CRIMEAN WAR (Wordsworth Military Library)

It would seem from the general historical perspective that the Crimean War was the most mismanaged, brutal and futile campaign that has ever been fought. For well over a hundred years it has been presented as the classic model of military and medical blundering. Military inefficiency is felt to have been slightly redeemed by the glamour surrounding the ill-fated heroism of the Charge of the Light Brigade, and medical chaos made acceptable by the subsequent achievements of the diligent Florence Nightingale. The facts that the Allies won this war against extremely tough opponents, that at the end of it the British Army had reached a high pitch of efficiency, and that the campaign was one of extreme difficulty, are all too frequently glossed over or completely ignored. In this reappraisal Philip Warner puts the record straight, defining the army's achievements and setbacks, the medical and logistical misfortunes, and the sheer horror of the war, in the context of the time and place.