it is very needful to the cause of the Fatherland in the manufacture of nitre, one of the ingredients of gunpowder. Wagons, barrels, and tanks will be sent to residences daily to collect and remove the same.
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ABOVE Paul von Hindenburg, German Commanderin-Chief in the second half of the war. He appealed to German women to pee for the Fatherland, such was the military demand for nitrogen.
Gunpowder is a mixture of nitre, also known as potassium nitrate or saltpetre, and two chemical elements: carbon (in the form of charcoal) and sulphur. Hindenburg’s scientific colleagues knew that under certain conditions urea, a nitrogen-containing chemical in urine, generates ammonia, a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen. The ammonia could
In August 1909, Haber and a young British chemist, Robert Le Rossignol, filed a patent for producing ammonia from nitrogen extracted from air, and hydrogen extracted from water. BASF, Germany’s largest chemical company, developed the process on an industrial scale. Production began in September 1913, the ammonia being used to make ammonium sulphate fertiliser. Haber and German chemist Carl Bosch, who led the BASF team, both won Nobel Prizes in Chemistry for their work on the process. The large-scale manufacture of nitrogenous fertilisers boosted food production in Germany,
October 2016
A British field-gun in action in 1918. A mix of chemicals was required for detonators, propellants, and explosives.
Poison gases Chlorine A lethal asphyxiating chemical-warfare agent prepared by the electrolysis of brine (a solution of sodium chloride in water). Chlorine was also employed to sterilise drinking water.
Image: WIPL
Phosgene Also known as carbonyl chloride, this highly toxic colourless choking-gas was used not only as a chemical-warfare agent, but also in industry to manufacture dyes and pharmaceutical products.
TWELVE FIRST WORLD WAR CHEMICALS Explosives TNT German chemist Julius Wilbrand irst prepared trinitrotoluene in 1863. In the First World War, the chemical was used as a blasting explosive in tunnelling operations and as a bursting charge in high-explosive shells. Lyddite The high explosive, also known as picric acid or trinitrophenol, was named ater Lydd, a town in Kent where it was manufactured. The British used the compound not only to ill shells, but also as an antiseptic by dissolving it in alcohol and water. Ammonal The name given to a variety of high explosives containing ammonium nitrate and aluminium.
and its people lauded Haber as the chemist who discovered how to produce ‘bread from air’. Soon after the war started, the process was employed to generate the ammonia needed to make nitric acid for the manufacture of explosives. Haber had effectively discovered a way of making ‘explosives from air’. FAR LEFT A German gas attack on the Eastern Front. LEFT Fritz Haber, the German chemist who produced first ‘bread from air’ and then ‘explosives from air’ – though later the choice became one or the other: ‘to starve or to shoot’. www.military-history.org
The explosives were used to ill hand grenades, shells, and trench-mortar bombs, and also as blasting explosives for underground mines. Amatol A high-explosive mixture of ammonium nitrate and TNT used by the British to ill shells when supplies of TNT began to run short. Cordite A British smokeless propellant consisting of nitroglycerine, nitrocellulose, and petroleum jelly. Mercury fulminate A primary explosive that detonates spontaneously and violently when subjected to shock or friction or when heated or hit by a spark. The compound was a key component of detonating compositions in fuses, grenades, bombs, and percussion caps.
As the war of attrition continued, Germany found it increasingly difficult to manufacture ammonia, by whatever means, in sufficient quantities to make explosives for the war effort and at the same time nitrogenous fertilisers for the farming industry. ‘The uncompromising alternative was to starve or to shoot,’ Haber observed after the war. Germany chose to shoot, and by the end of the war its people were starving.
FEMALE CHEMISTS On 22 April 1915, a German regiment of gas pioneers, supervised by Haber, unleashed 168
Mustard gas This oily liquid, also known as sulphur mustard or dichloroethyl sulphide, releases a vapour with a smell of mustard oil. The oil penetrated clothing, and caused painful blisters and burns. The vapour, if inhaled, resulted in terrible internal injuries. The Germans, French, and British all manufactured large quantities of the liquid for use as a blister agent in artillery shells.
Care of the sick and wounded Morphia Known as morphine nowadays, this bitter white crystalline compound was the painkiller of choice in the war. It is one of 50 or more nitrogen-containing organic compounds known as alkaloids that occur naturally in the opium poppy. Chloroform Surgeons used this colourless volatile liquid as an anaesthetic to carry out amputations and other operations on the wounded. The compound had been discovered in 1831. Chloride of lime Armies employed chloride of lime, also known as bleaching powder or calcium hypochlorite, as a disinfectant in the trenches, casualty clearingstations, and military hospitals.
tons of chlorine against the Allies defending the line at Langemarck, near Ypres. It was the first use of a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ in the history of warfare. Within a couple of weeks, British Secretary of State for War Lord Kitchener authorised the development and use of chemical weapons in retaliation for the German attack. Chemists were needed for the programme, so the War Office sent a notice to the Institute of Chemistry of Great Britain and Ireland calling for ‘men with a knowledge of chemistry’. But many chemists had already signed up for active service. Two memorials at the Royal MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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By 1917, Weizmann’s process was producing some 3,000 tons of acetone a year from maize and rice. Society of Chemistry headquarters in London list scores of chemists ‘who died in the service of their country 1914-1918’. It was not until late 1916 that Britain transferred all chemists in active military service to chemical duties at home. By then, a pool of qualified women chemists were already contributing to the war effort in the country’s academic, government, and industrial laboratories. In 1915, for example, the government hired May Leslie, who had graduated in chemistry at Leeds University in 1908, to carry out research in an industrial laboratory near Liverpool. Her investigations into the manufacture of 22
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nitric acid enabled the acid to be produced more efficiently. Martha Whiteley, a chemistry lecturer at Imperial College London, gathered a team of female chemists at the college to tackle the chronic shortages of pharmaceuticals, anaesthetics, and other chemical products that had been imported from Germany before the war. They not only developed ways of making local anaesthetics and painkillers for military hospitals, but also carried out research for the chemical warfare department of the Ministry of Munitions on tear gases and blister agents such as mustard gas. In one experiment, Whiteley applied a tiny smear of mustard gas to her arm to determine its effect and ‘for nearly three months suffered great discomfort from the widespread open wound it caused in the bend of the elbow’. She carried the scar for the rest of her life.
ACETONE FROM GRAIN In the early years of the war, Britain not only suffered shortages of the chemical products needed to care for the sick and wounded, it was also desperately short of one of the key chemicals needed to make cordite, the smokeless propellant used by the British Army and Royal Navy to fire their guns.
ABOVE A Canadian soldier with mustard-gas burns in a military hospital in 1917/18.
That chemical was acetone, a versatile solvent traditionally obtained from pyroligneous liquor, one of the products of heating wood under airtight conditions. Cordite factories used acetone to mix together the three components of cordite: petroleum jelly and the explosives nitroglycerine and nitrocellulose. Before the war, Britain depended on imports of the solvent from Austria and the United States for most of its needs and only produced small amounts itself. By 1915, stocks of the solvent were critically low. The country now faced the prospect of failing to meet the ever-increasing demands of its armed forces for the propellant. A discovery by Chaim Weizmann, a chemistry lecturer at the University of Manchester, provided a solution to the problem. Weizmann was born into a Jewish family in Belarus in 1874. After studying chemistry in Germany and Switzerland, he emigrated to England in 1904, and six years later became a naturalised British subject. Two years before the start of the war, he showed that the fermentation of grain using a certain type of bacterium yielded acetone. Soon after the start of the war, the fermentation process came to the attention of the October 2016
British Government, and Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, asked Weizmann to scale it up. By 1917, Weizmann’s process was producing some 3,000 tons of acetone a year from maize and rice. Weizmann subsequently became known as ‘the father of industrial fermentation’. In his autobiography, Weizmann, an ardent supporter of the Zionist movement, suggests that the Balfour Declaration, which encouraged the establishment of national home in Palestine for the Jewish people, was a reward for his services to the country. In July 1919, Weizmann was elected unopposed as president of the World Zionist Organisation, and in February 1949 became the first president of the State of Israel.
DAKIN FINDS A SOLUTION Troops in the First World War frequently lived for days in rat- and fly-infested trenches and dugouts, where they were bitten by fleas and clothed in lice-ridden uniforms. The wounded sometimes had to lie on the battlefield for hours or days in filthy clothing, mud, and soil teeming with dangerously infectious micro-organisms. Micro-organisms ‘have won more victories than powder and shot’, observed Canadian doctor Sir William Osler in an address at the outbreak of the war. Various reports estimate that diseases such as dysentery, typhoid, and gangrene caused 80% to 90% of all battlefield deaths during the European wars of the 19th century. In the Great War, that statistic was turned on its head. Shelling and rifle and machinewww.military-history.org
ABOVE The iconic object of the age of chemical warfare: the gas mask – here worn by a football team of British soldiers on the Western Front in 1916.
Shelling and rifle and machine-gun fire accounted for around 80% of all battlefield deaths, disease for just 20%. ABOVE Chaim Weizmann, ‘the father of industrial fermentation’, whose services to the chemistry of Britain’s war effort were, he suggested, rewarded with the Balfour Declaration.
gun fire accounted for around 80% of all battlefield deaths, disease for just 20%. The relatively widespread availability of chemical products, such as disinfectants, antiseptics, anaesthetics, and painkillers, enabled medical officers and nurses to provide much better care of the sick and wounded than had been possible in earlier wars. Early in the war, English surgeon Sir Rickman Godlee observed that practically all the wounds of soldiers injured on the Western Front were septic. Medical officers employed a wide range of antiseptics to combat these infections. They included preparations containing chemicals such as iodine, carbolic acid, picric acid, or hydrogen peroxide. Many of these preparations, however, proved irritating to wounds, even when applied as dilute solutions. In November 1915, English chemist Henry Dakin reported that a non-irritant antiseptic solution could be prepared by dissolving washing soda and bleaching powder in water, filtering out the solid that is formed, and finally adding boric acid, a mild antiseptic powder, to the solution. The following year, Dakin and Alexis Carrel, a French surgeon who had won the 1912 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, endeavoured to improve the treatment of infected wounds. Working together in a MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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CHEMICAL WARFARE TIMELINE 1914 August The French use hand grenades illed with ethyl bromoacetate, a tear gas.
1915 January The Germans ire T-shells at the Russians on the Eastern Front. These tear-gas shells contained a mixture of two chemicals: benzyl bromide and xylyl bromide. 22 April The Germans attack the Allies with clouds of chlorine gas released from cylinders during the Second Battle of Ypres. The attack was directed by Fritz Haber, ‘the father of modern chemical warfare’. May The British Army distributes smoke hoods to troops to protect against chlorine gas. The hoods are impregnated with chemicals that neutralise chlorine. 25 September The British employ chlorine gas as a chemical weapon in a cloud-gas operation at the Battle of Loos. December The Germans introduce their snout-type canister gas-mask. The Germans use phosgene mixed with chlorine in cloud-gas operations against the British in Flanders. Smoke hoods ofer no protection against phosgene.
1916 January The British issue troops with helmets that protect against chlorine, phosgene, and tear gas.
hospital in northern France, they developed the so-called Carrel-Dakin method. It involved flushing the surface of the wound frequently with a gentle stream of Dakin’s solution. As the solution rapidly deteriorated, it had to be freshly prepared before use.
DOUBLE AGENTS Some chemicals of the Great War acted as double agents, killing on the one hand and saving lives on the other. For instance, both Germany and the Allies employed chlorine as 24
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ABOVE British casualties of a German gas attack in 1917.
February Shells illed with a lethal poison gas are ired for the irst time in the war when the French bombard the Germans with phosgene shells at the start of the Battle of Verdun. The British begin to distribute the ‘box respirator’ gas mask, designed by English chemist Edward Harrison, to protect against a variety of gases. May The German artillery ire shells illed with diphosgene, another lethal chemical, against the French at the Battle of Verdun. 1 July On the irst day of the Battle of the Somme, the French ire shells that release highly toxic hydrogen cyanide. August On the Eastern Front, the Russians ire gas shells illed with chloropicrin. The chemical is a lung irritant and tear gas that penetrates gas masks designed to protect against chlorine and phosgene.
a chemical weapon. Yet the element was also essential for the manufacture of disinfectants like bleaching powder and anaesthetics such as chloroform. The British explosives ammonal and amatol are also examples. Both explosives contained ammonium nitrate, a compound that was also used as a soil fertiliser and therefore to feed people. Overall, the war was an unprecedented demonstration of chemistry’s ability to act as a double-edged sword. The discoveries of
1917 July The Germans ire shells illed with sternutators: chemicals that induce sneezing and vomiting. Their purpose is to force defending troops to remove their gas masks and thus expose them to lethal gases that were being ired simultaneously. The Germans begin to ire shells illed with mustard gas against the British. Gas masks ofered little protection against the chemical, as it attacked the whole body, causing blistering and severe burns. The vapour could be lethal if inhaled.
1918 16 June The French begin to ire mustard-gas shells on the Western Front. 29 September The British ire mustard-gas shells on the opening day of the Battle of St Quentin Canal.
chemists before and during the war provided a cornucopia of benefits for the armed forces and the civilian population. At the same time, the discoveries ripped open a Pandora’s box of death and destruction.
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Michael Freemantle is a science writer and author of The Chemists’ War, 1914-1918 (Royal Society of Chemistry, 2014) and Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! How chemistry changed the First World War (The History Press, 2012). October 2016
THE NORMAN
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October 2016
CONQUEST
INTRODUCTION
Image: WIPL
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www.military-history.org
he Battle of Hastings, fought 950 years ago this month, was the British debut of a new way of war, based on heavy shock cavalry. Though the feudal order had its origins as far back as the 8th century, the AngloSaxon (and, for that matter, Viking) military system had remained infantry-based. Hastings, on the other hand, was a clear-cut triumph of armoured cavalry over an infantry phalanx – and thus the beginning of ‘the age of chivalry’. At least, that is one contention. Medieval historian (and MHM Assistant Editor) Hazel Blair challenges this interpretation in our special feature. There are two related issues. First, the battle was long and hard-fought, with the Normans close to defeat as the light dimmed on that fateful autumn day. The reason was simple: heavy horse cannot break solid infantry. King Harold’s ‘shield-wall’ had stood firm through the long hours of battle. While it continued to do so, the Normans could not win. Tight-packed, many ranks deep, the front line and flanks were held by armoured thegns and housecarls who presented a barrier of shields and projecting blades to the enemy. Coupled with the shire militia of free peasants standing behind and hurling missiles overhead, the AngloSaxon line could not be broken by frontal assault. It was only last-minute accident and improvisation that finally allowed the Normans to penetrate and break up the shield-wall. The historical stakes could hardly have been higher. Yet the battle was exceptionally close-run, and the Anglo-Saxons were desperately unlucky to have lost. The second consideration is this: ‘the age of chivalry’ is an ideological construct, not a historical reality. Most Western armies throughout the Middle Ages were formed predominantly of infantry, and so long as the infantry was of good quality, discipline, and morale, it could not be broken in frontal assault by feudal heavy cavalry. The horsey military elite looked down on their social inferiors, whether in the village at home or in the army on campaign. Their propagandists – the poets and minstrels, the clerics and historians – echoed their posturing as the primary arm of medieval warfare. But on the battlefield, more often than not, the chivalry fought on foot alongside the humble archer and spearman. Of course they did: for horses are vulnerable to missiles, cannot be ridden into a solid line of infantry, and provide too unstable a platform for the effective defence of ground. There was nothing ‘obsolete’ about the shield-wall at Hastings. The Anglo-Saxons were just unlucky. Infantry have always been the essential basis of Western armies. Hazel Blair analyses the battle and the rival military systems, while Jack Watkins draws attention to the vital role of military fortification in the consolidation of Norman rule. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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Norman and Anglo-Saxon Warriors Who fought at Hastings? Medieval historian and MHM Assistant Editor Hazel Blair profiles the men on the battlefield in 1066.
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odern historians have debated the size of the armies that fought at Hastings, but nobody really knows how many men were involved in the battle. Nevertheless, we can sketch the roles played by some of them. There were two military systems present on the field at Hastings. The Anglo-Saxons relied
entirely on infantrymen – and a few archers – raised from the shires, complemented by a small group of trained fighters. Like Viking warriors, these men fought close-packed and on foot, in the tradition of their forebears. On the other side of the battlefield, the Norman army was heavily stratified. William led a combined-arms force that comprised infantrymen, archers, and mounted warriors.
Cavalrymen Like their stallions, those who fought on horseback at Hastings were bred for battle. Most were knights who held land in return for military service owed to a lord. They formed a highly trained mounted fighting force. The ability to fight effectively on horseback required great skill, and training for war in the saddle began at an early age. But owning and equipping horses was costly. It is likely that, while cavalrymen may have been tactically important to the battle’s outcome, they were less well represented on the battlefield than the Bayeux Tapestry would have us believe. But we know for certain that Duke William’s cavalrymen were fairly well armed. The Tapestry shows them wearing helmets and hauberks (shirts of mail), and carrying oblong kite-shields. The cavalry were well protected, but their armour was surprisingly light, and the many interlocking rings of mail afforded the wearer of the hauberk a degree of flexibility. But, although mail was designed to absorb the shock of an enemy blow, it was vulnerable to penetration by nimbler weapons, like swords and spears. The role of the Norman cavalrymen at Hastings was varied: they used swords to engage in close-combat fighting with the enemy, but they also carried lances, which could be thrown from a distance, or thrust overand under-arm to jab at infantrymen ahead of the horse. There has been some debate over the method preferred at Hastings, but hurling lances overhead would have been the most effective technique, given that the Anglo-Saxon shield-wall was positioned uphill. 28
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They were arranged in three sections, one behind the other. Despite some differences in the composition of the Norman and Anglo-Saxon armies, the length of the battle testifies to the fact that they were fairly evenly matched. Their precise numbers may elude us, but we know enough to take a closer look at the men who defended King Harold and those who finally overcame them.
The Tapestry shows some cavalrymen holding lances under-arm. This would have allowed the rider to advance at some speed, while directing the full force of his charge onto the lance’s tip, for maximum impact. Cavalrymen offered medieval armies strategic options unavailable to forces made up entirely of infantry. Horses could cover ground far more quickly than men on foot. The horses themselves were also used as weapons: not only were they psychologically very threatening, but by virtue of their size they could knock down and trample even heavily armed infantrymen who had broken ranks.
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WARRIORS
Fyrdmen The infantrymen who fought with Harold at Hastings belonged to the fyrd – an umbrellaterm for the Anglo-Saxon army, composed of freemen raised from the shires. It was not a standing army, but one that could be mobilised when necessary. The type of military service owed to the King, and by whom, was related to social rank and landholding. Anglo-Saxon England was divided into shires, which were themselves divided into hundreds, and then into hides. Sources describing the exact relationship between land and military service in 11th-century England are wanting, but we know that in Berkshire, one man per five hides was required to give military service to the King when requested. The result, as historian Richard Abels has shown, was that there were two types of fyrdmen who would have fought with King Harold on the battlefield at Hastings. The first would have been the landholder himself – one of the King’s magnates. As a www.military-history.org
nobleman, he would likely have been trained in the art of war – at least in theory, if not in practice. If he was a royal thegn (a minor aristocrat who owed military service to the King), he probably also had military experience. These noble fyrdmen could afford highquality arms and armour. They are the foot soldiers in the Tapestry shown wearing hauberks with mail sleeves and calf-length mail leggings. Their conical metal helmets included nose-plates and, in some cases, neck-guards at the rear. Most of these men are depicted wearing mailed coifs under their helmets, to cover their faces and necks. They are kitted out in arms and armour identical to those of the Norman cavalrymen. Most noble fyrdmen used swords, of which several period-examples survive, and also possessed spears. They carried shields for protection (both kite- and circle-shaped examples are shown on the Tapestry), but these could be formidable weapons in their own right, when used in conjunction with swords.
If he held a large estate, the magnate would also have been responsible for the provision of men from his land, relative to the number of hides he possessed. These warriors would have been villagers, farmers, and peasants, selected for their experience, strength, skill, or youth. These men were less well armed, but their peers may have provided them with weapons and provisions before they left for battle. They are pictured in the Tapestry without mail, although some may have worn padded or protective leather clothing. The majority possessed spears, which were slightly shorter than lances. Most are not equipped with swords, although many do have shields. Some even wielded makeshift weapons of wood and stone. William of Poitiers referred to these men in action when he described the ‘deadly hail’ of missiles unleashed by the Anglo-Saxons on the Norman infantry as it made its way up the hill in the opening stages of the battle: ‘They threw spears and weapons of every kind, murderous axes and stones tied to sticks.’ MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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Archers Both sides possessed them, but the Norman archers significantly outnumbered their Anglo-Saxon counterparts – only one Anglo-Saxon archer is depicted on the Tapestry. Some Norman archers are shown wearing coats of mail, but most do not wear any armour: those at Hastings were likely plucked from the lower rungs of Norman society. As missile troops, they were vital members of the Duke’s army. William positioned them up front, ahead of his mailed infantry and knights, to weaken and demoralise the Anglo-Saxons with an arrow-storm before the main assault. Showers of arrows could also provide the rest of the army with cover. Medieval archers propelled their iron-tipped arrows with wooden bows. Those depicted in the Tapestry are shown drawing their arrows to their chests before shooting, suggesting that the bows used at Hastings were ancestors of the 14th-century longbow, which was drawn to the ear and could send arrows even further. Some Normans may also have wielded crossbows, capable of shooting bolts with greater power. The Norman archers at Hastings shot rapidly and with great force, as the arrow-studded shields of the Anglo-Saxons attest. Some also consider the archers responsible for the death of King Harold himself. William’s archers were even given their own specific penance after the battle, to atone for the casualties they caused. Positioned on a hill, Anglo-Saxon bowmen could have rained shot on their adversaries from above. So why did Harold fight William with so few archers? Several theories have been advanced: one suggests that Harold’s archers suffered in the Battle of Stamford Bridge, fought just a few weeks earlier, and that those who survived could not travel south quickly enough because they did not have the means to do so. Another theory posits that archers tended to reside near areas of dense forest; that, as lowly warriors, they were typically recruited locally; and that there were therefore fewer bowmen available to fight at Hastings, located as it was in a fairly woodless area of south-east England. There is no real evidence to support either of these explanations, but both are certainly plausible.
Housecarls In addition to the mix of well-trained and lesser-trained warriors of the fyrd, Harold was supported by elite housecarls. The line between thegn and housecarl was a fine one, with both groups constantly evolving, but it is safe to say that housecarls were men with military and administrative duties, who served in the households of Danish and Anglo-Saxon nobles and kings. Introduced to England by Cnut, they were not quite mercenaries, who owed little allegiance to their commanders other than the military aid for which they were paid, but they were in receipt of wages in return for their service. They appear to have been professional, or at least semi-professional, private soldiers, although the idea that they formed a standing army has been convincingly rejected. Their exact nature has been the subject of much debate, and while, as a group, they are not mentioned by name in the written sources that describe the Battle of Hastings, they are known to have been a feature of Anglo-Saxon households from the age of Alfred the Great. A 12th-century Danish writer explained that, The king and other leading men who have a household should show their men favour and 30
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good will and give them proper pay. In return, men should give their lord loyalty and service, and be prepared to do all his commands. The men described here likely resembled the royal and noble housecarls, who arrived at Hastings straight from the Anglo-Saxon victory at Stamford Bridge. Like fyrdmen, housecarls fought on foot. They were better trained than fyrdmen, and wore superior, mailed military garb and helmets with nasal protection. As semi-professional fighters, not only would the royal housecarls have fought with Harold, but the noble housecarls might also have been responsible for supporting the fyrd by fighting along the front-line. It has been suggested that the housecarls at Hastings included those depicted in the Tapestry brandishing large, two-handed axes. Battle-axes were heavy and difficult to use – they were much larger than hand-axes, which were light and easily thrown. These frightening weapons were often employed against horses, and the Tapestry suggests that Harold’s army at Hastings comprised a special group of elite warriors capable of wielding them. October 2016
WARRIORS Norman infantrymen ‘Hastings was a battle of cavalry against infantry only in the sense that the English had no cavalry, not that the Normans had no infantry,’ wrote R Allen Brown in 1980. Nevertheless, over a quarter of a century later, Hastings continues to be painted as a victory for Norman horsemen. Yet, as the battlefield terrain was marshy and uneven, and thus not well suited to horses, the Norman infantry were more agile on the field than their cavalry, even though they could not cover as much ground, nor charge forward quite as fast. They were also cheaper to equip and maintain, so they were probably present in some number, though of this we cannot be certain. William of Poitiers mentions that Duke William placed heavily armed Norman infantry in mailed tunics behind his archers, but this is not depicted in the Tapestry’s battle scenes (the illustration on the right of a mailed infantryman is a reimagining of the biblical giant Goliath from an early 12th-century manuscript). Even King William is said to have fought on foot for a while, having had his horse killed under him. Like their saddled and Anglo-Saxon counterparts, some Norman infantrymen wore mail and conical helmets, and carried kite-shields, but it is likely that many were less well protected. They also carried spears which were both throwing and thrusting weapons. The better-off would have used swords to slash and stab at their opponents. Unlike the Anglo-Saxons, the Norman infantry did not huddle together, fixed to the ground for the whole of the battle. Fighting on the offensive, their role was more dynamic. They challenged the enemy face-to-face in the first and final Norman assaults at Hastings.
Image: English Heritage
BELOW Re-enactors take to the field at the annual English Heritage ‘Battle of Hastings’.
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Hastings 14 October 1066
Medieval historian and MHM Assistant Editor Hazel Blair analyses one of the most decisive battles in British history, 950 years after it was fought.
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n April 1066, ‘a portent such as men had never seen before’ was observed in the sky above England. The sign was Halley’s Comet and contemporaries believed it heralded great change. In medieval accounts of the Battle of Hastings, the omen foreshadows Harold’s downfall. But was the English king really destined for defeat?
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The best-known date in English history may be 1066, but we know surprisingly little about the battle that destroyed Anglo-Saxon England. When it comes to the Norman Conquest, myth and history often seem inseparable. Duke William of Normandy’s knights, for instance, have become synonymous with his victory, and the Bayeux Tapestry is packed
full of mounted warriors charging towards Harold’s line. By comparison, the English foot soldiers seem small and insignificant – as if doomed to die beneath the horses’ hooves. But despite the starry omen and William’s eventual triumph, Hastings was an exceptionally close-run battle. The duke’s mail-clad horsemen may have been a spectacle, but the strength of October 2016
Images: (centre) Alamy; (right) copyright Colin Smith
BATTLE OF HASTINGS
OPPOSITE The Battle of Hastings changed the course of English history. But how decisive was the role of the Norman cavalry? ABOVE Harold Godwinson [LEFT], William of Normandy [CENTRE], and Harald Hardrada [RIGHT]: each considered himself King of England after Edward the Confessor died in January 1066.
the Anglo-Saxons’ defence against the Norman invaders deserves wider recognition.
HAROLD: SUCCESSOR OR USURPER? England’s economy in the 11th century was strong, but even prosperous countries are not immune to political infighting. Although Edward the Confessor led a relatively peaceful life, he was childless and his death plunged the kingdom into turmoil as rival parties vied for the English throne. The king’s closest blood relative was Edgar the Aethling, a 14-year-old boy unable to muster the strength required to fight his illness, let alone fight for the crown. The Witenagemot (an assembly of AngloSaxon nobles) thus elected Harold Godwinson as Edward’s successor. His kingly qualities had shone through during his campaigns against Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, King of Wales, in the early 1060s, and, having held the earldoms of East Anglia, Wessex, and Hereford at various times, he was considered the man best qualified to lead the country. Some Anglo-Saxons even maintained that, with his dying breath, Edward granted Harold his kingdom. To the Normans, however, Harold was nothing but a covetous usurper. They claimed Duke William was bestowed Edward’s blessing, marked for kingship because of familial ties to the House of Wessex through his great-aunt Emma, Edward’s mother. But William’s fight for England might also have been personal: Harold, the Norman www.military-history.org
chroniclers and the Bayeux Tapestry stress, had broken a sacred oath. While visiting Normandy in 1064/1065, Harold had accompanied William in his pursuit and defeat of the Duke of Brittany during the Breton-Norman War (1064-1065). He was thanked for his services in the campaign, and it was then, the Normans claimed, that he promised to support William should the bastard duke make a bid for the English throne. Trouble was also stirring to the east, as King Harald Hardrada of Norway made ready to seize Harold’s crown. Harald’s predecessor Cnut had subjugated England half a century earlier, and this, Hardrada claimed, made him Edward’s rightful heir.
NORMANS AND NORSEMEN King Harold’s men gazed across the Channel throughout the summer and autumn of 1066. The King had come to Kent from London to quash raids led by his unscrupulous brother
Tostig, and, once his sibling had fled, turned his attention to the looming threat from Normandy. According to one Anglo-Saxon chronicler, he marshalled land and naval forces ‘larger than any king had assembled before in this country’. In full anticipation of Duke William’s invasion (though, seemingly, not Hardrada’s), he had men keep watch from the Isle of Wight and stationed others along the chalky southern coastline. Having suffered two centuries of Viking raids, the Anglo-Saxons were a battle-hardened people. The King was vigilant; his troops were ready – but the Normans did not come. On 8 September, believing the campaigning season over, Harold dispersed his navy and withdrew his men from their watch along the Kentish coast. They had been alert for months but had run out of provisions. And, although the King knew his rivals were still out there, probably plotting his demise, he assumed that, with winter approaching, their fervour would have cooled. He was mistaken. That day, Hardrada came ashore near York to contest Harold’s crown. With Tostig’s support, the Norwegian king harried the east coast demanding surrender, punishing anyone who dared resist.
STAMFORD BRIDGE The army Harold had at his disposal in 1066 proved itself at the Battle of Stamford Bridge, fought against the Norwegian invaders three weeks before Hastings. There, the Anglo-Saxons won a decisive victory. Hardrada – his name means ‘hard ruler’ – was a warrior-king with a fearsome reputation. Already, LEFT The Bayeux Tapestry shows Harold receiving arms and armour from William. This scene reinforces the idea that Harold was a disloyal usurper, justifying William’s outrage and invasion. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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1066 TIMELINE 5 January Edward the Confessor dies King Edward fell ill in November 1065 and died in the New Year, aged 63. He was buried in Westminster Abbey the following day and was later made a saint.
6 January Harold Godwinson is crowned King of England Edward died childless, so Harold Godwinson, England’s most powerful earl, was selected to succeed him.
24 April Halley’s Comet appears A ‘long-haired star’ was seen in the sky, signifying great and imminent change. In the Middle Ages, dramatic natural occurrences were considered heavenly signs that corresponded with earthly events.
ABOVE William constructed his fleet from scratch and was ready to set sail by mid-August, but his Channel crossing was delayed by several weeks due to contrary winds. William’s flagship The Mora is shown with a papal banner flying from her masthead – Pope Alexander II supported the invasion, although whether he gave William his banner has been debated. BELOW William placed skirmishing archers in front of his foot soldiers, who are not depicted here. The duke rode with his cavalry in the rear.
in the two weeks since his landing, he had massacred Mercians and Northumbrians at the Battle of Fulford – an initial challenge to his invasion, led by Harold’s northern earls Edwin and Morcar. But the English military system was robust, and Harold’s army was tough and well disciplined. Learning of the Norwegian advance and the crumbling Anglo-Saxon resistance, Harold and his men travelled north in just five days to rout the invaders, picking up further troops from the shires along the way. Having rapidly assembled, the AngloSaxons delivered a crushing defeat to the Norwegians on 25 September. Along with several thousand warriors, both Hardrada and Tostig were slain. Few reliable details of the engagement survive. The Norwegians are said to have fought without their armour, having been taken by surprise. Some 13th-century Icelandic sagas state that the English fought with cavalry, but there is little evidence to support this and, for the most part, the historical record suggests Harold’s men fought on foot. The exact number of casualties is unknown, but both sides battled hard and the fighting lasted several hours. In the end, of the 200-300 warships with which the invaders had come to England, fewer than 25 returned to Norway.
Harold’s imminent defeat in the south must not obscure the scale of his achievement in Yorkshire. Indeed, his victory in the north is testament to the might of the force he could muster at short notice. Having extinguished the Viking threat, his position was much stronger. The reign of England’s last Anglo-Saxon king, though volatile, was at its zenith.
BATTLE The Normans set sail for England two days later. William made the voyage from St-Valerysur-Somme with a fleet of 700 newly built ships loaded with soldiers, horses, provisions, and weapons. Crossing the water, propelled by a favourable wind, his men landed at Pevensey Bay on 28 September. When Harold, in York, received news of William’s landing, he promptly made for London with those infantrymen who were able to make the journey south. There, he gathered more levies, raised from neighbouring shires, and installed a fleet of ships in the Channel to stop the Normans retreating. William sought combat and a quick victory. Assembling his troops, he led them northwards to present-day Battle, where the armies converged on Saturday 14 October. The precise location of the battlefield has not been convincingly located, but William founded Battle Abbey near the site four years later. Emerging from dense forest, their spears glistening in the morning sunlight, Harold’s men arrayed in a strong defensive position. Whether or not Harold picked the location of the fighting in advance has been the subject of much debate, but, regardless, we know that his foot soldiers benefitted from being stationed uphill. The Normans approached the battlefield from the south, with an integrated force of
8 September Harold moves inland Harold dismissed the militia he had stationed along the south coast. Hardrada lands near York.
20 September Battle of Fulford Harold’s earls Edwin and Morcar battled Tostig and Hardrada at Fulford, near York. The battle ended in a decisive victory for the Viking invaders: nearly 1,000 Mercians and Northumbrians were slain. 34
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It was William of Normandy’s finest achievement, but, while decisive, his victory at Hastings was not inevitable. archers, infantry, and cavalry, arranged in three groups, one behind the other. The duke rode in the centre-rear, surrounded by his knights, his left wing manned by Bretons and his right wing by Franco-Flemish mercenaries. Trumpets were sounded at 9am. The battle commenced.
SHIELD-WALL It may have been William of Normandy’s finest achievement, but, while decisive, his victory at Hastings was not inevitable. The Anglo-Saxons employed a practised and effective method of defence that was hundreds of years old: atop Battle ridge, they stood many ranks deep, rooted to the ground, shoulder-toshoulder behind a wall of overlapping shields. Armoured thegns (nobles who owed military service to the king) and housecarls (royal and noble household troops) manned the front-line and flanks, with the weight of several thousand levies packed behind them. The Normans advanced. Proceeding up the slope, the Norman archers and infantry inflicted some casualties on their enemies early in the day: ‘On both sides the foemen raged with brandished spears,’ wrote the author of The Song of the Battle of Hastings (a controversial, but recently rehabilitated 11th-century source). But although some Norman arrows and javelins found their way behind the shield-wall, the Anglo-Saxons remained close-packed and unyielding: They [the Anglo-Saxons] met missile with missile, sword-stroke with sword-stroke… each corpse, though lifeless, stood as if unharmed and held its post. The Norman foot soldiers had little impact. Comparing the eventual outcome of the battle with that of Stamford Bridge, one might be inclined to attribute the Anglo-Saxons’ defeat at Hastings to the might of William’s cavalry. But that would be too hasty a conclusion: the reality was that the Normans continued to struggle uphill for most of the day, on a field that was uncultivated and difficult for their horses. www.military-history.org
And once in combat, the cavalry had just as great difficulty overcoming the English as their infantry. Charging with lance and sword, they would have found the AngloSaxon shield-wall impenetrable as long as Harold’s infantry maintained their formation and kept their nerve. Horsemen cannot break determined infantry in frontal collision. Horses will not ride into a solid barrier, especially one fronted by a hedge of blades. Each horseman is separated from his enemy by the head and neck of his mount. And each faces half a dozen opponents among the far more closely packed infantry opposite. The fighting lasted until dusk, the AngloSaxon line still unbroken. Why, then, does the myth of all-conquering Norman cavalry persist?
ROMANCE OF THE MOUNTED WARRIOR In The Western Way of War, Victor Davis Hanson makes two points especially relevant to this question. The first is that medieval nobles were proud of their role as cavalry. Knights were trained, high-status fighters, recruited from a political and social elite, and keen to assert their superiority over lower-class infantry. Horses, especially warhorses, were expensive to maintain, which made them suitable symbols of aristocratic power. For evidence, one need look no further then William I’s own royal seal, produced soon after the Conquest – its obverse depicts the King as a warlord: mounted, in mail, as if riding into battle. Hanson’s second point is that the romance of the mounted warrior was compounded
BELOW Though simple in its construction, the shield-wall was often the defensive tactic of choice for ancient and medieval infantrymen.
25 September Battle of Stamford Bridge Harold’s men killed Hardrada and Tostig at the Battle of Stamford Bridge. Several thousand of the invaders were slaughtered. The surviving invaders returned home, promising never to return.
28 September William lands at Pevensey Duke William of Normandy arrived at Pevensey Bay and set up camp in an old Roman fort, before travelling east to Hastings.
6 October Harold arrives in London Harold rode south from York with some of those who fought at Stamford Bridge and rested in London, where he picked up reinforcements before pushing on south to meet William.
14 October Battle of Hastings William won a decisive victory after a hard day’s fighting.
25 December William is crowned King of England Despite his triumph at Hastings, England did not immediately submit to William. He faced resistance in London, but continued to consolidate his hold in the southeast. Having proven his resolve, he was finally crowned king on Christmas Day 1066. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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HAROLD’S DEFEAT So why did Harold lose the Battle of Hastings? Contemporary sources report that he was forced to begin fighting before all his men had arrived on the field, but, even if this is true, the fighting lasted several hours, so it probably had little impact. Some historians have cited Harold’s recent losses at Stamford Bridge as a key reason for his downfall. But there is no evidence that his professional core was significantly depleted in this battle, and the bulk of his line at Hastings was, in any case, formed of militia raised in the southern counties. Others have questioned the adequacy of his position – although, as noted, the debate over the battle’s precise location still rages on. The problem with these explanations is that they presuppose an English defeat, when, in fact, William’s army was not invincible and Harold’s troops defended themselves successfully for most of the day. The king’s men, though wearied and somewhat diminished, were not broken. In fact, having already withstood several hours of Norman cavalry LEFT The death of a military leader could significantly weaken a medieval army by throwing it into confusion. Lifting his helmet to prove he was alive, William restored the courage of the fleeing Normans. BELOW That Harold was killed after being hit in the eye by an arrow is one of the battle’s most seductive legends. The earliest evidence supporting the story comes from a southern Italian monk called Amatus of Monte Cassino, who described the incident in the mid-1080s. Other reports state that Harold was cut down and hacked to pieces.
‘They met missile with missile, swordstroke with swordstroke... each corpse, though lifeless, stood as if unharmed and held its post.’ assaults, close-quarters fighting, and relentless showers of arrows, it seemed as though they were set to win. Their defence was such that the troops on William’s left flank began to peel away: ‘frightened by such ferocity, the infantry and Breton mounted warriors both retreated, with all the auxiliary troops who formed the left wing. Almost the whole of the duke’s army yielded’, believing ‘their duke and lord had been slain,’ wrote Poitiers. Thinking they were victorious, some of the Anglo-Saxons broke ranks and rushed forward in hot pursuit of the fleeing Normans. This was a costly error. William lifted his helmet to prove he was still alive, and led a fresh charge
when European kings and nobles battled Muslims in the Middle East with a view to recovering the Holy Land. There, heavily armoured Crusader cavalrymen led a number of successful shock charges against Saracen horsemen and archers. Lightly armed Saracens were often overwhelmed by their metal-clad opponents. The chronicler Fulcher of Chartres described Eustace Grenier’s decisive rout of the Fatmids at Yibneh in 1123 in some detail: this battle did not last long because when our foes saw our armed men advance in excellent order against them their horsemen immediately took flight as if completely bewitched, going into a panic instead of using good sense. Their foot soldiers were massacred. Saladin’s army was similarly defeated in the Crusader counterattack at Arsuf in 1191. Despite the importance of infantry during the Crusades, noble, armoured knights became increasingly linked with Christian victories. This general association, in turn, has contributed to the conventional wisdom that William’s cavalry must have trumped Harold’s shield-wall at Hastings. 36
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against his enemies, slaughtering those who had descended from the hill. The English reformed their line to prevent further breaches in their shield-wall, but, on reaching the Anglo-Saxons, the Normans began to inflict heavy casualties on a line now somewhat disordered and demoralised.
‘AN UNUSUAL KIND OF COMBAT’ Even now the Normans struggled to break through. And they could not continue to fight at close-quarters without sustaining heavy losses. Their mighty warhorses were no match for the English shield-wall, which resisted the onslaught of the Norman heavy horse just as the Swabians had done 13 years earlier at Civitate in southern Italy. But because they had made small inroads against the Anglo-Saxons by retreating, the Normans decided to repeat this manoeuvre. Turning on their heels once more, they pretended to withdraw, enticing yet another wave of English foot soldiers down the hillside. Then, wheeling their horses, the Norman cavalry charged across the battlefield and butchered those who had run after them. Poitiers says they repeated the move twice, killing ‘thousands’ of Anglo-Saxons. The feigned retreat has been heavily scrutinised by historians, with some rejecting the veracity of the incident because of the intricate organisation required to carry out the operation. But given that the Normans had already used the trick at Arques in 1053, and at Messina in 1060, there is little reason to doubt the ability of William’s cavalry to employ this tactic at Hastings. Nevertheless, the Anglo-Saxons continued to hold firm. According to Poitiers, ‘an unusual
The fighting lasted until dusk, the Anglo-Saxon line still unbroken. www.military-history.org
kind of combat ensued, one side attacking in bursts and in a variety of movements, the other rooted to the ground, putting up with the assault.’ The day was drawing to a close when news spread that Harold, his brothers, and other leading nobles had been killed. Believing they had almost routed the Normans earlier in the day, the Anglo-Saxons’ morale must have plummeted. Their defence faltered. In the context of an uncertain royal succession, without their king, they were thrown into confusion.
COMBINED-ARMS TACTICS William seized his chance and charged forward with fury; the Anglo-Saxons finally gave way. Spent, they turned on their heels and fled into the trees behind them, but the Norman cavalry gave chase and cut them down. Some Englishmen staged a last-gasp defence, but they too were slaughtered. It was, then, William’s combined-arms force that led him to victory: his army was more than the sum of its parts, and the ‘variety of movements’ employed by the Normans in their final assault was the key to their success. Archers shot arrows, further weakening the Anglo-Saxon mass, which had been reduced BELOW The obverse of William the Conqueror’s great seal. Medieval seals were marks of identity and authority. They were impressed on wax and then attached to documents to confirm their authenticity.
ABOVE Their line having been broken, the AngloSaxons fled. Some of them escaped the carnage on horseback, others fled on foot only to be chased and cut down by the Normans.
by the wily cavalry. And greater credit should surely be accorded to the Norman heavy infantry, who are only briefly mentioned in the sources and are not represented on the Bayeux Tapestry at all: presumably they contributed to this final assault, just as they did in the opening stages of the conflict, fighting at close range with spears and swords. Hastings has inspired more questions than it has provided answers. One thing, however, is certain: Harold, whatever his order of battle, defended himself successfully for almost nine hours against his attackers. Positioned uphill, he built around him a fortress of men who thwarted each of the Normans’ attempts to breach his shield-wall, which maintained its structural integrity for the best part of the battle. Not even the cavalry could break through. In fact, the Anglo-Saxons defended themselves so well that they began to think they had won. Perhaps they would have, had they not broken ranks to give chase. In doing so, they gave William the opening he needed to unleash the full force of his combined-arms professional army. Without realising, they ushered in the end of the Anglo-Saxon age. r
FURTHER READING Reginald Allen Brown, The Norman Conquest of England: sources and documents, Bodyell Press, 1984. Jim Bradbury, The Battle of Hastings, Sutton Publishing, 1998; reprinted by The History Press, 2010. Harriet Harvey Wood, The Battle of Hastings: the fall of Anglo-Saxon England, Atlantic Books, 2012. M K Lawson, The Battle of Hastings, 1066, The History Press, 2007. Stephen Morillo, The Battle of Hastings: sources and interpretations, Bodyell and Brewer, 1996.
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Castles of the Conquest
1066-1087 Photo: David Flintham
Jack Watkins examines the fortifications erected by William the Conqueror in England in the years following his victory at Hastings.
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hen the Normans conquered England in 1066, they lost no time in embarking on what is generally recognised as the biggest programme of castle-building Western Europe has ever seen. In fact, William the Conqueror launched it the moment he stepped off the boat at Pevensey Bay, immediately erecting a wooden fort within a pre-existing Roman defensive enclosure. Moving swiftly east, another was quickly thrown up on the cliffs above Hastings, ahead of the showdown with Harold. And following his momentous victory on 38
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14 October, six miles north-west on Senlac Hill, the Conqueror marched on to Dover, where he ‘spent eight days adding to it those fortifications it lacked,’ according to Norman chronicler William of Poitiers. It is tempting to try to trace the Conqueror’s footsteps through these places on those first feverishly active weeks of his reign, but, in truth, you cannot see much of his work. Pevensey Castle is now a Romantic – though still substantial – ruin, and the sea has receded from where it must once have lapped close to the walls. Hastings Castle as a structure scarcely offers any spectacle at all, though the setting is dra-
matic. At Dover, it is unclear quite what work was undertaken: none of it is apparent within the magnificent later castle built by Henry II.
FORTIFIED NOBLE RESIDENCES What is not in doubt is that the castle, according to its purest medieval definition as a fortified noble residence, was introduced to this country by the Normans. According to Anglo-Norman chronicler Orderic Vitalis (c.1075-1142), the Anglo-Saxons succumbed to Norman rule because ‘the fortresses which the Gauls call castles had been very few’. As a result, he wrote, the English, although October 2016
CASTLES MOTTE-AND-BAILEY CASTLES
MAIN IMAGE Hastings Castle is a motte-andbailey castle that was built soon after William landed in England. Its construction is depicted on the Bayeux Tapestry [RIGHT]. The castle was rebuilt in stone in 1070 and a chapel was added. Having suffered damage during the Dissolution of the Monasteries and during the Second World War, the site is now a ruin.
‘workmanlike and courageous’, proved too weak to withstand their enemy. It is worth remembering the ‘Conquest’ in 1066 was not a mass invasion or migration of people, but rather a takeover by a select military elite of mounted warriors. Although they were few in number, William could not trust the remaining Anglo-Saxon aristocrats who had survived Hastings. He parcelled out his new kingdom among his trusted followers, who sought to buttress their fragile control over their new fiefdoms with castles. These had the tripartite function of acting as symbols of authority, as defensible strongholds, and as private residences. The English were unfamiliar with the new structures because their own fortifications had been in the form of palisaded enclosures, or walled towns. Covering vast acreages, the English burhs, as conceived by Alfred the Great, required defence in large numbers, whereas a castle could be held by relatively few men.
CONTINENTAL CASTLE BUILDING
BELOW LEFT Robert of Mortain (William’s half brother) built a timber structure at Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire in 1070. The stronghold was strategically placed to defend the northern approach to London. It underwent a series of renovations between the 11th and 14th centuries. BELOW RIGHT Guildford Castle in Surrey is not mentioned in the Domesday Book, William’s ‘great survey’ of England. So it was probably built sometime after 1086, either by William or one of his noblemen.
Photo: English Heritage
Castles were already common on the Continent. In the Middle Ages the first master castle-builder was Fulk Nerra, or Fulk the Black, Count of Anjou from 987 until 1040. He has been credited with building 13 castles. Fulk, dubbed by later historians le grand bâtisseur, was the first of the medieval lords to fully grasp the strategic value of
the castle for launching properly prepared cavalry assaults. He seems to have been familiar with the writings of the 5th-century Roman military expert Flavius Vegetius, who in his Concerning Military Matters stressed the value of siting fortifications along a route of communication, so that no point of defence was more than a day’s horseback ride from another. Some of Fulk’s castles still survive today – at Langeais, on the Loire, and at Loches and Montbazon, both on the Indre – all dating to the first decades of the 11th century, making them just about the earliest stone keeps extant in northern Europe. At a time when France was more a medley of rival political entities than a unified kingdom under one ruler, and thus in a state of near-constant warfare, Fulk’s Norman neighbours were cut from the same battle-hardened warrior cloth. The Norman aristocracy are known to have built castles from the 1030s onwards. As duke, William made Caen his military base, from where the castle walls still glower formidably over the town.
The most common castle-type William brought to England was the motteand-bailey. These comprised a mound (usually artificial), measuring between 16ft and 35ft, and an encircling walled ditch (the motte), topped by a tower of wood or stone, which contained a hall, a kitchen, and accommodation for soldiers and servants. This was reached by gangway connected to an outer walled court (the bailey), which contained various other domestic structures, stables, and, occasionally, a chapel. While many first-generation mottes survive, their towers – often erected quickly and made of wood – do not, although Hastings Castle is shown undergoing construction in the Bayeux Tapestry. Berkhamsted, one of the Conqueror’s earliest motte-and-bailey castles, still has impressive earthworks, even though it is now a ruin. A good example of an old motte that has been reutilised can be seen at Guildford: the early 12th-century castle can be seen built into the eastern slope of the original motte, underscoring the site’s calculated, awe-inspiring verticality. Meanwhile, Clifford Tower in York, built in the middle of the 13th century, stands on a motte raised by William the Conqueror between 1068 and 1070, during his ruthless ‘harrying of the North’.
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Image: © Royal Armouries
ROCHESTER CASTLE
ABOVE The White Tower in London was begun in the late 11th century. It guarded London’s main medieval thoroughfare, the Thames, and was added to and renovated over several hundred years.
STONE KEEPS The other kind of castle that William brought to England, the stone tower-keep, proved more durable. While these became the predominant castle-type in the 12th century, some were also embarked on during the Conqueror’s reign. With their thick walls, they scarcely had need of the extra defence afforded by being placed on a mound, though the bailey enclosures were retained. On completion, these castles were often coated with plaster or whitewash to preserve the stone. The White Tower owes its name to the repeated whitewashing it received throughout the Middle Ages. While the Tower of London has come to refer to the whole complex (often associated with Henry VIII and thought of as a royal prison), originally the title applied solely to William’s White Tower. Though it was probably unfinished at the time of his death in 1087, it is the most celebrated of the great Norman stone keeps, or donjons. Thanks to later additions like window enlargements and the cupolas on the cornertowers, alongside its modern use as part of a museum complex, it is harder today to gain a sense of the White Tower’s impact on the conquered people of London. But, as an 118ft by 107ft rectangle, 90ft in height, with walls 15ft thick, it remains a formidable statement of Norman military superiority. Colchester Castle, almost contemporary, was built above the vaults of a Roman temple and was even larger, measuring 151ft by 110ft. Its impact is somewhat reduced today, 40
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The most impressive survivor among Norman tower-keeps is Rochester. It rises to 113ft, is 70ft square at its base, and has walls between 11ft and 13ft thick. Not only is it the tallest tower-keep in England, it is probably the tallest in Western Europe. Being open to the sky and devoid of its floors somehow only underscores the menacing quality of Rochester Castle. But its austere appearance belies the fact it would have been considered almost palatial in its day, as the round-arched arcade of the former Great Hall indicates. Rochester’s location above the strategically key River Medway was typical. Most castles stood beside a river crossing or confluence, or near a crossroads, or on high ground. And Rochester would prove the continued effectiveness of the rectangular stone keep as the decades passed. Even as castle designs were evolving in response to advances in military technology, and as experiments were carried out with circular or octagonal forms, rebels held out BELOW Rochester Castle sits on the east bank of the River Medway in Kent. It has been remodelled over the centuries, but the stone keep remains the fortification’s key feature.
in Rochester Castle against King John so firmly in 1215 that one chronicler wrote: ‘our age has not known a siege so hard pressed or strongly resisted’. In the event, having eventually broken into the bailey, John’s engineers proceeded to mine under the south-east corner-tower, succeeding in causing the wall to collapse. Even then, the rebels were able to hold out behind the keep’s internal cross-walling for a further two days before finally surrendering.
LASTING CONQUEST By the end of William’s reign, only 8% of England remained in the hands of Anglo-Saxon noblemen. Most of the land was divided between the Crown, the Church, and William’s followers. For all that the Normans won the throne at Hastings, it was the architecture of power, in the form of castles, through which lasting conquest was achieved. Castles continued to be built through the rule of the Conqueror’s successors. It has been estimated that, by the end of his son William II’s reign, there were 500 castles in England. These were deeply resented by the locals. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle groaned that the Normans ‘were burdening the unfortunate country folk with forced labour at the castles. Once they finished building them, they filled them with devils and bad men.’ But these castles served their prime military function: the fact that many never saw battle only confirms this. Rather like the nuclear deterrent, non-use might be taken as a sign of effectiveness. r Jack Watkins is a writer on history, heritage, and conservation, and the general editor of the Encyclopedia of Classic Warfare (1457 BCAD 1815), which is published by Amber.
Image: David Flintham
not only by its function as a museum, but as a result of the two upper stories having been lopped off in a failed attempt at demolition during the English Civil War.
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T
he driving force behind the creation of the navy of Classical Athens was Themistocles, who recognised that the check delivered to Persian ambitions at Marathon in 490 BC was only temporary. One day, he knew, Persia would make a second attempt to conquer Greece. In 483 BC, Themistocles persuaded the people of Athens to fund the construction of a large and powerful fleet of triremes with the proceeds from the city-state’s recently discovered silver mines in Laurium. These ships served a noble purpose when the Persians returned in 480 BC. Athens contributed more than any other Greek state to the naval war against Persia, and her force of 180 triremes at the epic Battle of Salamis exceeded the size of the next largest contingent, Corinth’s flotilla, by 140. 42
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Herodotus wrote of these Athenian ships that ‘they were there for the benefit of all of Greece when they were needed’. Without the war galleys of Athens, there could have been no victory – and Greece would have succumbed to Persian rule.
A NAVY OF FREE MEN Athens used her navy to further her own imperial ambition as the 5th century progressed. She placed her reliance on trained free-citizen rowers, able to work together to propel and manoeuvre their light, fast-moving triremes to deliver powerful ramming attacks against enemy ships, and then extricate themselves to avoid counterattacks. The fleet’s primary offensive manoeuvres were the diekplous, or breakthrough, in which a force of triremes would try to push into an enemy formation, and the periplous,
Image: Alamy
The Athenian navy of the 5th century BC defeated the Persian Empire and won control of the Aegean Sea. Marc DeSantis takes a look at this supreme instrument of war in its heyday.
ABOVE A fragment of relief sculpture provides vivid detail of the design of an ancient trireme. The first-bank oarsmen depicted appear to have occupied an outrigger. The second- and thirdbank oarsmen, who occupied the lower decks, are presumably hidden by the planking of the ship’s hull. The ancient trireme was essentially a muscle-powered ram. And the Athenians were the supreme masters of naval manoeuvre.
which entailed rowing around opposing ships in order to ram them in their beams or sterns. Athens’ navy was very much a professionalised force, much as the army of Sparta was far more capable than a typical hoplite city-militia. Aboard each trireme were 170 rowers, and each was paid the fair wage of one drachma per day, which was about what a skilled craftsman could earn in a civilian trade. October 2016
all of Greece when they were needed.’ Herodotus
AN OFFENSIVE FLEET Athens lay at the centre of a maritime empire, with her fleet providing protection for the seaborne commerce that was her lifeblood. Once her Long Walls, connecting the city to the port city of Piraeus, were finished in the 450s BC, she was nearly invulnerable to outside attack. Her trading vessels, protected by the warships of the fleet, could bring her all the food that her urban population required. To pay for her ships, Athens used the tribute provided by the subject cities of her Aegean empire. She was thus able to sustain a large and robust fleet. When the Peloponnesian War broke out in 431 BC, Athens had a massive lead in sea power, and she confidently pitted this strength against the superior land power of Sparta and her Peloponnesian allies.
In 429 BC, Acarnania, in north-west Greece, was invaded by a Peloponnesian army under the command of Cnemus of Sparta. A little later, a Peloponnesian fleet of 47 ships sailed westward out of the Gulf of Corinth along its southern edge with reinforcements for his army. They had been shadowed by a small squadron of just 20 Athenian triremes moving in the same direction on the opposite side of the Gulf. This force, stationed at Naupactus, on the Gulf’s northern side, was under the command of Phormio, an experienced officer who had previously commanded Athenian ships at Samos in 440 BC, and also hoplites during the Siege of Potidaea in 432 BC. Naupactus was well situated to allow Phormio to maintain a watch on maritime
ABOVE A black-fi depicting a Greek warship. I one bank of oars, making it a pentecon 50-oared warship. But note the line of shields protecting the oarsmen.
Ima
Athenian oarsmen were neither conscripts nor mercenaries: they were lower-class citizens performing a public duty in a democratic state in which they had full political rights. The Athenian navy was therefore crewed by highly motivated free men with a stake in the system – men with the morale to master their craft and become able to execute the most difficult naval manoeuvres. The Athenians preferred to use the bronze rams at the prows of their ships to strike opposing galleys. To accomplish this required much practice, which the Athenians willingly undertook.
traffic going into or out of the city of Corinth and the Gulf. His principal mission was to prevent the Peloponnesian fleet from carrying its soldiers to Acarnania to augment Cnemus’s army.
THE APPROACH TO CHALCIS To reach Acarnania to the north, the Peloponnesian fleet would first have to cross over from the southern side of the Gulf, exposing them to an Athenian attack. Phormio had decided to allow them to sail unhindered through the narrows of the Straits of Rhium, out to the Gulf of Patras, where there was more room in which to fight, while he waited with his ships off Chalcis and the Evenus River on the northern side of the Gulf of Patras. Once the Peloponnesian ships had come on Patras in Achaea, they made a starboard (right) turn, to the north, and tried to cross to the other side of the Gulf. The 20 Athenian ships immediately sailed south to intercept them. Phormio hoped to strike the Peloponnesian fleet far from land in wideopen water where his highly trained crews could make the most of their superior ability to manoeuvre and ram. Once the Athenian ships were sighted, however, the Peloponnesians halted their passage and waited for nightfall before attempting to complete the crossing. But they were spotted by the Athenians and compelled to fight in open water.
Image: University of Texas Libraries
A NAVAL ‘LAAGER’
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The Peloponnesians knew they were no match for the Athenians in a battle of manoeuvre. Many of their ships were equipped to carry soldiers, and thus not well suited to a sea fight, which they wanted desperately to avoid. LEFT The Athenian Empire in c.450 BC. The Peloponnesian War was essentially a struggle between democratic city-states under Athenian hegemony and oligarchic or conservative states led by Sparta. Most of the former were maritime states, most of the latter essentially land-based. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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They therefore formed a defensive circle, or kyklos, with the prows of their ships facing outwards and no room between each ship through which an Athenian galley might intrude, thereby making the diekplous impossible. Inside this laager they placed all their smaller ships for protection, as well as the five speediest and best-handling ships in their fleet. These would act as a fire brigade and rush to the aid of any threatened sector of the circle. Phormio’s problem was clear. How could he attack the Peloponnesian fleet in such a strong position? He had just 20 ships of his own, and was therefore outnumbered more than two-to-one. Since the enemy was arrayed in a circle, the periplous could not be used, as there was no flank to turn. The only remaining choice, head-on collisions, would risk his lightly built ships on the outward-pointing rams of the Peloponnesians. Further, if he pressed hard in any one sector, he would be vulnerable to counterstrikes by any unmarked Peloponnesian ships. The solution that he hit on was to form his fleet into a line, and row around and around the enemy circle. During these revolutions, the Athenians would now and again mount feint attacks, causing the Peloponnesians to draw in a bit each time. On and on this dance continued, with the Peloponnesian ships becoming packed ever more tightly. Phormio also knew something about the local waters, and expected a wind to blow in soon, at sunrise. When this wind came, he expected the enemy vessels, too closely packed together, to collide and their formation break up.
THE VICTORY AT CHALCIS The anticipated dawn wind finally did arise, and the Peloponnesian ships smashed into each other within the restricted space of their shrunken kyklos. All was chaos as the
The Peloponnesian ships smashed into each other within the restricted space of their shrunken kyklos. 44
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Image: akg-images / Peter Connolly
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Peloponnesians tried to avoid collisions with friendly vessels. The orders of their captains could not be heard amid the din, and their rowers, who lacked experience, could not row properly in obedience to their helmsmen’s directions. At this critical juncture, Phormio at last chose to attack, with his galleys striking at the packed mass of enemy ships they had so ably corralled. The Athenian charge was irresistible. Several Peloponnesian ships were either sunk or disabled, and the rest of the fleet broke apart in panicked flight. Another dozen ships were captured by the Athenians as they fled. The Athenians had quite literally rowed circles around their opponents. The encounter had been a showcase for their skill at rowing and their ability to dictate when and how a battle would be fought. After this, the Athenian squadron went back to its base at Naupactus. Phormio sent word to Athens of his victory and requested that more ships be sent, for he anticipated that the Peloponnesians would again come out to fight. He was right: the Spartans were angry that the Peloponnesian fleet had been beaten by a smaller force, and wanted another chance.
ABOVE Ancient naval battles were often collisions between light, fast, well-handled ships that relied on manoeuvre and ramming, and heavy, slower, clumsily managed ships that fought defensively and relied on grappling, boarding, and, in effect, on turning a naval battle into something akin to a land battle. This imbalance was very evident in the long Peloponnesian War. Only towards its end did Athens’ enemies begin to catch up in maritime skill.
The Spartans ‘could not at all explain their defeat,’ Thucydides, the historian of the Peloponnesian War, tells us, ‘the less so as it was their first attempt at sea; and they fancied that that it was not that their navy was so inferior, but that there had been misconduct somewhere.’ The Spartans failed to appreciate ‘the long experience of the Athenians as compared with the little practice which they had had themselves’. The Spartans dispatched three commissioners, Timocrates, Brasidas, and Lycophron, to determine what had gone wrong.
NAVAL BUILD-UP IN THE GULF The Athenians sent an additional 20 ships to Phormio, but this flotilla did not move immediately to join him at Naupactus, sailing first to Crete on an unnecessary secondary mission, where, because of ‘adverse winds and stress of October 2016
both sides trained for battle, each unwilling to depart from the area. The Peloponnesians were reluctant to sail into open water, where they had only recently been defeated, and the Athenians would not fight in the narrows, where the confined waters would make their manoeuvring tactics less effective. It says much about the aura of invincibility that the Athenian navy possessed that the Peloponnesians, now under the command of Cnemus and Brasidas, were unwilling to attack for several days even though they possessed a nearly four-to-one advantage over the enemy.
THE DECISION TO FIGHT Finally, fearing that additional ships would soon arrive from Athens, the Peloponnesians decided to seek battle. They sensed, however, that the crews of their ships were demoralised by the earlier defeat, so Cnemus and Brasidas spoke to them about the upcoming battle. About the last engagement, they said that of ‘preparation for it, as you know, there was
BELOW In 429 BC, the confined waters of the Gulf of Corinth was the arena in which Athens’ small fleet trounced the numerically superior Peloponnesians at the Battles of Chalcis and Naupactus.
little enough; and the object of our voyage was not so much to fight at sea as an expedition by land’. They admitted that ‘perhaps also inexperience had something to do with our failure in our first naval action’. The Spartans reminded their crews that ‘you have always the advantage of superior numbers, and of engaging off your own coast, supported by your hoplites; and as a rule, numbers and equipment give victory’. The men of Athens’ 20 triremes were not without their own apprehensions. Their ‘fleet’ was a mere squadron, and they could not help but fear the odds against them. Phormio knew their mood. He recalled for them that they had earlier beaten the Peloponnesians, who now ‘not even themselves thinking that they are a match for us, have not ventured [again] to meet us on equal terms, but have equipped this multitude of ships against us’. Of the enemy crewmen, Phormio reminded his own that ‘you have defeated most of them already; and beaten men do not face a danger twice with the same determination’. As for his battle plan, the Athenian admiral said that he would not sail into the Straits, where ‘in a contest between a number of clumsily managed vessels and a small, fast, well-handled squadron, want of sea room is an undoubted disadvantage’.
Map: Ian Bull
weather,’ Thucydides writes, it ‘wasted no little time there’. In the meantime, the Peloponnesians were readying their fleet for a second battle. They sailed along the coast to Panormus in Achaea, where their army was waiting in support. Phormio also made sail, and moored his 20 ships off Molycrian Rhium (on the northern side of the Straits of Rhium). Between this city and Achaean Rhium, which lay on the opposite side of the Straits, was a stretch of water about three-quarters of a mile/ one kilometre wide. At Achaean Rhium, a fleet of 77 Peloponnesian ships anchored when they saw the Athenians do the same at Molycrian Rhium. What followed was a week-long waiting game, during which
THE PELOPONNESIAN ATTACK The Peloponnesians sailed eastward from the narrows back into the Gulf of Corinth, hoping to make Phormio think that they were making for the Athenian base at Naupactus. On their right wing, they placed their 20 best ships, in the belief that this squadron would catch the Athenians as they also sailed eastward along the coast to protect Naupactus. Phormio did indeed fear that the object of the Peloponnesian attack was Naupactus, and moved quickly along the coast with his ships in single file, attempting to reach it first. The Peloponnesians thereupon executed a rapid port (left) turn northward, bringing their fleet about so as to trap the Athenian triremes against the coastline. The manoeuvre was only partially successful, with the 11 galleys in the head of the Athenian fleet escaping. But the rear nine were caught and driven ashore. Some of these ships were taken under tow, while others were fought over by Athens’ Messenian allies, who bravely boarded them and fought the Peloponnesians for their possession. The 11 Athenian triremes not caught in the trap were still being pursued by the 20-strong right-wing squadron of the Peloponnesians. Ten of these Athenian ships found the safety of the harbour of Naupactus, and pointed their prows toward the enemy, ready to fight to the last against the approaching Peloponnesians, who were already singing the victory paean. Meanwhile, the hindmost, 11th, ship was being hunted by a Leucadian (Peloponnesian) warship that had ranged far ahead of the rest of the right-wing squadron. The captain of this Athenian galley saw that a merchant ship lay at anchor just outside the harbour. He used it craftily, as an obstacle, rowing around it, then turned on his pursuer and rammed and sank the enemy vessel. The loss of this single Leucadian ship caused the other Peloponnesians to panic. They were no longer in battle formation, having thought the battle won. Some crews had actually stopped rowing to allow the rest of their fleet to catch up. This made them perfect sitting targets. The Athenian triremes in the harbour now counterattacked, and quickly seized six Peloponnesian ships. They then took back all of their own ships, both those that been driven ashore and those that were being towed away.
PHORMIO AND ATHENIAN NAVAL SUPREMACY Both sides set up trophies to mark the victories that they had won: the Athenians for the stunning reversal of fortune outside Naupactus; the Peloponnesians, less convincingly, for their ‘victory’ over the rearmost portion of Athenian squadron. Still worried about the arrival of more Athenian ships, the Peloponnesian fleet 46
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sailed deeper into the Gulf and made for Corinth. Soon afterwards, the 20 Athenian ships that had been sent to link up with Phormio’s squadron before the engagement finally appeared. Phormio would prove to be one of the ancient world’s finest admirals, and his actions off Chalcis and Naupactus were marvels of naval command. The first, off Chalcis, was a masterful, almost clinical, dissection of a bigger but poorer-handling fleet by a smaller but more adroit force. At Naupactus, on the other hand, Phormio showed that he and his fleet could
Control of the sea was largely conceded to Athens until almost the end of the conflict.
ABOVE This artist’s reconstruction captures something of the chaotic character of ancient naval warfare. Fleets were close-packed for protection. The danger was of collisions and multiple pile-ups that could quickly reduce a fleet to chaos.
As for Phormio’s subsequent career, apart from a short and abortive campaign in Acarnania during the winter of 429/428 BC, he is not reported as having held any further wartime commands. Why this was so is not known. It is possible that he died not long afterward. Phormio’s memory remained evergreen among the Athenians, who placed a statue of the great admiral on the Acropolis, and gave him a state funeral when he passed away. r
recover their balance and triumph even when the action had initially gone very badly. Phormio’s victories also had wider strategic implications for the war. The Peloponnesian bid to take Acarnania was crippled because their reinforcements could not get through. The maritime trade of Corinth and the other Peloponnesian cities was also hindered by the continued presence of Athenian ships in the Gulf of Corinth. Most importantly, by demonstrating Athenian naval superiority so powerfully, Phormio discouraged the Peloponnesians from undertaking other naval efforts that might have destabilised the Athenian Empire or even brought down the intervention of Persia. Control of the sea was largely conceded to Athens until almost the end of the conflict.
Marc G DeSantis is the author of Rome Seizes the Trident, a naval history of the Punic Wars, published by Pen & Sword.
FURTHER READING Thucydides’ The Peloponnesian War (available in various editions), Donald Kagan’s The Peloponnesian War (Viking, 2003), and J S Morrison et al., The Athenian Trireme (Cambridge University Press, 2000). October 2016
Image: Alamy
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Tukhachevsky THE RED NAPOLEON Retired US colonel Bill Wenger discovers hidden genius in the little-known career of the Red Army’s Marshal Tukhachevsky.
T
he military prisoner, stripped of rank, dejected, and severely beaten, struggled to stand before the judges of the tribunal to hear read aloud a handwritten confession smeared with his own blood. He was summarily condemned to death. Within the hour, he was taken to the basement of the infamous Lubyanka Prison in Moscow and shot in the back of the head. Thus ended, at just 44 years of age, the life of one of the first five Marshals of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky. Tukhachevsky was one of the most brilliant, innovative, and influential military theorists since Napoleon Bonaparte. Some military historians believe the Second World War could have ended sooner had Tukhachevsky lived to lead the fight.
FORMATIVE YEARS
Tukhachevsky was one of the most brilliant, innovative, and influential military theorists since Napoleon Bonaparte. 48
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history. He encouraged his children to be independent thinkers and, as an avowed atheist, discouraged involvement in the Russian Orthodox Church. Tukhachevsky attended Moscow Military School, and in 1912 he was accepted at the Alexandrovskoye Military School, renowned for its intellectually rigorous curriculum. After graduating first in his class, he was commissioned as a junior officer in his father’s regiment, the Semyenovsky Guards. War erupted in Europe, and the young officer found himself mobilised. As he departed in September 1914, the future Marshal of the Soviet Union declared famously: I am convinced that all that is needed in order to achieve what I want is bravery and self-confidence. I certainly have enough self-confidence… I told myself that I shall either be a general at 30, or that I shall not be alive by then.
BRAVERY AND TENACITY IN WORLD WAR I Young Lieutenant Tukhachevsky exhibited excellent military instincts. His soldiers considered him the most capable officer in his regiment. He was popular with the men
ABOVE A posed photograph of Russian soldiers ‘in action’ during the First World War. OPPOSITE Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky (1893-1937).
because he frequently took time to talk to and get to know them. Within his first five months on the Eastern Front, he was decorated six times for bravery. In 1915, he was captured for the first time. Always aggressive, he escaped. This was repeated four times until, finally, he was sent to a special camp for recalcitrant prisoners at Ingolstadt Castle, Bavaria. In Ingolstadt prison, Tukhachevsky was the cellmate of a tall, aloof French captain named Charles de Gaulle. The future President of France read German newspapers and delivered lectures to the other 150 or so prisoners on the progress of the war. After the war, Tukhachevsky and de Gaulle remained in touch, discussing the implications of the mechanisation of war. At Ingolstadt, Tukhachevsky had extensive discussions on combined-arms warfare, the use of air power, and even guerilla and counterinsurgency warfare with some of the most aggressive, progressive, and intelligent officers in the French, British, and even US services. October 2016
Image opposite: Alamy
Tukhachevsky was born on 15 February 1893 in the village of Slednevo in Smolensk Province of north-central Imperial Russia. His family was aristocratic, but impoverished. Nevertheless, Tukhachevsky grew up in considerably better circumstances than the majority of his countrymen, who lived a poverty-ridden and benighted existence in peasant villages. His father was an intellectual, cultured man who taught his son music, languages, and
TUKHACHEVSKY
LEFT Russian soldiers of the First World War. Unusually for a Russian officer of aristocratic extraction, Tukhachevsky took time to talk to and get to know his soldiers.
literature, history, astronomy, and mathematics. He was an accomplished musician and a close friend of composer Dmitri Shostakovich; with Shostakovich, Tukhachevsky played a violin that he had personally hand-crafted. Despite his many cultural refinements, however, Tukhachevsky was known to have been ruthless and brutal towards his enemies in battle. Tukhachevsky entered the Communist Party on 5 April 1918. Why would an Imperial Russian officer from an aristocratic family become a Communist? Perhaps he joined the Party because of disenchantment with the corruption, inefficiency, and failure of the old Tsarist Army. Perhaps he saw career opportunity in the new Red Army. Perhaps, as some believed, his young heart was won to the cause of the working class during an emotional personal encounter with Lenin. Whatever the reason, Tukhachevsky was henceforward, until his death, loyal to the Party, its cause, and its leaders.
RED AND SOVIET ARMY COMMANDER After becoming a member of the Communist Party, Tukhachevsky joined the Red Army, and his career accelerated remarkably. In 1918, he took command of the First Red Army, soundly defeating the White Army commanded by Vladimir Kappel by adroit envelopment and superb use of modern combined-arms. The Bolshevik Defence Minister, Leon Trotsky, made Tukhachevsky commander of the Fifth Army in 1919. Tukhachevsky led a campaign to defeat and capture Siberia from the anti-Communist White forces of
In August 1917, Tukhachevsky escaped for the fifth time, travelling north-east for over 700 miles in two months to return to the Russian lines. He found the Imperial Russian Army on the brink of mutiny and embroiled in the turmoil of revolution. The Russian economy had collapsed, the ‘Kerensky Offensive’ had been a disaster, and the German counterstroke had brought the enemy to within 300 miles of Petrograd. After the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917, the new government, despite massive 50
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German territorial gains, was compelled to make peace. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk early in 1918 ended the war on the Eastern Front.
MAN OF CULTURE AND INTELLECT Tukhachevsky was a man of considerable intellect, talent, and sophistication. He was handsome, physically strong, athletic, and well-tailored. He spoke and read extensively in French, German, and English as well as his native Russian. He was extraordinarily knowledgeable in a wide range of subjects, including
‘I told myself that I shall either be a general at 30, or that I shall not be alive by then.’ Mikhail Tukhachevsky October 2016
LEFT The Russian Revolution – the world-shaking event that allowed brilliant men like Tukhachevsky to reach the top of their professions. BELOW LEFT Tukhachevsky (third from left, looking away from camera) during the Russian Civil War.
tanks and mechanised vehicles, the Katyusha rocket system, improved high explosives, the first successful helicopter, modern communications devices, and enhanced chemical warfare munitions and employment techniques. Also developed were the concepts and equipment necessary for the creation of airborne forces by both the Wehrmacht and the Red Army – and soon, by imitation, the US Army. Tactical and operational combined-arms doctrine was tested and written in collaboration. This meant similar – though not identical – German and Soviet approaches. A young German colonel called Heinz Guderian was deeply involved in the equipment-testing and doctrinal development in Russia. Guderian would become the leading spokesman and practitioner of the Germans’ highly successful Blitzkrieg tactics during World War II. Tukhachevsky was in the forefront of these developments, incorporating the new thinking and weapons systems into his own evolving concept of ‘Deep Battle’. And he took the opportunity to learn all he could about the Reichswehr’s conception of war – in anticipation of possible future conflict between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Throughout, Tukhachevsky remained deeply anti-Nazi. Aleksandr Kolchak. In this struggle, he successfully used his cavalry to envelop the enemy’s open flanks. He used similar tactics against Anton Denikin’s White army in the Caucasus in 1920. Lenin and Trotsky called on Tukhachevsky so frequently they nicknamed him ‘The Fireman’. At the age of just 27, he was placed in command of the Western Front (comprising two, later four, entire armies). He defeated the Poles and almost captured Warsaw. He was also called on to suppress the anti-Bolshevik uprisings at Kronstadt and in Tambov Province. He invariably executed his missions with efficiency and notable brutality. In 1921 Tukhachevsky was appointed Head of the Military Academy, and in 1925 became Deputy Chief-of-Staff of the Red Army. In 1928 he was assigned Commander of the Leningrad Military District and Chief of Ordnance. He was also advancing within the Party. At the 17th Party Congress in 1934, Tukhachevsky www.military-history.org
was elected a Candidate Member of the Russian Communist Party Central Committee.
THE NAZIS AND THE TREATY OF RAPALLO The Treaty of Versailles strictly limited German military production and development. Hitler sought to evade these restrictions. The Nazis wanted to develop modern weapons and the innovatory tactics to employ them. So the Reichswehr needed a location to test them away from the prying eyes of the Disarmament Committee of the League of Nations. The 1922 Treaty of Rapallo between Germany and the USSR had resolved the economic and territorial disputes between the two countries and normalised relations. This treaty led to military cooperation between the Germans and the Soviets. It facilitated the development of many new weapons systems, among them the Stuka Ju-87 dive bomber, new
MILITARY WRITINGS Among the first of many military treatises by Tukhachevsky was The Battle of the Bugs (1920), which advocated complete destruction of the enemy rather than attrition warfare. With Future War (1928) and Instructions on Deep Battle (1935), Tukhachevsky confirmed his position as a theorist of war able to cover the full range from national strategy to battlefield tactics. It is likely that he drew ideas from the work of G S Isserson (some of which is still classified) and of J F C Fuller. Finally, Tukhachevsky, with his team of military writers, edited and published his famous, final, seminal work: Provisional Field Service Regulations of 1936. Here he codified his concept of highly mobile, flexible, and aggressive combined-arms Deep Battle. Together with generals Voroshilov, Budenny, Blyukher, and Yegorov, Tukhachevsky was named among the first Marshals of the Soviet Union in 1935. He was still just 42 years old. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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TUKHACHEVSKY
Continuous offensive operations, with integrated, well-supported combined arms, were central to Tukhachevsky’s conception of war.
TOP & ABOVE LEFT Tukhachevsky was the military theorist who taught an entire generation of Red Army officers how to make war. He was, above all, the advocate of mobile, flexible, aggressive, combined-arms ‘Deep Battle’. ABOVE Tukhachevsky (second from right) and fellow Red Army generals in front of Lenin’s Mausoleum in 1935. LEFT Tukhachevsky in 1936, the year before his arrest and execution.
MILITARY THEORIES Tukhachevsky did not develop his theories in a vacuum or without historical context. Quite the contrary: he built on a long tradition of Russian and Soviet thinking and writing on military affairs. Ideas of swift attack in overwhelming numbers and the wreaking of havoc in enemy rear-areas had been tenets of the military strategy of Generalissimo Aleksandr Suvorov two centuries before. Tukhachevsky evolved his concepts in the extraordinary and stimulating climate of military intellectualism in the Soviet Union during the 1920s and 1930s. Perhaps the greatest influence on him was Aleksandr A Svechin, 52
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a brilliant member of the General Staff who in 1926 published his Strategy. In this seminal document, Svechin was the first to define clearly the operational level of warfare: ‘Tactics make up the steps from which operational leaps are assembled. Strategy points out the path.’ Svechin also described the critical and essential relationship between the military and the political/national military-industrial complex. Tukhachevsky absorbed, expanded on, and vigorously advocated these concepts. Continuous offensive operations, with integrated, well-supported combined arms, were central to Tukhachevsky’s conception of war. The purpose of an offensive was to capture, disrupt, defeat, and above all destroy the enemy in the shortest time possible. Swift attack and ruthless execution were essential to victory. Defence, he argued, ‘is only a temporary expedient… employed locally while on the offensive in other sectors, or in the consolidation after taking an important objective, to gain time, cover a withdrawal, or repel an attack by superior enemy force.’ He was also an advocate of effective centralised command and control: ‘the collegial system of command was inefficient and ineffective. Commanders have to be able to think independently, and make decisions without interference from the political commissars, who are ignorant of military matters.’ Tukhachevsky favoured a broad statement of the commander’s battle objectives so as to permit initiative and independent action by well-trained and highly motivated subordinate commanders on modern, widely dispersed battlefields. Today, soldiers would recognise this concept as the explicit ‘commander’s intent’. Tukhachevsky’s great strength was that he thoroughly understood the interconnectivity and interrelationship of the strategic, the operational, and the tactical elements October 2016
THE MILITARY IDEAS OF MIKHAIL TUKHACHEVSKY æ'HHSFRQWLQXRXVRSHUDWLRQVDUHWKHNH\WRVXFFHVVLQPRGHUQZDU æ'HVWUXFWLRQRIWKHHQHP\LVDPHDQVDQGQRWDQHQGLQDQGRILWVHOI æ'LVUXSWGLVDEOHFDSWXUHDQGGHVWUR\WKHHQHP\IRUFHVE\FRQWLQXRXVDQGUXWKOHVVDWWDFN QHYHUDOORZLQJWKHHQHP\WRUHVWRUUHJURXS æ&KDQQHOWKHHQHP\WRNLOO]RQHVDQGNLOOER[HVZKHUHFRPELQHGDUPVFDQGHVWUR\KLP æ8VHPRELOHʼnUHSRZHURŀHQVLYHVSLULWDQGDUPRXUHGUHVHUYHVWRH[SORLWHQHP\ZHDNQHVVHV EUHDFKHQHP\OLQHVDQGSHQHWUDWHWKHHQHP\UHDUWRGLVUXSWKLVFRPPXQLFDWLRQVDQGORJLVWLFV æ'RQRWRYHUO\GHSHQGRQRQHZHDSRQVV\VWHPRUIRUFH%DODQFHIRUFHVDQGV\QFKURQLVHWKH DSSOLFDWLRQRIIRUFH æ3URWHFWŌDQNVDQGKDUDVVWKHHQHP\E\UHVRXUFHIXOQHVVDJJUHVVLRQDQGLQLWLDWLYH æ$UPRXUHGIRUFHVPXVWEHDEOHWRDFWLQFRQFHUWZLWKERWKLQIDQWU\DQGRWKHUIRUFHVDVZHOO LQGHSHQGHQWO\DVVKRFNDQGH[SORLWDWLRQIRUFHV æ:LGHO\GLVSHUVHWKUHDWVWRWKHHQHP\VRKHFDQQRWFRQFHQWUDWHKLVIRUFHV æ7HFKQRORJ\FDQPXOWLSO\WKHSRZHURIVPDOOIRUFHV æ*RRGFRPPDQGHUVFDQHPHUJHIURPDQ\VRFLDOFODVV æ7KHFRPPDQGHUH[HUFLVHVFRQWURORYHUKLVXQLWWKURXJKKLVVWDŀ æ3URSHUFRQWURORQWKHSDUWRIWKHFRPPDQGHUUHTXLUHVFOHDUDQGVXFFLQFWH[SUHVVLRQLQFRPPXQLFDWLQJ PLVVLRQDQGRUGHUVSURSHUVHOHFWLRQRIWKHGLUHFWLRQRIDWWDFNDQGWLPHO\FRQFHQWUDWLRQRIIRUFHV æ7KHEHVWUHVXOWVLQEDWWOHDUHDFKLHYHGZKHQDOOFRPPDQGHUVIURPKLJKHVWWRORZHVWDUHWUDLQHGLQ WKHVSLULWRIEROGLQLWLDWLYH æ6ROGLHUVRIDOOUDQNVXVHWKHLUWLPHEHWWHUWUDLQLQJRQDFWXDOZDUʼnJKWLQJWDVNVWKDQRQGULOOVDQGSDUDGHV æ6ROGLHUVRIWKH5HG$UP\PXVWEHWUDLQHGDQGGLVFLSOLQHG æ7KHVSLULWXDOVWUHQJWKRIWKH5HG$UP\LVDYHU\SRZHUIXOZHDSRQ æ7KH5HG$UP\LVWKHFXWWLQJHGJHRIWKH5HYROXWLRQ æ7KH5HG$UP\VKRXOGQRWFRQIXVHPDVWHU\RIWKHRU\ZLWKFRPPDQGRISUDFWLFH
necessary to the successful prosecution of modern warfare. His extraordinarily broad and penetrating grasp of the entire spectrum of warfare places him at the apex of the military theorists of the 20th century.
STALIN Tukhachevsky’s influence among the Soviet military and his popularity with the public at large, together with the reach of his writings and his international connections, made him a threat. Stalin was constructing a monstrous totalitarian dictatorship, and all people of independent mind, especially those with a revolutionary past, were now under suspicion. Suddenly, in 1937, Tukhachevsky was demoted and relegated to the low-level position of Commander of the Volga Military District. Soon after that, he was arrested by the NKVD (the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs) – Stalin’s secret police. During the Soviet invasion of Poland during the Polish-Soviet War of 1921, Tukhachevsky had come into conflict with Stalin over the Soviet failure to capture Warsaw. Tukhachevsky blamed Stalin, the Regional Commissar, for failure to provide the necessary support for his attack. Thus began a history of animosity and conflict that would ultimately prove fatal to Tukhachevsky. Stalin regarded Tukhachevsky as an influential intellectual, a strong dynamic www.military-history.org
INSET This grainy image shows Tukhachevsky at his show trial – with clear evidence of beatings.
leader, and thus, potentially, a serious rival. Tukhachevsky and other Red Army officers were the victims of an elaborate state conspiracy involving the secret services of at least four countries: Nazi Germany, Czechoslovakia, France, and the Soviet Union. Germany was interested in emasculating the Russian officer corps. In 1936, Reinhardt Heydrich, the ambitious, Machiavellian chief of Himmler’s Sicherheitsdienst (SD) concocted an elaborate plot. Through a series of intermediaries of dubious credibility, the Nazis passed to Stalin’s NKVD (for a considerable fee) bogus documents that clearly implied that Tukhachevsky was a traitor. The Soviet marshal was arrested on 22 May 1937. He was accused and indicted for collaboration with the Nazis against the Soviet Union. A special tribunal of the Supreme Court presided over by the Senior Judge of the Soviet Union, Vasili Ulrikh, was convened on 11 June 1937, for the purpose of prosecuting the personnel involved in the ‘Trotskyist Anti-Soviet Military Organisation’.
The tribunal reviewed the ‘evidence’ and the forced confessions. The accused were summarily condemned to death. People’s Commissar Kliment Voroshilov signed the execution orders, which were approved by Stalin. Within hours, Marshal Tukhachevsky and the other high-ranking officers were murdered by pistol shots to the head. Stalin afterwards asked if Tukhachevsky had spoken any last words. He was told, ‘The snake said he was dedicated to the Motherland and Comrade Stalin.’ These executions marked the start of the ‘Great Purge’. It lasted into 1941 and resulted in the imprisonment of more than 37,000 Russian officers and commissars, and the death of more than 7,200. The Red Army was thus effectively decapitated by the Stalinist dictatorship. The main beneficiary was, of course, Adolf Hitler.
TUKHACHEVSKY’S LEGACY Had Tukhachevsky not been executed in 1937 would his presence in the Soviet military leadership during World War II have made a difference? It is a question that has fascinated military historians for decades. Much would have depended on the latitude and independence permitted by Stalin, who was never trusting, and always suspicious of possible rivals within the Soviet hierarchy. Stalin did not allow his remaining generals much independence until t became clear that the Soviets were in serious danger of being defeated by the Nazis. Perhaps hen Tukhachevsky would have made a difference. But his legacy remained. Though his writings were banned after his death, his ideas continued to have a profound influence. A major contribution was made to Soviet victory through the military leadership of his former students. These successful combat leaders included the remarkable Marshal Zhukov, but also others, such as Marshals Konev and Rokossovsky, and Generals Chernyakhovsky, Antonov, Pliyev, and Vatutin. They and many others employed the concepts of Tukhachevsky to excellent effect in the encirclement and defeat of the Field-Marshal Friedrich Paulus’s Sixth Army at Stalingrad, in the decisive victory of Soviet manoeuvre at Kursk, and in the combined-arms drive to, and capture of, Berlin in 1945.
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Colonel Bill Wenger served for 42 years in the US Army before retirement. He volunteered for multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. In civilian life, he is a real-estate executive and college instructor. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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REGIMENT. REGIMENT. REGIMENT. REGIMENT.
The Louisberg Grenadiers at Quebec 13 September 1759 Patrick Mercer on the role of the Louisberg Grenadiers in General Wolfe’s decisive victory at Quebec.
GRENADIERS AND LOUISBERG The most numerous part of Britain’s Georgian Army was the infantry. A battalion was about 54
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Image: WIPL
W
hen Benjamin West painted his famous canvas The Death of Wolfe at Quebec in 1770, all sorts of controversy surrounded it. First, it was thought to emulate too closely several depictions of the death of Christ, with Captain Hervey Smythe, Wolfe’s aide-de-camp, taking the place of the Virgin Mary, and the Colours being substituted for the Cross. Second, Joshua Reynolds advised West not to paint the figures in contemporary clothing, but to use Classical attire. In consequence, King George III initially found the whole thing too avant-garde and refused to buy it. Third, only four of the 14 people shown in the picture were actually there: Colonel Fraser of Fraser’s Highlanders, for example, could never have looked on so passionately as he was not even present on the battlefield – he was still recovering from earlier wounds. Standing in the right foreground, clutching his hands in pious misery, is another puzzle. He is a bareheaded soldier of Hopson’s Regiment, the 40th Foot, a unit that was certainly in Canada at the time, but not at this battle. Look more closely, though, and a grenadier’s ‘mitre’ cap can be seen on the ground in front of him. He is a grenadier of the 40th, and a little research reveals that he is a Louisberg Grenadier, an 18th-century ‘special forces’ unit, at the head of which General James Wolfe was riddled with musket fire on 13 September 1759.
700 strong, and consisted of conventional ‘battalion’ companies and one specially picked company of grenadiers, the tallest, smartest, and most mature men, who would be used as shock troops. With this in mind, commanders would often ‘brigade’ these specialist troops: that is, they would take the grenadiers from several battalions and band them together for a particular operation. So it was that after the fall of Louisberg in July 1758, the 22nd, 40th, and 45th Regiments all detached their grenadiers, who were then formed into a half battalion and, unusually, dubbed ‘Louisberg Grenadiers’.
ABOVE Benjamin West’s famous – and highly inaccurate – painting of the death of Wolfe at the climax of the Battle of Quebec.
The target against which these men would be thrown was the linchpin of French Northern Canada – Quebec. This great port and fortress, though, lay at the top of the St Lawrence River, the entrance to which was protected by the heavily fortified town of Louisberg. In the summer of 1745, during the War of Austrian Succession, Louisberg had been besieged and captured by the British, but it had then been returned to France under the terms of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1748. October 2016
Headdress Grenadiers of every country usually wore tall ‘mitre’ caps. In the case of the British grenadiers, they were embroidered in front with the regimental facing colour and royal designs, and in the rear with a grenade encompassing the regimental number.
Equipment By the mid 18th century, grenades were no longer carried, but each soldier had one pouch of cartridges on his hip and another on a waist belt for instant use. On the broad leather cross-belt, grenadiers still had a brass matchcase, a leftover from the time when grenade fuses had to be lit before they were thrown.
Weapons In the Americas, British troops mostly carried the Long Land Pattern musket at this period, as well as a bayonet and, for grenadiers, a short sword. The musket, or Brown Bess, would fire four rounds a minute in the hands of well-trained infantry. Contrary to popular belief, it was fairly accurate up to about 100 paces and had only a modest recoil.
Clothing The long-reaching scarlet coat, waistcoat, and breeches were worn in the colonies. Each regiment’s clothing was faced in a particular colour: in the case of the 40th Foot, buff. Leather belts that would normally have been pipe-clayed white were kept in their natural ‘buff’ state.
Long cloth gaiters or ‘spatterdashes’ were worn, which allowed the men to move through brush more easily and gave some protection from water to the ankles and feet. Black gaiters replaced the usual white ones on campaign. Shoes were a subject of much controversy. Square-toed and well tallowed, either buckled and worn low on the foot or laced and worn slightly higher, the troops’ shoes were not fitted to a particular foot. Instead, the men were ordered to swap them from foot to foot daily to reduce wear.
www.military-history.org
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Reconstruction: Patrick Mercer
Leg and footwear
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Image: WIPL
With the outbreak of the Seven Years War, the Americas once again became a cockpit. An attack on Louisberg collapsed in 1757, but William Pitt directed that another attempt be made the following year. This time the French failed to beat off the British approach at sea as they had done before, and an amphibious assault started on 8 June. Under Brigadier-General James Wolfe’s command, Hopson’s 40th Foot took part in an audacious landing and flank attack that forced the outlying French forces back into the main fortifications. There followed a sixweek siege that combined conventional tactics on land with daring operations by the Royal Navy. Finally, on 26 July, after the cutting out
One specially picked company of grenadiers, the tallest, smartest, and most mature men, were used as shock troops. www.military-history.org
of several ships in the harbour, and with the ramparts under a most destructive fire, the French surrendered.
UPRIVER TO QUEBEC But there was to be no attempt on Quebec that year; instead, a series of minor expeditions were mounted against lesser French garrisons and their Indian supporters, while preparations were made for the next season’s campaigning. Here, the Louisberg Grenadiers sprang into life, with a great deal of interest being shown in their training and fitness by Wolfe. He had been entrusted with an independent command for amphibious operations against Quebec, which was to be approached from the south-east – that is, from across the St Lawrence River. With fewer than 8,000 troops, he needed to capitalise on his best and most-experienced men. Landed on the Île d’Orléans on 28 June, Wolfe quickly established batteries to fire across the river from Point Levis, and he soon after determined to assault Beaumont to gain a foothold on the northern shore. In 1760, an eye-witness account of what followed was published. While the author is not named, he is described as the ‘SergeantMajor of Hopson’s Grenadiers’. I can only assume that he was the senior non-commissioned officer of the Louisberg Grenadiers: The first push we made was on the 31 July, with 13 Companies of Grenadiers, supported by about 5,000 Battalion-men. As soon as we landed we
OPPOSITE PAGE The Quebec campaign of 1759, showing [TOP] the theatre of operations in general and [BOTTOM] the decisive battle on the Heights of Abraham. ABOVE A near contemporary reconstruction of the decisive collision on the Heights of Abraham.
fixed our Bayonets and beat our Grenadier’s March, and so advanced on. During all this time their cannon played very briskly on us, but their small-arms, in their trenches, lay cool until they were sure of their mark; then they poured their small-shot like showers of hail, which caused our brave Grenadiers to fall very fast. Brave General Wolfe saw that our attempts were in vain, so he retreated to his boats again. The number of killed and wounded that day was about 400 men. In our retreat, we burnt the two ships, which we had run ashore on that side to cover our landing. Casualties were heavy; as Vaudreuil, the French commander, wrote afterwards, ‘I have no more anxiety about Quebec. Wolfe, I assure you, will make no progress… He contented himself with losing about 500 of his best soldiers.’
THE GRAND ASSAULT The British continued the siege from across the St Lawrence, but as their numbers dwindled due to wounds and disease, Wolfe became even more determined to attack his enemy before the advantage of numbers shifted decisively. MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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THE LOUISBERG GRENADIERS AT QUEBEC The three regiments whose grenadier companies made up the Louisberg Grenadiers had very varied histories. At the time of Quebec, the old custom of calling the regiment by its colonel’s name was still in use, but so was the new regimental number which reflected when each unit was raised. Whitmore’s 22nd Foot had been raised in 1694. Designated Cheshire in 1781, they had buff facings, but due to their red ‘small-clothes’ (waistcoat, breeches, and so on), they were nicknamed ‘The Red Knights’. At Dettingen in 1743, a detachment protected King George II at a moment of great peril. In recognition, he plucked a sprig of oak and told them to wear it in their caps forever. And they still do. Hopson’s 40th Foot were raised in Nova Scotia in 1717 out of a number of independent companies specifically designed for service in the Americas. Numbered 40 in 1751, they fought throughout the American Revolution, being designated 2nd Somersetshire in 1781. Amalgamated with the 82nd Prince of Wales’s Volunteers in 1881, they were then redesignated South Lancashire Regiment. Their nickname, ‘The Excellers’, cleverly reflected ‘40’ in Roman numbers: XL. Warberton’s 45th Foot were raised in 1741 as a marine regiment, and originally numbered as the 56th Foot. Soon renumbered as the 45th, the regiment returned to England, having been fought to a standstill in the American Revolution. They were the first to be given a county title in 1781 – the 1st Nottinghamshire. Later, in recognition of their service in the Peninsular Campaign, the 45th were granted the special title Sherwood Foresters, while their nickname – ‘The Old Stubborns’ – described their conduct at Talavera in 1808. The annus mirabilis of 1759 was the high point of British power in the 18th century. While the year started with a threat of French invasion, Fort Ticonderoga and Quebec were taken in the Americas, Guadeloupe in the West Indies, Madras was secured in India, Minden was a resounding victory in Germany, and the Royal Navy triumphed at Lagos and Quiberon Bay.
So it was that on 12 September, an advanced guard rowed upstream and landed under the cliffs of Anse-auFoulon with a view to establishing a bridgehead between Montcalm’s main forces around Quebec and his other troops further to the west. The Loiusberg Grenadiers were to deploy between the 35th on the extreme right of the line and the 28th to their left, with the rest of Wolfe’s slender forces (about 3,300 in all) wheeling like a gate towards Quebec across the Plains of
‘A terrible slaughter ensued from the quick fire of our field pieces and musketry.’ 58
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Abraham. The Sergeant-Major has the wrong date, but he describes the action very accurately: On the 14th we landed, at break of day, and immediately attacked and routed the enemy, taking possession of a battery of four 24-pdrs, and one 13-inch mortar, with but an inconsiderable loss. We then took post on the Plains of Abraham, whither Monsieur Montcalm (on hearing that we had landed, for he did not expect us) hastened with his whole army (consisting of cavalry as well as infantry) to give us battle. About 9 o’clock, we observed the enemy marching down towards us in three columns. At 10, they formed their line of battle, which was at least six deep, having their flanks covered by a thick wood on each side, into which they threw above 3,000 Canadians and Indians, who galled us much. The Regulars then marched briskly up to us, and gave us their first fire, at about 50 yards distance, which we did not return, as it was General Wolfe’s express orders not to fire till they came within 20 yards of us. They continued firing by platoons, advancing in a very regular manner till they came close up to us, and then the action became general. In
about a quarter of an hour, the enemy gave way on all sides, when a terrible slaughter ensued from the quick fire of our field pieces and musketry, with which we pursued them to the walls of the town, regardless of all excessive heavy fire from all their batteries. The enemy lost in the engagement, LieutenantGeneral Montcalm (who was torn to pieces by our grape-shot), two brigadier-generals, one colonel, two lieutenant-colonels, and at least 130 officers and men killed and 200 taken prisoners at their very sally-ports, of which 58 were officers. On our side were killed the brave and never to be forgotten General Wolfe, with nine officers, four sergeants, and 44 privates; wounded, Brigadier-General Monckton, Colonel Carlton, Quarter-Master-General, Major Barre, AdjutantGeneral, and 50 other officers, with 26 sergeants and 557 privates. This action was the more glorious, as the enemy were at least 12,000 strong, besides 500 horse; whereas we, at the utmost, did not consist of above 3,500.
THE CAPITULATION The Sergeant-Major can be excused for exaggerating Montcalm’s forces – 12,000 is about right for his entire force, but he had fewer than 4,000 before Quebec that day. The author neglects to mention, though, that Wolfe ensured terrible execution among the French by ordering each musket to be ‘double shotted’ – loaded with two balls – but he continues: We lay on our arms all night, and in the morning we secured the bridge of boats which the enemy had over Charles River, and possessed ourselves of all the posts and venues that was or might be of any consequence leading to the town, and broke ground at 100 yards’ distance from the walls. We likewise got up 12 heavy 24-pdrs, six heavy 12-pdrs, some large mortars, and the 46-inch howitzers to play upon the town, and we had been employed three days, intending to make a breach, and storm the city sword in hand. But we were prevented by their beating a parley, and sending out a flag of truce with articles of capitulation, and the next day, being 17 September, we took possession of the city, where we found 250 pieces of cannon, a number of mortars, from 9 to 15 inches, field pieces, howitzers, etc, with a large quantity of artillery stores. And with that the Louisberg Grenadiers’ job was done. Wolfe had died at the head of his hand-picked shock troops, and whilst the victory was by no means theirs alone, this corps d’elite had added another triumph to the annus mirabilis of 1759.
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Patrick Mercer is a former soldier, journalist, and MP. He is interested in any action of the British Army or Royal Navy, but has made a special study of the Italian Campaign. October 2016
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CHURCHILL’S NAVY: THE SHIPS, PEOPLE, AND ORGANISATION 1939-1945
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Brian Lavery Bloomsbury, £25 (pbk) ISBN 978-1844863365
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rian Lavery’s Churchill’s Navy was irst published in 2006, but remains an extraordinary achievement, and this reissue is very timely, with interest in the Second World War apparently showing no signs of waning, and the generation that actually fought in it diminishing steadily with each new anniversary. From the fall of France in the summer of 1940 until the invasion of Normandy in June 1944, the main burden of ensuring Great Britain’s survival and of maintaining the ight against Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and later Imperial Japan fell on the Royal Navy. There is no better book than this sweeping, comprehensive volume to convey some sense of the enormity of the Senior Service’s war efort; its author is one of Britain’s foremost naval historians and Curator Emeritus at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich. Churchill’s Navy is structured like an encyclopaedia, and is similarly comprehensive, but manages to be simultaneously as gripping and readable as the best works of popular history.
AMPHIBIOUS WARFARE Lavery divides his work into 12 sensible sections, encompassing the technological, social, operational, and structural elements of the Royal Navy. Quite literally, no aspect of the war where the Royal Navy made a contribution or which in any way afected its wartime story has been wholly overlooked. Nonetheless, the author displays an instinctive understanding 62
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of his core narrative, devoting, for example, much more time and detail to ships and men than he does to base infrastructure. Lavery begins by looking briely at the state of the service in 1939, and then canters switly through an appropriately brief overview of the naval war. One of the most admirable achievements of Churchill’s Navy is the way in which the book determinedly avoids becoming yet another operational history of the war at sea. In Part II, Lavery moves on to what can best be described as the Royal Navy’s governance: command structures, communications, and logistics. In Part III, he then looks briely outside the Royal Navy to proile Great Britain’s ‘Enemies and Allies’, before diving into the heart of the service in Parts IV-VI: ‘The Ships’, ‘Naval Society and Culture’ (which includes subjects as diverse as discipline, traditions, and medicine), and ‘Oicers and Ratings’, which also takes in the Royal Marines and the Women’s Royal Naval Service. One of Lavery’s greatest strengths is his ability to be as perfectly at home when sketching the intricacies of ship design, in just four accessible yet comprehensive pages, as he is when describing in earthy detail the realities of mess-deck life, or the hobbies and drinking habits of the average sailor. In writing Churchill’s Navy, Lavery has drawn from both complex technical manuals and vivid personal memoirs. His prose is peppered with carefully chosen irst-hand testimony from veterans, some of them
long-forgotten everyman igures he has pulled out of the shadows, others instantly recognisable household names, including Alec Guinness and Nicholas Monsarrat. Churchill’s Navy is a book that irmly deies attempts to pigeonhole it. From people and kit, Lavery moves on to examine how the service was subdivided for operational purposes, looking at the Battle Fleet (Part VII), the Fleet Air Arm (Part VIII), and the Submarine Service (Part IX). He is successful in conveying the nature of the occasionally complex relationship between the latter two services and the rest of the Royal Navy, which can sometimes be tortuous to explain, particularly for the non-specialist reader.
NAVIES WITHIN THE NAVY The last three sections of Churchill’s Navy are devoted to three other areas of operational activity that at times had such distinctive cultures, philosophies, and operational needs that they also took on the appearance of being separate ‘navies within the Navy’. Part X looks at the hard-worked convoy escorts, which arguably fought the most important battle of all, protecting British trade convoys in the Atlantic, Arctic, and around the British coast. Part XI analyses ‘The Coastal Navies’, including Coastal Forces, mischievously nicknamed ‘Costly Farces’ by irritated sailors conined to capital ships swinging at anchor in the main Home Fleet base at Scapa Flow. This chapter October 2016
MHM REVIEWS
LEFT The anchoring gear of the battlecruiser HMS Repulse. BELOW LEFT New recruits are greeted by a warrant officer at HMS Royal Arthur in Skegness, February 1940.
the nature of beach assaults, shore bombardment, the vital role of beachmasters, and supply and logistics. All these subjects are covered with admirable clarity and precision.
ART AND ARTIFICE
also includes an appropriate nod to the ot-ignored and unsung heroes of the Royal Naval Patrol Service, and their even less glamorous and more frequently overlooked comrades in the Examination Service and the Boom Defence Service. Finally, Part XII is devoted to the intricacies of amphibious warfare, including Combined Operations and the enormous efort the Royal Navy devoted to Operation Overlord in June 1944. www.military-history.org
Overlord’s naval dimension (which had its own codename: Operation Neptune) has oten been coloured military khaki rather than navy blue, glossed over by military historians eager to focus on what happened ater the soldiers’ boots hit the beach. Some 79% of the extraordinary assemblage of naval power which facilitated Neptune was British or Canadian, including 892 out of 1,213 major warships, and 3,261 out of 4,126 landing crat.
Lavery robustly rectiies this neglect of the naval contribution. He marches switly through amphibious warfare training, the development of specialised assault shipping, and the daring (and highly secret) beach-survey work carried out by the men of the Combined Operations Pilotage Parties. He follows these up with a look at the bewildering and complex range of landing crat at the disposal of the Allies by 1944. He then covers
Churchill’s Navy is lavishly illustrated with over 300 images. As well as the traditional photographs, Lavery has chosen, refreshingly, to provide some colour by reproducing artworks, including a number of striking paintings by the war artist Richard Eurich. He also makes excellent use of wartime propaganda posters and technical drawings reproduced from contemporary oicial pamphlets and other publications. The text is also supported by numerous bespoke maps, charts, and diagrams, covering everything from the location of naval bases to command structure and the exponential growth of recruitment from 1939 to 1945. Useful appendices detail the Royal Navy’s principal warship and aircrat types, and identify the various members of the Board of Admiralty and the Commanders-in-Chief who directed activities through nearly six years of war. In a concise single-page conclusion, Lavery robustly and rightly puts the Royal Navy back at the heart of the Second World War story. While acknowledging the Senior Service’s undoubted failings and mistakes, he ends, correctly, by stating that ‘its conduct… allows it to be remembered as one of the decisive forces of the 20th century’. Churchill’s Navy is without question the deinitive analysis of the service, perfectly pitched in style, tone, and content. There is something for every reader, whether specialist or not. The phrase ‘tour de force’ is overused, but in this case it is certainly applicable. Lavery’s book is comprehensive, fascinating, brilliant, and a must-have for anyone with an interest in the Royal Navy or the history of the Second World War. æ
NICK HEWITT MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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O S THE BEST NEW MILITARY HISTORY TITLES THIS MONTH
THE SECOND ANGLO-SIKH WAR Amarpal Singh Amberley Publishing, £25 (hbk) ISBN 978-144565023
n the morning of 29 March 1849, Duleep Singh presided over his last Durbar (court) at Lahore, at which the 10-year-old Maharajah signed away to the British all Sikh claims to the Punjab. Thus came to an end half a century of Sikh Empire. Britain’s inal victory in the Second Anglo-Sikh War must rank as one of the Raj’s greatest feats of arms since the Battle of Plassey nearly a century earlier, the victory that established the East India Company’s control over Bengal. The writing had been on the wall a decade before the decisive Battle of Gujrat that ended the second confrontation between the armies of the Sikhs and the East India Company. Under Ranjit Singh, the Sikhs had gone from strength to strength. The one-eyed strongman not only held his nation together in an iron ist, but had determinedly expanded his borders. His death in 1839 precipitated a period of tension between the Sikh political and military castes, culminating in the army’s fatal error of launching an invasion of British territory. The ensuing First Anglo-Sikh War erupted as an almost inevitable clash of empires, like the cataclysmic collision of two tectonic plates. The commander of the British force in the irst war, General Sir Hugh Gough, was fortunate in having an informant in the person of the treacherous Raja Lal Singh. Thanks to him, the East India Company was able to inlict a crushing defeat on the enemy at the Battle of Sabraon. The war had lasted barely two months, and under the Treaty of Lahore, ratiied in 1846, the Sikhs were forced to surrender large tracts of their territory to the British.
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From that time until the inal collapse of the Sikh Empire in 1849, the Durbar was placed under the control of Sir Henry Lawrence as British Resident in Lahore. Lawrence had taken part in the First AngloAfghan War, having been dispatched to Peshawar in 1842 when news came through of the annihilation of a British column on the retreat from Kabul. He was fully aware of the need to keep a part of the Sikh Army on side to provide a bufer against the Afghans, who were menacing the North-West Frontier. But when an ailing Lawrence went back to England on leave, trouble broke out at Multan, resulting in the murder of two British oicers. This set in train the events that led to the Second Anglo-Sikh War, the subject of Amarpal Singh’s masterful study of this crucial conlict in Britain’s imperial adventure in India. Gough was again in command of the army, though he did not cover himself in glory. In late 1848, Gough led his main force against Sher Singh’s army, which was defending the line of the River Chenab, where they had established a bridgehead on the eastern side of the river. On 22 November 1848, the Sikhs repelled a British cavalry attack on the bridgehead at the Battle of Ramnagar. Although later forced to withdraw from their exposed position, the Sikhs regarded the battle as a morale-raising victory. Early in the New Year, while waiting for support, Gough was forced to move to prevent Sher Singh from joining up with Chattar Singh’s army. Unexpectedly encountering Sher Singh’s position, he decided to attack, even though it was late in the day.
In the resulting battle – Chillianwala – Gough’s troops sufered heavy losses. Some units lost their colours, part of one British cavalry regiment led in panic, and four guns were lost. Sher Singh’s army was also hard-hit, however, losing 12 guns. The decisive battle of the war was fought on 13 February, when Gough attacked the Sikh army at Gujrat. Here Britain’s superior weaponry at last told, and, with a three-hour bombardment from almost 100 guns, the Sikhs were driven from their entrenchments. The question then facing the Governor-General, Lord Dalhousie, was whether to annex the Punjab outright or place it under temporary administration. The argument against the less-complicated option of administration was the fact that the Punjab was a borderland, and therefore no risks could be taken that would leave this frontline
region open to Afghan aggression or another Sikh uprising. The East India Company proited handsomely from this venture. The haul of booty was valued at £2 million, which equates to something like £180 million in today’s money. The downfall of the Sikh Empire was problematic for the British. The annexation of the Punjab meant that the Government of India found itself, in practice, lord and master of the wild North-West Frontier and the largely desolate, uncharted belt of tribal territory that bordered Afghanistan. This became the sot underbelly of British India and, until their inal retreat from the Subcontinent in 1947, there was scarcely a moment when British troops were not engaged in combating banditry or putting down revolts by the warlike Pashtun tribes of the Frontier. JULES STEWART October 2016
William Sitwell Simon & Schuster, £20 (hbk) ISBN 978-1471151057
MHM REVIEWS
EGGS OR ANARCHY – THE REMARKABLE STORY OF THE MAN TASKED WITH THE IMPOSSIBLE: TO FEED A NATION AT WAR
he story of how Britain organised the distribution of food to its people in wartime should be a fascinating one. How do you feed 41 million people when you produce only a third of the food that they consume? How do you import food when the ships that are supposed to bring it from overseas are liable to be sent to the seabed by enemy action? In Eggs or Anarchy, William Sitwell tells us something of this story, but has chosen to focus on the man tasked with the problem of feeding the population: Fred, Lord Woolton, Minister for Food from 1940 to 1945. Woolton was undoubtedly an exceptional man. He was born into poverty, but became a successful businessman, before being chosen by Neville Chamberlain to assist the government in its hour of need. As a minister, Woolton was innovative. He was given enormous power to modify the nation’s diet, and he used this power well, ensuring that the entire population had access to balanced, healthy food. He ensured that pregnant women and children had extra rations so that the next generation would grow up to be a healthy one. He devised ways of delivering food to those who were bombed out of their homes, setting up regionally based transport convoys dedicated to carrying food and water. These were on constant alert, ready to be dispatched to whichever towns in their area had need of them. The state-run British Restaurants were another nationwide initiative, where subsidised food was served. On the London Underground, he ran food trains that stopped at stations where people were sheltering from air raids. Because of Woolton’s actions, it has been suggested that the generation which grew up in the war years was healthier than any before or since, an incredible achievement considering that starvation might have been the alternative. Much of the book, however, is taken up with detailing Woolton’s home and social life, which makes it a duller read than it deserves to be. There are extensive quotes from his letters and diaries, and we hear a great deal about his (very happy) marriage – but this does not make for an exciting narrative. A tighter focus on the problems of ‘feeding a nation at war’, and perhaps more about the ‘Dig for Victory’ campaign, would have made this much more of a gripping read. FRANCESCA TROWSE
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WINGS OF EMPIRE: THE FORGOTTEN WARS OF THE ROYAL AIR FORCE, 1919-1939 Barry Renfrew History Press, £25 (hbk) ISBN 978-0750965071 arry Renfrew has tackled one of the neglected periods of British military history: the inter-war years. Sandwiched between two world wars, the period is oten treated as a Cinderella subject, meriting perhaps just a nod with a view to describing post-WWI recovery or the preliminaries to WWII. In this interlude, however, there was an empire to police and, perhaps more importantly for the recently formed RAF, survival was at stake. As it proved, policing became an ongoing role for the new service. The immediate post-war period was a time of swingeing cuts to the military budget, and both the Army and the Navy saw the return of air power to their control as one way of ofsetting such cuts. The dismantling of the RAF would have removed a competitor for funds and a challenger to their prestige and authority. The RAF had already been hit by a loss of 90% of its manpower, with dozens of airields closed, and a reduction to just 24 squadrons. The post of air minister had been abolished, and control of the RAF passed to Churchill. This, however, proved a saving grace, as Churchill’s enthusiasm for innovation, daring, and glamour made him a friend of the Air Force. His appointment of Hugh Trenchard to lead the RAF provided Churchill with a skilled administrator, a tireless worker with a superb grasp of detail, and a bulldog whose belligerence was to come in handy in his many confrontations with politicians, generals, and admirals. The military doctrine behind the retention of the RAF was that of ‘air control’. With a huge empire to be policed by a relatively small number of troops, it was argued that a few planes could cover vast areas, acting as an all-seeing ‘imperial eye’ that would cause ‘inferior’ native races to cower or, if they did not, to succumb to aerial bombing. The clinching argument in all this, at least for the Government, was cost: a few planes and accompanying personnel was far cheaper than employing land forces. Early successes, later problems dealing with more complex situations, an outline of various campaigns, and the lives of serving RAF personnel, oten in the words of the men themselves, are all discussed in Renfrew’s book. KEITH ROBINSON
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www.military-history.org
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MHM ’S ROUND-UP OF THE BEST MILITARY HISTORY TITLES
ILLUSTRATED BOOK Weapon: a vis of arms and a DK, £25 (hbk) ISBN 978-0241257807 A lavishly illustrated book, of t that only DK can produce, on t of arms and armour. Produce association with the staf at th Armouries, the book has a sound academic basis. It covers a huge time span – covering every period from the irst stone weapons to the latest of modern irearms – and an equally wide geographical spread The illustrations hav them also con acti
Victoria’s Harvest: the Irish soldier in the Zulu War of 1879 David Truesdale and John Young Helion & Company, £25 (hbk)
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ISBN 978-1910294529
The Tattie Lads: the untold story of the Rescue Tug Service in two world wars and its battles to save cargoes, ships, and lives Ian Dear Bloomsbury, £25 (hbk)
Irish soldiers in the British Army go back at least as far as Henry V. By the time of Victoria, it seems that at least 20% of the Army was of Irish extraction. This book is the story of those Irish soldiers who fought in the Zulu War and shared the Army’s experience of both defeat and victory.
The Rescue Tug Service worked tirelessly to bring to port damaged vessels and thus keep up the supply of food and essential items during two world wars. But this branch of the service has been absent from histories of both the Royal Navy and the Merchant Navy.
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
ISBN 978-1844864010
Air Power: a global history Jeremy Black Rowman & Littleield, £24.95 (hbk) ISBN 978-1442250963
A Shau Valor: American combat operations in the Valley of Death Thomas R Yarborough Casemate, £19.99 (hbk)
Hadrian’s Wall: everyday life on a Roman frontier Patricia Southern
Charting the rise of military aviation, this ground-breaking new book covers both the world wars and the more limited conlicts of the 20th and 21st centuries. Jeremy Black looks at debates around strategic bombing, aircrat carriers versus battleships, and how air power has become the weapon of choice, spreading maximum destruction with minimum commitment.
ISBN 978-1612003542
ISBN 978-1445640259
The Valley of Death was a focal point of the Vietnam War. It was a place where North Vietnamese and American forces repeatedly fought head-to-head, making it the most deadly killing ground of the entire campaign. This is the irst work to cover the entire nine years of operations in the Valley of Death.
This book tells the fascinating story of how Hadrian’s Wall was built and manned by Roman soldiers, what life was like on the frontier, and what happened to it when the Romans let Britain. Patricia Southern deals with the everyday life of the troops manning the Wall, and their interactions with the local populace.
Amberley Publishing, £25 (hbk)
October 2016
O TAYLOR DOWNING REVIEWS A CLASSIC WAR MOVIE
FILM | CLASSIC
FULL METAL JACKET Warner Home Video £4.75
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tanley Kubrick made only 13 feature ilms during his career, but – with 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and A Clockwork Orange (1971) among them – they were some of the most important ilms of the late 20th century. Three of his movies have a strong anti-war theme: Paths of Glory (1957), set in the First World War, shows literally and metaphorically the injustice of war (see MHM 41); Dr Strangelove (1964), a dark comedy, explores the madness at the centre of the Cold
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War philosophy of Mutually Assured Destruction (see MHM 42), and Full Metal Jacket (1987), set in Vietnam, shows how war dehumanises.
ANTI-WAR FILMS All Kubrick’s anti-war ilms were adapted from books or plays. Full Metal Jacket was loosely based on a 1979 novel called The Short-Timers by Gustav Hasford, about the author’s experiences in the 1st US Marine Division of training and then action in Vietnam. Kubrick very much liked the
terse, colloquial dialogue. He worked on the screenplay with Hasford and Michael Herr, who had written the great Vietnam memoir Dispatches (1977). The most common criticism of Full Metal Jacket is that it is two separate ilms. The irst 43 minutes are set in the US Marine training camp at Parris Island, South Carolina. The next 70 minutes are set in Vietnam. In fact, the two halves are inextricably linked. The irst shows a group of men evolving from civilians to trained killers. The second shows how they carry out their killing in the alternative reality of combat. It adds up to one of the great Vietnam war movies. The opening scenes of the ilm are cut to the song ‘Hello Vietnam’. Young recruits are shorn of their long hair, making them look identical and anonymous, as they begin the transition from civilian to military life. There then follows one of the most extraordinary and extreme performances in any war ilm: Lee Ermey, an ex-Marine drill instructor himself, plays Gunnery Sergeant Hartman. He bawls and screams obscenities at a few dozen recruits whom he has eight weeks to turn into killers. He calls them ‘maggots’ and ‘pukes – the lowest form of life on earth’. He says they are ‘totally worthless’ and that they will ‘hate’ him. Over scenes of the recruits drilling, marching, swinging and climbing on ropes, doing endless press-ups, and chanting as they run, Hartman completely destroys the individualism in every recruit. He takes each man apart before slowly putting him together again as an obsessed and dedicated Marine killer. The trainees sleep with their riles. They are told to give them girls’ names. As they lose their masculinity, they gain a weapon as a substitute. Many of the lines come from US Marine training of the 1960s, and were ad-libbed by Ermey. He screams, ‘What do we do for a living?’ The recruits yell back, ‘Kill, kill, kill!’ The memorable phrases tumble
out. ‘Your rile is only a tool. Your killer instinct is what kills,’ and ‘The Marine Corps doesn’t want robots – it wants killers.’ The regime at Parris Island was known to be harsh. It produced an elite within the US military. It is barely credible that it was ever as brutal as this. For nearly 20 minutes, no individual personalities emerge from Hartman’s cruel regime. But, slowly, we get to know that the man he has nicknamed ‘Joker’ (Matthew Modine) is deiant. He wins Hartman’s praise. The recruit he calls ‘Cowboy’ (Arliss Howard) is from Texas, from where Hartman says only ‘steers and queers’ come. The man he nicknames ‘Pyle’ (Vincent D’Onofrio) is overweight, slow, and has a fear of heights. Hartman shouts, ‘Were you born a fat, slimy shit or did you have to work on it?’ But the instructor is determined to ‘motivate’ Pyle. In reality, Pyle would not have survived a week of Marine basic training. When Hartman inds a doughnut in Pyle’s footlocker (food is banned in the dormitory), he announces that the rest of the trainees will have to be punished until Pyle is motivated. While they do push-ups, Pyle slowly munches his doughnut. When he makes mistakes on parade, the others are made to do hard physical exercises while Pyle sits watching with his thumb in his mouth. The recruits get their own back by beating Pyle at night until he is in tears. The cruelty is painful to watch. Ater eight excruciating weeks, the recruits inally graduate. Hartman tells them they are no longer maggots – they are Marines. He says, ‘You are now part of a brotherhood. Remember some Marines die in combat. But the Marine Corps lives forever. So if you die, you will live forever.’ There is a inal scene in which Pyle extracts his revenge on Hartman. Then he talks tenderly to his rile, points it into his mouth, and blows his brains out.
VIETNAM The ilm then cuts to the Marine base at Da Nang in Vietnam. It is January October 2016
MHM REVIEWS THE TET OFFENSIVE
968. Joker is now a Marine journalist writing for Stars and Stripes, the oicial S military newspaper. The editor tells Joker and the other ournalists that the phrase ‘search and estroy’ is banned. Instead, the words weep and clear’ are to be used. In any of his ilms, Kubrick mocks the icialese that was used to disguise olly or dishonesty. That evening, the iet Cong launch the Tet Ofensive. Joker is sent on a reporting mission o Hué with a rookie photographer amed Raterman (Kevyn Howard), who wants to experience combat. As hey ly across country by helicopter, he door-gunner ires randomly at ivilian farmers in the ields below, oasting that he has killed 157 ‘gooks’ nd at least 50 water bufalo. Outside Hué, Joker and his photogapher come across a mass grave of
civilians. The Viet Cong had carried out a series of massacres in Hué of those thought to be US sympathisers. Joker muses that the dead know only one thing: ‘it’s better to be alive’. Joker is wearing a ‘Ban the Bomb’ badge while his helmet has ‘Born to Kill’ written on it. A Marine colonel confronts him as they stare at the corpses and demands to know what the two contrary signs are supposed to mean. To the complete puzzlement of the colonel, Joker replies, ‘I think I was trying to suggest something about the duality of man, sir.’ When Joker inally meets up with the platoon he is to follow for his assignment, he discovers his old training buddy, Cowboy, is sergeant in the unit. Everywhere there are signs of how absurd the war has become. ‘Animal Mother’ (Adam Baldwin) is a crazed MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
Images: Warner Brothers
On 30 January 1968, just as President Johnson announced that the US was winning the war in Vietnam, the Viet Cong launched the Tet Offensive, named after the festivities that mark the Vietnamese New Year. This was a series of coordinated military assaults in almost every town and city across South Vietnam. More than 80,000 North Vietnamese troops took part in attacks that came as a complete surprise to the South Vietnamese, the Americans, and their allies. It led to the temporary loss of many towns to Communist forces. In the following week, the US suffered the heaviest casualties of any week during the Vietnam War, with more than 500 killed and 2,500 wounded. Eventually, all the attacks were repelled, with the Viet Cong suffering heavy losses. The bitter fighting of the Battle of Hué lasted for a month and led to the complete destruction of the city by American forces, as depicted in Full Metal Jacket. Although in the end the Viet Cong military assaults failed, the Tet Offensive provoked a dramatic increase in opposition to the war in the US. For many Americans, the gulf between what the government said was happening and what they saw nightly on their television screens was never as great. Violent protests against the war rocked many American cities during the long hot summer of 1968. The political fallout was also immense. Johnson suffered a massive collapse in his popularity, and in March announced he would not stand for re-election as President. The Offensive led to the handing over of much of the fighting to South Vietnamese forces, and resulted in the gradual withdrawal of US troops from south-east Asia – a process that was completed under President Nixon in the 1970s.
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LEFT American war artist Tom Lea’s Marines Call It That 2,000 Yard Stare.
THE ‘THOUSAND-YARD STARE’ The ‘thousand-yard stare’ is the name given to the aimless, unfocused look of a traumatised soldier. The phrase was first used to describe the expression of US Marines, staring ahead but not really seeing, in the island battles of the Pacific during the Second World War. It came from the title of Tom Lea’s painting of a Marine, set against a battlefield scene (shown above), which became famous when Life magazine reproduced it in 1944. Shell-shocked soldiers in the First World War displayed the same detached and haunted look, but the term was not used in that war. When the Marines discuss the look in Full Metal Jacket, it is, as with so much else in the film, turned on its head. They see it as an indication that a soldier has been in combat, and thus consider it a battle honour that signifies his experience of war.
M60 machine-gunner with ‘I Am Become Death’ written on his helmet. Sitting on a chair as ‘guest of honour’ among the platoon is a dead Viet Cong soldier – ‘the inest human being we will never know’.
UNDER FIRE The platoon heads of to occupy Hué and comes under heavy ire. Joker and Raterman revert to being rilemen. Resting in a landscape of death and destruction, an oicial ilm crew appear with a 16mm Arrilex camera. They interview some of the platoon, who relect on the crazy morality of war. ‘What do I think about America’s involvement in Vietnam?’, says one. 70
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‘I think we should win.’ Joker says on camera, ‘I wanted to visit exotic Vietnam, the jewel of south-east Asia. I wanted to meet interesting and stimulating people of an ancient culture… and kill them.’ A Vietnamese soldier appears with a young woman and ofers her to the platoon for sex. He asks for $15 per soldier, but accepts $5 from each. The Marines form a disorderly queue. The next part of the ilm follows the patrol as it explores a burning and destroyed suburb of war-torn Hué. It is a familiar technique in war ilms to follow a group of men cut of and under intense pressure. Kubrick uses his favourite tracking shots (just as
he did in Paths of Glory) to keep the viewer alongside the patrol as it moves cautiously through the rubble. The commander is killed by a booby trap. The patrol gets lost. Cowboy, as a senior NCO, takes command. He sends Eightball (Dorian Harewood), a black Marine corporal, to reconnoitre the buildings ahead. ‘Put a nigger behind the trigger,’ Eightball says as he moves of. As he reaches the building, he is shot by a Viet Cong sniper. An argument breaks out within the squad. Some of them want to retrieve Eightball’s body. Cowboy insists they have come up against a large enemy force and they must withdraw. Against orders, the medic goes to recover the body, but is himself shot by the sniper. Bullet ater bullet rips into his body. The Marines ire randomly, causing even more destruction. Cowboy orders the squad forward, but is killed by the sniper while on the radio. All their training has been forgotten and the Marines are now jabbering, leaderless grunts tormented by a single sniper. Enraged, Animal Mother says, ‘Let’s go get some payback.’
DESCENT INTO HELL The whole sequence now sees the men descending into hell. Thick black smoke from burning buildings turns day into night. Fires blaze everywhere. The spooky soundtrack has the sound of doors creaking and metal wrenching. Moving forward through this hell, Joker and Raterman discover the sniper, who turns out to be a teenage girl. They wound her. The rest of the patrol arrives. Since they joined the Marines, the men have been told that a rile is a man’s best friend. But here is a young woman who has caused death and destruction with her rile. They stare down at the badly wounded girl, who is mumbling. ‘She’s praying,’ says Joker. It turns out she is pleading for them to shoot her. Animal Mother says they should leave her to the rats. Eventually, Joker inishes her of with his pistol – a mercy killing. He
stares into the distance wearing the ‘thousand-yard stare’. In the inal scene, the platoon advance through the wasteland of Hué singing the ‘Mickey Mouse March’. The rousing Marine chants from training have been forgotten and replaced by a silly song from a children’s TV show. Everything has descended into sheer cynicism. In narration, Joker says, ‘We have nailed our names in the pages of history.’ He concludes, ‘I’m so happy that I’m alive. I’m in a world of shit but I’m alive.’ The soundtrack breaks into the Rolling Stones classic ‘Paint It Black’. Despite the fact that the locations in Full Metal Jacket look and feel so strongly like Vietnam, the ilm was actually shot entirely in Britain, partly at Pinewood Studios and partly on a vast derelict gasworks site at Beckton on the Thames Estuary. The buildings, which were about to be demolished, were dressed with giant Vietnamese billboards, and the roadways were illed with palm trees. British Gas structures became the fading French colonial architecture of Vietnam. The Parris Island scenes were shot at a former RAF camp: Bassingbourn Barracks in Hertfordshire. The Territorial Army supplied the extras. Kubrick, an American exiled to Britain, liked to shoot ilms in this country. It is not a war ilm that will be shown on television on a winter Sunday aternoon. Apart from the constant obscenities in its language, the level of brutality and violence it conveys is hard to take. Kubrick is as unlinching as he was in A Clockwork Orange, where Malcolm McDowell and his gang of psychopathic ‘droogs’ unleash unrelenting violence on their victims. Whether in the dehumanising of basic training or the absurd violence of Vietnam, Full Metal Jacket is equally unremitting. Kubrick is a master of composition in both the highly polished, neat training barracks and in the burning, derelict landscape of hell. It is diicult to know whether to laugh or cry at some of the lines in the script. But in showing what it takes to train men to become elite killers, and how this collapses in the horror of war, Kubrick has made one of the most powerful anti-war movies of all time.
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FULL METAL JACKET (1987) A Warner Home Video. Directed: Stanley Kubrick. Written: Stanley Kubrick, Michael Herr, and Gustav Hasford. Starring: Matthew Modine, Adam Baldwin, Lee Ermey, and Vincent D’Onofrio.
October 2016
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A PROMOTION OF SOME OF THE BEST EVENTS COMING UP OVER THE NEXT FEW MONTHS
W H AT ’ S O N
SURREY IN THE GREAT WAR Surrey Heritage’s First World War commemoration project ‘Surrey in the Great War: A County Remembers’ will be represented at the following selection of events across Surrey this autumn:
1 NOVEMBER Talk: Surrey in the Great War and Dorking Dorking Local History Group, United Reform Church, Dorking, RH4 1BS 7.30pm www.surreycommunity.info/dorkinglocalhistorygroup
8 OCTOBER Surrey Heritage Showcase Lingfield & Dormansland Community Centre, Lingfield, RH7 6AB 12pm-4pm www.exploringsurreyspast.org.uk/ showcase2016
5 NOVEMBER West Surrey Family History Society Open Day and Family History Fair Woking Leisure Centre, Woking, GU22 9BA 10am-4.30pm wsfhs.co.uk/pages/openday.php
16 OCTOBER Discovering World War I Harlequin Theatre, Redhill, RH1 1NN 2pm-4pm www.reigate-banstead.gov.uk/ info/20078/whats_on_in_the_borough/560/first_world_war_centenary
11 NOVEMBER Talk and screening of the 1916 film The Battle of the Somme Cobham Village Hall, KT11 2LU 7.45pm. Tickets £5 by post from CCHT, PO Box 335, Cobham, KT11 9AY (please enclose an SAE)
21 OCTOBER Talk: Surrey in the Great War King George’s Hall, Esher, KT10 9RA 1.30pm www.elmbridge.gov.uk/leisure-andculture/whats-on-in-elmbridge/ royston-pike-lecture-series
19 NOVEMBER Reflections on the Somme Surrey Western Front Association, Dorking Halls, Dorking, RH4 1SG 8.30am-4.30pm
[email protected]
WEB: Visit www.surreyinthegreatwar.org.uk for more information about each of these events.
ROYAL ARMOURIES CONFERENCE 1066: INTERPRETING THE NORMAN CONQUEST IN 2016 To mark the 950th anniversary of the Norman Conquest, the Royal Armouries will be holding an evening lecture and conference at the Tower of London. The conference will begin on the evening of 14 October – the date of the Battle of Hastings – with a lecture by Professor David Bates on 1066 in 2016: ‘Putting the Norman Conquest into Perspective’. The conference will appeal to delegates with a wide range of interests in the period. Topics include England and Normandy pre-1066, arms and armour, the capture of London and its early castles, and the influence of 1066 on the church, warfare, and government. Speakers include Dr Edward Impey (Master of the Armouries), Professor John Blair (University of Oxford), Professor Elisabeth van Houts (University of Cambridge), Professor Pierre Bauduin (Université de Caen Normandie), Professor Stephen Baxter (University of Oxford), and Dr Tom Licence (University of East Anglia). The full programme and speakers can be found at www.royalarmouries.org
WEB: www.royalarmouries.org DATES: Friday 14-Sunday 16 October 2016 EMAIL:
[email protected] WHERE: H M Tower of London
PHONE: 0113 220 1888 HOW MUCH: Tickets can be booked online. Evening lecture: £15; conference (inc. evening lecture): £115
THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS Re-live the atmosphere and tension 950 years on as 1,066 soldiers clash in this special anniversary ‘Battle of Hastings’. Attractions include authentic encampments, traders, falconry displays, kids’ battles, author talks, archery, and the battle – complete with foot soldiers, archers, and cavalry. Witness the action on the date that changed history, and immerse yourself in medieval life. An actionpacked and entertaining event for all the family.
WEB: www.english-heritage.org.uk/battle DATES: Saturday 15-Sunday 16 October 2016, 10am-5pm EMAIL:
[email protected]
WHERE: Battle Abbey, High Street, Battle, TN33 0AD (a 10min walk from Battle Station, which is served by Southeastern Railway) PHONE: 0370 333 1183
HOW MUCH: £15.60; Concession: £13.85; Family: £39.20; Child (5-15 years old): £9.00; under 5 years: free. Buy tickets in advance online for a 10% discount
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REVIEWING THE BEST MILITARY HISTORY EXHIBITIONS WITH TAYLOR DOWNING 01
05 ADULTS
£10
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CONCESSIONS
£7
VISIT
REAL TO REEL: A CENTURY OF WAR MOVIES IWM London, Lambeth Road, London, SE1 6HZ 020 7416 5000 www.iwm.org.uk Until 8 January 2017: open 10am-6pm daily, with last admission at 5pm
F
or readers of ‘War on Film’ in MHM, the superb Real to Reel: a century of war movies at the Imperial War Museum in London is like a home from home. Almost every movie that has been explored in ‘War on Film’ features in this exhibition – along with many more. Displayed alongside posters from Went the Day Well? (1942), The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), The Dam Busters (1955), and Oh! What a Lovely War (1969), are Peter O’Toole’s robes from Lawrence of Arabia (1962), and Ken Adam’s original sketches for the design of the War Room in Dr Strangelove (1964). Visiting Real to Reel is like walking down a tunnel in which the sounds and images from some of the greatest war movies of the last hundred years reverberate from wall to wall. 72
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
THE BIG PUSH The exhibition explores how and why war ilms are made, how and why we watch them, and the way in which we react to them. Its starting point is The Battle of the Somme (1916), a simple propaganda ilm made and released while the battle raged in France. Half of the population of Britain saw it during its run. Most of the ilm is completely authentic. Before the battle, it shows cheerful troops marching up to the front, waving, and documents the vast assemblage of shells and war materiel for ‘the Big Push’. Then, aterwards, it shows the wounded returning from battle: men with shattered bodies stagger to dressing stations and prisoners are brought in. What proved impossible to capture with the cameras of the day was the key moment of any Western Front ofensive, when the oicers led their
men ‘over the top’ and into no man’s land. So Geofrey Malins, a feature-ilm cameraman before the war, staged a sequence showing men going ‘over the top’ in a mortar training school that was situated behind the lines. It is deeply ironic that these faked images made such an impact at the time. They have continued to do so ever since, being repeated in countless television documentaries and, endlessly, in the recent coverage of the Somme centenary. The most familiar images of the Great War are not real – they were staged in the manner of a feature ilm. To make the point, a Moy & Bastie hand-cranked 35mm camera used on the Somme is on display in the exhibition. Large, cumbersome, and mounted on a heavy tripod, it was simply not possible to carry such a device into the front trenches. By contrast, displayed next to it, is the camera recently used by photojournalist Tim Hetherington to ilm in Afghanistan. Tiny by
comparison, lightweight, and digital, this camera allowed its operator to get up close and personal with the action, as Hetherington did in Restrepo (2010), his extraordinary documentary-ilm about the war. Hetherington was killed while ilming in Libya in 2011, joining a long list of combat cameramen killed in action.
PRODUCING PROPAGANDA Many war ilms are popular because they explore human qualities or dilemmas that are taken to the extreme at times of conlict, such as courage, self-sacriice, loyalty, and the willingness to confront danger. Real to Reel makes it clear that these issues can be just as easily treated in love stories set against a backdrop of war, as in Casablanca (1942) and Captain Corelli’s Mandolin (2001), as well as in more conventional combat stories like The Cruel Sea (1953) or Fury (2014) Some ilms were obviously produced for propaganda purposes. October 2016
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MHM VISITS
L ONDON, UNI T ED K INGDOM
PICTURED ON BOTH PAGES: 1. British 15-inch naval guns outside the entrance to IWM London. 2. The ‘Oscar’ awarded for The True Glory in 1945, in the category of Best Documentary Feature. The ilm described the Allied victory in the Second World War.
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3. A Moy & Bastie 35mm cine camera, the type used to capture real and recreated footage for The Battle of the Somme. 4. Staged: British troops go ‘over the top’ in The Battle of the Somme. 5. James McAvoy as Robbie Turner in Atonement. The uniform he wore is on display in the exhibition. 6. The Great Escape motorbike (replica) is displayed alongside the exhibits. 7. Colour storyboards and ilm posters can be studied up-close.
Images: all © IWM, except 2. © IWM (EPH 3864); 3. © courtesy of the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum, University of Exeter; 4. © IWM (Q 70164); © Universal City Studios LLLP. Photographed by Alex Bailey; 8. © courtesy of American Zoetrope
8. Colour storyboard artwork of the famous helicopter attack scene from Apocalypse Now, set to ‘The Ride of the Valkyries’ from Wagner’s Ring Cycle.
This is not only the case with ilms like Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will (1935), made to burnish the image of Hitler as leader of a resurgent Nazi state. It is also true of ilms encouraged by the Ministry of Information during the Second World War, when almost half the population visited the cinemas each week. Film was a good way of getting a message through to a mass audience. Movies like In Which We Serve (1942) and Desert Victory (1943) helped to celebrate the national struggle against a seemingly all-powerful enemy, while Millions Like Us (1943) tied women war workers on the home front in with campaigns on the ighting front. But ilm has also been used to present an anti-war message. Stanley Kubrick’s ilms are especially powerful here. Sometimes, however, presenting war in a hostile way creates a dilemma. At one point, Stanley Kubrick is quoted as writing, ‘there are obviously elements in a war ilm that involve visual spectacle, courage, www.military-history.org
loyalty, afection, self-sacriice, and adventure, and these tend to complicate my anti-war message.’ Nevertheless, through invoking a powerful sense of injustice in Paths of Glory (1957), an overwhelming impression of the absurdity of Mutually Assured Destruction in Dr Strangelove (1964), and the inhumanity of turning citizens into killers in Full Metal Jacket (1987), Kubrick’s ilms stand out as some of the most powerful anti-war ilms ever made.
HOLLYWOOD MOMENTS A giant screen at the centre of the exhibition shows how Hollywood copies reality and takes it further. Visitors can view ilm shot by a cameramen of the Army Film and Photographic Unit, which shows British troops landing on Sword Beach on 6 June 1944 – D-Day. Then they can compare it with a clip from one of the most powerful war sequences ever made for the cinema: the opening of Steven Spielberg’s Saving
Private Ryan (1998), which shows US troops landing on Omaha Beach. Spielberg copies the authentic shots taken from the front of landing crat heading into the beach, looking back at the men waiting for the ramp to go down. In the real footage, perhaps surprisingly, the men look calm and conident. In the Spielberg version, they look terriied and throw up. Then, using handheld cameras, Spielberg captures the hell of Omaha with dramatised explosions. We hear the sound of bullets ricocheting of the beach defences, and see men horribly mutilated, covered in gallons of fake blood. Despite all the artiice and visual efects used in this sequence, many veterans sufered from attacks of post-traumatic stress when they watched it, and found the scenes so realistic that they had to leave the cinema.
MODERN WARFARE Real to Reel is certainly not just about the world wars. It includes many
examples of recent ilms, bringing the story of war movies right up to date. There are references to ilms about the war in Iraq ( Jarhead, 2005; The Hurt Locker, 2008) and Afghanistan (Kajaki, 2014). Eye in the Sky (2015) is the most recent ilm included in the exhibition. Set in Nairobi, Kenya, it explores the moral and legal implications of using drones to ight terrorists, and explores the dangers drones pose to civilians. Interviewed for the exhibition, director Gavin Hood and writer Guy Hibbert explain on camera some of the ideas behind the ilm, which was intended to prompt debate about the complex issues surrounding the killing of innocent people with a view to – it is hoped – saving a greater number of lives. The Imperial War Museum is to be congratulated on mounting such a powerful and provocative exhibition. Anyone who enjoys ‘War on Film’ should visit.
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ISTI S
THE BEST MILITARY HISTORY EVENTS, LECTURES, AND EXHIBITIONS CONFERENCE
£115
Image: Colin Moss, Camoulaged Factory Buildings, c.1939-1941, pencil and watercolour on paper, Leamington Spa Art Gallery & Museum
Image: © Royal Armouries
FREE
1066: INTERPRETING THE NORMAN CONQUEST IN 2016 14-16 October 2016 Tower of London, London, EC3N 4AB www.royalarmouries.org 01332 201 888
EXHIBITION
CONCEALMENT AND DECEPTION: THE ART OF THE CAMOUFLEURS OF LEAMINGTON SPA, 1939-1945 Until 16 October 2016 Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum, Royal Pump Rooms Parade, Leamington Spa, CV32 4AA
www.warwickdc.gov.uk/royalpumprooms 01926 742 700
T
he Civil Defence Camoulage Establishment was founded at the beginning of the Second World War to develop camoulage for important locations on the Home Front, including factories, power stations, and airields. In 1941, the organisation was expanded to include the Naval Camoulage Section. This exhibition tells the history of the ‘camuoleurs’, or camoulage staf, who were based in Leamington Spa during the war. Artists featured in the exhibition include Colin Moss, Evelyn Dunbar, Stephen Bone, and Dorothy Annan. Their work will be displayed alongside items relating to the history of Leamington Spa during the Second World War.
Hosted by the Royal Armouries at the Tower of London to mark the 950th anniversary of the Battle of Hastings, this public conference will examine the history of and debates surrounding the Norman Conquest. It will begin on the evening of 14 October – the date of the Battle of Hastings – with a lecture by Professor David Bates. Talks and presentations by leading historians are scheduled across the weekend, and attendees will have the opportunity to discuss the Norman Conquest with historical experts.
STUDY SESSION
19 October 2016 Waddesdon Manor, nr Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, HP18 0JH www.waddesdon.org.uk/events/study-session-arms-as-art/
Photo: John Bigelow Taylor © The National Trust, Waddesdon Manor
£25 ENTRY
THE ART OF ARMS AND ARMOUR 01296 653 226
Waddesdon Manor was built at the end of the 19th century for Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild. It now houses a vast collection of art and objects acquired by his family. This study session will introduce visitors to the arms and armour in the Rothschild collection. The session will include a short lecture about the history of the objects and their design, and attendees will also have an opportunity to view some of the pieces up-close in the research library, which is not normally open to the public. The ticket price includes admission to the grounds. Students can attend for the reduced price of £10, and National Trust/Art Fund members can purchase tickets for £15. Cofee will be provided on arrival.
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ELEVEN UNICORNS 12 October 2016 HM Frigate Unicorn, Victoria Dock, Dundee, DD1 3BP 01382 200 900
Eleven major Royal Navy warships have borne the name Unicorn over the last 500 years, with the
irst launched in 1544, and the most recent in 1992. This talk will chart the evolution of naval warfare by considering each of these vessels historically. It will focus on changes and advances in technology, and will explore the impact of these developments on navigation, propulsion, and gunnery.
DATES TO REMEMBER 6 OCTOBER
Poet of the Great War: Ivor Gurney
£10
The British Academy, 10-11 Carlton House Terrace, London, SW1Y 5AH www.britac.ac.uk 020 7969 5200 Free
ENTRY
EXHIBITION
EVENT
This event celebrates the poetry and music of Ivor Gurney. Dr Philip Lancaster from the University of Exeter will speak about Gurney’s life and writing, with accompaniment from pianist Gavin Roberts.
FREE
BATTLE OF HASTINGS 950 15-16 October 2016
age
£15.60
Image: © The Map House
High Street, Battle, East Sussex, TN33 0AD www.english-heritage.org.uk 0370 333 1183
To mark 950 years since the Battle of Hastings, English Heritage are re-enacting the battle near the site of William of Normandy’s victory over King Harold in 1066. A total of 1,066 soldiers will take to the ield in this blood-pumping anniversary clash. The event will also include children’s activities, traders, and falconry displays. The walk will start from Temple Church, and the organisers recommend that
WAR MAP: PICTORIAL CONFLICT MAPS, 1900-1950 23 September-18 November 2016 The Map House, 54 Beauchamp Place, Knightsbridge, London, SW3 1NY www.themaphouse.com 020 7589 4325
This exhibition brings together some of the most important pictorial conlict maps of the 20th century – from military campaign maps to government-backed propaganda maps and maps created by revolutionaries. All were made during a 50-year period that saw two world wars, the Boer war, and the Russian civil war, as well as key political events such as the formation of the European Trade Charter and the United Nations. The exhibition is accompanied by a 230page book by Philip Curtis and Jakob Søndergård Pedersen.
THEATRE
946: THE AMAZING STORY OF ADOLPHUS TIPS
£5-£45 ENTRY
Until 11 September 2016
Image: Steve Tanner
Shakespeare’s Globe, 21 New Globe Walk, Bankside, London, SE1 9DT www.shakespearesglobe.com 020 7902 1400
946: The Amazing Story of Adolphus Tips is the stage adaption of a novel by Michael Morpurgo. It tells the story of Operation Tiger – one of many rehearsals for the D-Day landings, carried out in Devon in April 1944. A total of 946 American servicemen were killed during the operation, when they were attacked in the Channel by German E-boats. Few details of the incident survive, and some people are convinced there was a cover-up. Residents in Slapton and six neighbouring villages were evacuated to make way for the practice landings, and this family show views the events through the eyes a young villager called Lily, whose cat Adolphus goes missing during the evacuation.
www.military-history.org
MHM VISITS
TALK
16 OCTOBER
A Closer Look Tour: Somme – science and technology IWM North, The Quays, Traford Wharf Road, Manchester, M17 1TZ www.iwm.org.uk 0161 836 4000 Free
This is one of a series of tours marking the 100th anniversary of the Battle of the Somme. Using artefacts and displays, it will explore the impact of science and technology on the Somme battlefield in the First World War.
29 OCTOBER
Powis Castle: late-night Powis Powis Castle & Garden, Welshpool, Powys, Wales, SY21 8RF www.nationaltrust.org.uk/ powis-castle-and-garden 01938 551 929 £13.40
Powis Castle is an 800-year-old fortress in Wales. Built c. 1200, it was once used by the princes of Powys. The castle is home to world-famous formal gardens, an orangery, and an aviary. This October, you can explore the castle after hours. Learn about its history and find out about the people who once lived there.
MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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B BOOKS
A PROMOTION OF MILITARY HISTORY TITLES AVAILABLE TO BUY.
HIROHITO’S WAR: THE PACIFIC WAR, 1941-1945 Francis Pike In his magisterial 1,208-page narrative of the Pacific War, Francis Pike’s original interpretation balances the existing Western-centric view with attention to the Japanese perspective on the conflict. As well as giving a blow-by-blow account of the campaigns and battles, he offers many challenges to the standard accounts of the war. PUBLISHER: Bloomsbury Publishing PRICE: £20 WHERE TO BUY: www.bloomsbury.com or all good retailers
HENRY OF LANCASTER’S EXPEDITION TO AQUITAINE, 1345-1346 Nicholas A Gribit This is the first full-length account of Henry’s two major but now neglected victories early in the Hundred Years War – the first decisive victories won by either side. One of England’s greatest soldiers and statesmen, Henry of Lancaster did much to inspire the emergence of professionalism in English medieval armies. PUBLISHER: The Boydell Press PRICE: £30 WHERE TO BUY: Every good bookshop or www.boydellandbrewer.com
OPERATION INSANITY Colonel Richard Westley In the midst of the horrors of the Bosnian War, Richard Westley found himself commanding British troops in a battle to save an entire town from massacre. It proved to be one of the British Army’s finest hours since the Second World War. PUBLISHER: John Blake Publishing PRICE: £8.99 WHERE TO BUY: www.johnblakebooks.com/operationinsanity
BRITANNIA AND THE BEAR: THE ANGLO-RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE WARS, 1917-1929 Victor Madeira New in paperback, Britannia and the Bear tells the full story of the earliest Bolshevik spies in Britain. It reveals the espionage battle that raged unseen through the interwar years, as Britain fought to counter the fledgling USSR’s determined infiltration of Whitehall and all levels of British society. PUBLISHER: The Boydell Press PRICE:£14.99 WHERE TO BUY: Every good bookshop or www.boydellandbrewer.com
ATLANTIC MEETING H V Morton Atlantic Meeting is H V Morton’s unique account of the historic meeting between Winston Churchill and President Roosevelt 75 years ago, which led to the Atlantic Charter. Foreword by David Owen, British Foreign Secretary 1977-1979. PUBLISHER: Methuen PRICE: £16.99 (hbk) WHERE TO BUY: www.methuen.co.uk
THE LIBERATION OF EUROPE, 1944-45
THE REGIMENT: 15 YEARS IN THE SAS
Mark Barnes
Rusty Firmin
This book showcases the extraordinary and highly significant archive of photographs taken by Times photographers as Europe was liberated from occupying forces between 1944 and 1945. It includes unseen images of Allied and German troops, senior generals, civilians, weaponry, and the devastation of war. With a masterly text and explanatory captions by Second World War historian Mark Barnes.
A legendary figure for a generation of soldiers, Rusty Firmin led one of the two SAS assault teams during the Iranian Embassy siege in 1980. Delving into the shadowy world of the SAS, this is the unforgettable chronicle of Rusty’s combat experiences during his 15 years of service.
PUBLISHER: Casemate UK PRICE: £25 WHERE TO BUY: www.casematepublishing.co.uk or www.amazon.co.uk
PUBLISHER: Osprey Publishing PRICE: £8.99 WHERE TO BUY: www.ospreypublishing.com
THE BATTLE OF CRÉCY: A CASEBOOK
RUSSIA’S LAST GASP
Michael Livingston and Kelly DeVries (eds) This casebook is the most extensive collection of documents ever assembled for the study of one of the famous battles in history. Here we see the Battle of Crécy across the cultural landscape of Europe, enabling us to understand the events of 26 August 1346 like never before. PUBLISHER: Liverpool University Press PRICE: £20 with the code MILITARYHISTORY on the Liverpool University Press website WHERE TO BUY: www.liverpooluniversitypress.com
Prit Buttar Continuing his best-selling series on the Eastern Front, acclaimed historian Prit Buttar explores Russia’s explosive final years of the First World War and offers an enthralling account of the costly Brusilov Offensive, a campaign that saw success on the battlefield but plunged Russia into revolution back home. PUBLISHER: Osprey Publishing PRICE: £25 WHERE TO BUY: www.ospreypublishing.com
IN THE NEXT ISSUE ON SALE 13 OCTOBER
THE FIRST TANKS
ALSO NEXT ISSUE:
Jeremy Black assesses the role of tanks in the First World War, and Arnold Harvey offers a selection of first-hand testimony from pioneer tank-crews.
æ æ æ æ
The Alamo, 1836 William T Sherman: the iron man of the Union Roosevelt versus Churchill: a tense wartime relationship Regiment: The Royal Welch Fusiliers at Mametz Wood, July 1916
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TITIO S PUT YOUR MILITARY HISTORY KNOWLEDGE TO THE TEST WITH THE MHM QUIZ, CROSSWORD, AND CAPTION COMPETITION
MHM QUIZ Made in 1943, The Gentle Sex is a wartime propaganda ilm highlighting women’s contribution to the Second World War. Not only does the movie detail women’s war work, but it was also a patriotic moralebooster. As such, it is now a piece of social history in its own right.
This month, three lucky readers have the chance to win a copy of The Gentle Sex, courtesy of Strawberry Media. Co-directed and narrated by Leslie Howard, it is an occasionally humorous drama that follows seven women from diferent backgrounds as they ind their feet in wartime Britain. Thrown together in the Auxiliary Territorial Service,
the women become close friends. Ater some basic training, they soon muck in, driving trucks, drilling, and operating anti-aircrat guns. But how do they compare to their male counterparts? As the ilm’s title might suggest, the script and narration
are sometimes condescending, but overall the ilm aimed to show that the women were capable and successful in their newfound roles. We have three DVDs of the The Gentle Sex to give away. The ilm has recently been rereleased as part of Strawberry Media’s ‘The World War II Collection’. To browse more of their titles, including a range of First and Second World War DVDs, visit www.strawberry mediauk.wordpress.com
MHM
CROSSWORD NO 73
ACROSS 7 English Parliamentary general (7) 8 ___ Convention, international agreement concerning prisoners of war and other wartime conduct (6) 10 Castle captured by Parliamentarians in 1643 (8) 11 Roman emperor famous for his conquest of Dacia (6) 12 ___ War, such as the English, American and Spanish (5) 13 Tall fur hats worn as ceremonial dress (9) 15 Soldier who originated as a mounted infantryman (7) 16 Ottawa chief who rebelled against the British in 1763 (7) 20 Famous British WWII ighter plane (9)
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MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
October 2016
CAPTION COMPETITION
To be in with a chance of Answer winning, simply answer online at the following question: www. ? Leslie Howard starred military-history. org as aeronautical engineer R J Mitchell in The First of the Few (1942). By which title was the ilm known in the US?
MHM OFF DUTY
MHM
We continue our caption competition with an image from this month’s ‘Regiment’. Pit your wits against other readers at www.militaryhistory.org/competitions
LAST MONTH’S WINNER ANSWERS
SEPTEMBER ISSUE | MHM 72 ACROSS: 6 Carbines, 9 Apache, 10 Bikini, 11 Cheyenne, 12 Shrapnel, 13 Lisbon, 14 Vinegar, 17 Mombasa, 20 Amiens, 22 Arbalest, 25 Ordnance, 26 Scarab, 27 Kassel, 28 Scout car. DOWN: 1 Danish, 2 Ensign, 3 Waterloo, 4 Cadets, 5 Chinooks, 7 Brigade, 8 Sicily, 15 Immortal, 16 Arsenals, 18 Belfast, 19 Camels, 21 Ernest, 23 Boston, 24 Stalag.
WINNER: ‘The lengths we have to go to when Donald Trump comes to town!’ 23 James ___, Confederate general,
5 Castle besieged unsuccessfully
wounded at the Battle of Fort Sanders (5)
by Parliamentarians in 1643 (6)
25 French resistance movement during
6 Battle fought in 1942 during Japan’s
the Second World War (6)
invasion of the Philippines (6)
26 Early long-barrelled irearm (8)
9 ___ Rouge, Communist guerrilla
27 Marshal of the RAF and Deputy
organisation led by Pol Pot (5)
Supreme Commander at SHAEF under
14 Last battle of the English Civil War (9)
Eisenhower (6)
17 Ancient galleys with three tiers
28 Assyrian capital destroyed by
of oars (8)
the Medes (7)
18 ___ car, such as a Saracen or
DOWN
19 Australian or New Zealand soldier (5)
1 Opponent of a Roundhead (8)
21 Middle Eastern kingdom conquered
Saladin (8)
2 Water-cooled automatic
by Assyria (6)
machine-gun (8)
22 Ammunition (6)
3 US jet ighter irst lown in 1947 (5)
24 British WWII anti-submarine
4 Oicer of the Roman army (9)
weapon (5)
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Arnold Mulligan
RUNNERS-UP ‘A dangerous concentration of hot air has been identiied in the Westminster area.’ Edward654 ‘Ater a dinner of baked beans and a heavy night on the beer, the consequences were too awful to contemplate.’ Stephen Brophy
Think you can do better? Go head-to-head with other MHM readers for the chance to see your caption printed in the next issue. Enter now at www.military-history.org/competitions MILITARY HISTORY MONTHLY
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ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT… Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson fact file
‘Stonewall’ Jackson Ace Beard! Who was he? Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson was one of America’s inest generals. He attended the United States Military Academy before joining the US Army as a second lieutenant in the First Artillery Regiment. He was made lieutenant ater displaying bravery in the Mexican-American War (1846-1848). Ater the war, he took up a professorship at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI). He resigned and joined the Confederacy when the American Civil War broke out in 1861.
Where did he get his nickname? Jackson earned his ‘Stonewall’ moniker at the First Battle of Bull Run, also known as the First Battle of Manassas, fought between the Union and the Confederacy on 21 July 1861. This was one of the South’s irst major victories. Jackson commanded the 1st Virginia Brigade, which comprised some 2,000 men from the 2nd, 4th, 5th, 27th, and 33rd Virginia Infantry Regiments. At Manassas, the Union was initially successful in pushing back the Confederates. With his brigade beginning to fracture, Confederate General Bee asked Jackson for support. Jackson promised to ‘give them [the enemy] the bayonet’ as they advanced. In an attempt to revitalise his troops, Bee exclaimed, ‘There stands Jackson like a stone wall. Rally behind the Virginians!’
Born: 1824 Nationality: American Occupation(s): Confederate general Key qualities: aggressive, strong-willed, and audacious Greatest achievement: his flank attack at the Battle of Chancellorsville in 1863 Died: 1863
Was that a compliment?
He sounds a difficult man. Why was he admired? Despite his stern disposition, Jackson was a popular military commander. He won great renown for his successful defence of the Shenandoah Valley against the Union Army in the spring of 1862. Named ‘Jackson’s Valley Campaign’, his defence prompted one man to pen a poem called Stonewall Jackson’s Way. It ends, ‘The foe had better ne’er been born / That gets in Stonewall’s way.’ This poem became a popular Southern ballad. Jackson’s brigade then joined the Army of Northern Virginia and earned further successes under the command of General Lee. The Stonewall Brigade participated in Confederate victories in the Seven Days Battles, the Second Battle of Bull Run, and at the Battle of Fredericksburg. 82
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What was Jackson’s greatest victory? His defence of Shenandoah Valley was certainly remarkable, but Jackson’s actions at the Battle of Chancellorsville in 1863 were even more impressive. There, as one of Lee’s best generals, Jackson led 28,000 men on a 12-mile march to attack the Union Army’s right lank. It was a risky strategy, but it paid of. Jackson took the lank by surprise, paving the way for one of Lee’s greatest victories. ‘To move switly, strike vigorously, and secure all the fruits of victory is the secret of successful war,’ wrote Jackson. Chancellorsville, however, was also where he sustained the injuries that would kill him. Having been caught in a friendly ire incident, he died of pneumonia on 10 May 1863.
Could Lee have won at GettysBurg with Jackson By his side? This question has been endlessly debated. Jackson was certainly a gited strategist, but historians dealing in hypothetical questions must be careful: events could have transpired in any number of ways. October 2016
Photo: Library of Congress
There is some debate regarding the authenticity of Bee’s statement, and some people thought he meant to criticise Jackson for being slow to respond. Nevertheless, the manoeuvre was successful and the Confederates pushed back the Union. The nickname stuck for the rest of Jackson’s life, and his contingent was hereafter known as ‘the Stonewall Brigade’. But ‘Stonewall’ was not Jackson’s only nickname. He was also known as ‘Old Blue Light’ on account of his fierce Presbyterianism; his own soldiers called him ‘Old Jack’; and, at the VMI, Jackson’s students had called him ‘Tom Fool’, mocking his severity and strict teaching style.
