Category: The Folio Society

Churchill was better at strategy than politics

On By Marc NadeauIn Battle of Alamein, Bernard Montgomery, Erwin Rommel, History, Leadership, Military, Simon Ball, The Folio Society, Ukraine, Winston Churchill, World War IILeave a comment
Professor Simon J. Ball (University of Leeds)

I recently reviewed Professor Simon J. Ball’s revealing book about the battle of Alamein (The Folio Society). He generously accepted to answer few questions for this blog, and I take immense pleasure in sharing the content of our exchange with you today. I trust you will enjoy reading it.

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Professor Ball, I might be wrong, but I have a feeling that the Mediterranean theater during World War II has been overlooked. Why is it important to pay more attention to it? How crucial was it in the big picture of the conflict? 

SJB: The war in the Mediterranean was of central importance. It blew apart the idea of the Mediterranean as a unified zone, although all the major powers tried to engineer integration at some points. Oddly the idea of the Mediterranean as an integrated politico-economic-cultural area, “breathing with the same rhythms”, was popularized by Fernand Braudel in the late 1940s.

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The distorted memory of Alamein

On By Marc NadeauIn Alamein, Bernard Montgomery, Erwin Rommel, History, North Africa, Simon Ball, Stalingrad, The Folio Society, World War II1 Comment
British soldiers during the second battle of Alamein (The Times of Israel)

“History will be kind to me for I intend to write it”, declared Winston Churchill. That quote might reveal why the second battle of Alamein seems only to reach a limited audience of military history specialists and enthusiasts. In terms of visibility and shelf space, Alamein doesn’t rank with D-Day, Stalingrad, or Bastogne.

Knowing that the battle stopped Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s advance on Egypt during the turning point year of 1942, one can reasonably wonder why that is so. In a nutshell, “the absence of the victors left plenty of room for the ‘losers’ to have their say. […] the British state’s insistence on not telling a national narrative over-represented the voices of its enemies”, explains historian Simon Ball in The Folio Society edition of his insightful history of the battle fought in the sands of North Africa in October and November 1942.

Material rather than manpower would have been the drivers of the Allied victory. In sum, “the Axis had lost the battle for four reasons: enemy air superiority; the poor performance of the Italian troops; the Eighth Army’s superiority in modern weapons; and their own lack of fuel.” Rommel became an icon – a phenomenon I observed on numerous occasions while visiting military museums in the United Kingdom – and his opponent, Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery drew flak from “old régime” figures who could not stomach the methods of this iconoclast figure who privileged meritocracy. The tenants of that school preferred to give way to Rommel rather than applaud the success and qualities of Montgomery. That phenomenon is regrettably still observable to this day.

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Wellington was not an easy figure to build into a romantic hero

On By Marc NadeauIn Alan Forrest, Battle of Waterloo, Duke of Wellington, History, Maréchal Lannes, Maréchal Ney, Napoléon, Scots Greys, Sir Thomas Picton, The Folio SocietyLeave a comment
The Duke of Wellington (source: National Army Museum)
(Cliquez ici pour la version française)

I recently had the tremendous pleasure of exchanging with internationally renowned author and historian Alan Forrest about his book on the Battle of Waterloo. Here is the content of our discussion.

Professor Forrest, it’s been a real treat for me to read and review your amazing book on this blog. Many thanks for accepting to answer a few questions for our readers.

I have always nourished a deep interest and admiration about the Duke of Wellington (the first name of my blog was Wellington.World). But he clearly lacked the “romantic poignancy” of his French opponent in the battlefield. Do you feel he has been mistreated / misjudged by history?

I do not think there is any reason to feel that Wellington has been misjudged. He enjoys a high reputation as a military commander, careful in his preparations for battle and alert to the threat of enemy attack. His record in the Peninsular campaign – where he did not, of course, have to face Napoleon – is impressive; and at Waterloo his use of the terrain and his tactics in the face of repeated French attacks have been widely praised. He was, it is true, a more defensive tactician than Napoleon, but I don’t think that that has led to his military qualities being undervalued, and certainly not in Britain.  On the other hand, he was not an easy figure to build into a romantic hero, in contrast to Napoleon who did so much to create his own romantic narrative and who fascinated even those who had no reason to support his ambitions (Walter Scott, for instance, or Goethe, or Byron). 

What is your global appreciation of the Iron Duke? Has he been overrated?

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Why Wellington Lost the Battle of Memory

On By Marc NadeauIn Alan Forrest, Duke of Wellington, Field Marshal Blücher, History, Horatio Nelson, Military, Napoléon, The Folio Society, Waterloo1 Comment

On a beautiful June day in 2014, I travelled from Brussels to Waterloo by train. For a long time, I longed to walk the battlefield where one of my favorite military heroes, Arthur Wellesley, earned his laurels. Before ascending the Lion’s Mound with my family, I wanted to visit and spend time at Wellington’s HQ, the iconic house where the famous British warlord spent the night before and after the battle.

Being a huge booklover, I expected to leave with a few tomes about the Iron Duke under my arms. Instead, I was greeted by a bleak, quasi non-existential array of books of the said subject adorning the bookshelves. The only titles offered were of Napoleon and his Marshals. All I could come out with was a Christmas ornament at the effigy of the famous British soldier. An affront, in my humble opinion. I understand why so many people are fascinated and enthralled by the Little Corporal, but to the point of overshadowing his victorious nemesis at the very place where Wellington tried to snatch a few hours of rest? Where he let one of his subordinates, Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Gordon die in his camp bed after being mortally wounded during the battle? This sad state of affairs has haunted me for several years now.

That was until I received a copy of the book Waterloo, written by the renowned British historian Alan Forrest, which is part of the Great Battles series published by The Folio Society (the book was originally published in 2015 by Oxford University Press). I have to admit that I regret not having read it before. Not only does it answer my long-lasting question, but it is also written by a masterful author. After all, who would not enjoy reading a passage about Field Marshal Blücher treating a concussion “[…] with an interesting mixture of garlic and schnapps”? And Alan Forrest even makes a mention of my beloved “Cantons de l’Est” (Eastern Townships, in Quebec), where I live.

More seriously, Alan Forrest first tells the reader that Waterloo was a political victory for Wellington and the United Kingdom, serving to plaster the cracks in British national identity and unity, notably in Scotland. The outcome of what happened on 18 June 1815 on the “Morne Plaine” was used to flatter the legendary military ethos of the Scottish people. Having lived for several months in the land of my ancestors, I visited quite a few Regimental Museums and I can attest that the legacy of Waterloo is still extremely vibrant in Caledonia.

Second, the military confrontation in Belgium was not a crucial victory, in the sense that “even if he had won at Waterloo, Napoleon would surely have lost the war, and victory would have provided him with only the briefest of respites.” Furthermore, “Britain already had its hero from the Napoleonic Wars, an unambiguous figure on whom all could agree, in the person of Horatio Nelson. It did not need Wellington […].” The subject of my admiration arrived too late, 10 years after the battle of Cape Trafalgar and did not serve in the right branch of the British Armed Forces. History can be brutal.

Thirdly, there was a question of character. While Napoleon draped himself in the “cult of a heroic French defeat”, his British opponent was the opposite. “Weariness and sadness for the loss of his companions-in-arms made it impossible for him to exult, though his apparent lack of excitement at the scale of his victory was widely assumed to stem from a cold aloofness that would make him a hard man to like and a somewhat ambivalent national hero.” Napoleon did not lose sleep over the death of soldiers, because that was their ultimate duty in war. Wellington was made of a different fabric.

Napoleon could not defeat the British squares and the Prussian reinforcements on the battlefield on that fateful summer day, but he etched himself in the memory – and affection – of future generations. While I will probably never fully embrace this outcome at Waterloo – contributing to my desire to read even more about Wellington – I came to understand what Winston Churchill meant when he said that history would be kind towards him because he would write it. The commander of the British troops would have needed to learn how to become a tragic hero and be able to count on better advocates.

Alan Forrest’s book might not be first pick for those wanting to stick to battle stories, troop movements, logistics and the minutiae of a battle. But it is an excellent explanation of the aftermath and legacy of one of history’s most famous battles. As we approach the Holiday Season, I would highly recommend this excellent book for the history buff in your circle. As we stare down few more weeks of Covid-19 related confinement, I am confident this new (and beautifully bound) edition of Waterloo will be an ideal companion for long winter evenings.

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Alan Forrest, Waterloo, London, The Folio Society, 2020, 224 pages.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Ms. Cathleen Williamson, who is in charge of public relations for The Folio Society for generously providing me with a complimentary copy of this fascinating book.