Military History

Military History

Cornelius Ryan

Anyone interested in reading military history sooner or later comes around to Cornelius Ryan, known to his friends as Connie. He wrote stunning books on World War II: The Last Battle, about the struggle for Berlin; A Bridge Too Far, about the ill-fated race to cross the Rhine bridge at Arnhem in 1944; and, of course, the book with which his fame will always be linked, The Longest Day. Read more

Military History

A Great Soldier’s Last Victory

By Eric Niderost

Maurice Hermann, Count of Saxony and Marshal of France, swept the horizon with his telescope, his gaze occasionally pausing on the villages of Vlijtingen and Lauffeld in the distance. Read more

Turkish troops dug into their trenches and awaiting attack near Gaza.

Military History

The Haversack Ruse In Gaza Impressed Even Lawrence Of Arabia

By Harold E. Raugh, Jr.

Since the days of the Trojan Horse, military deception and ruse have been effective instruments when used by an innovative commander to deceive and defeat an enemy, minimizing friendly casualties and expenditure of valuable resources in the process. Read more

“Shenandoah Valley, September 1864,” first-hand drawing by Alfred R. Waud, a war correspondent for Harper's Weekly. On September 19, 1864, Union General Phillip Sheridan’s Army of the Shenandoah defeated General Jubal Early at the Third Battle of Winchester.

Military History

Crook’s Devils

By Kevin O’Beirne

In the fourth summer of the Civil War, things were not going well for the Union. After more than three years of bloody conflict the Confederacy, although on the defensive and having lost significant territory, was still defiant and dangerous, while the war-weary North wondered if victory was truly attainable. Read more

Military History

Samuel Pepys

By Kelly Bell

The wind was from the southwest early on the morning of June 13, 1665, as the Dutch and British fleets deployed just off southeastern coast of England, 40 miles east of the town of Lowestoft in Suffolk. Read more

Military History

The Berezina Bridges

By Jonathan North

The shattered remains of Napoleon’s once brilliant Grande Armée entered Smolensk on November 9, 1812. Taking stock of the situation, the emperor realized that he and his army couldn’t possibly winter in the charred remains of the city. Read more

Military History

To the Mons

By Eric Niderost

Southwestern Belgium echoed with the ceaseless tramp of heavy boots on cobbled roads as long brown lines of khaki-clad men marched into Mons and its suburbs. Read more

In an ambush led by Arminius (later known as Hermann), three Roman legions were destroyed in Germania in 9 CE. The event, one of Rome’s worst defeats, was seized upon by nationalists in the 19th-century, and later by the Nazi Third Reich, as the mythological origin of the German state. Paintings such as “The battle of Hermann in the Teutoburg Forest,” (1840) by Wilhelm Lindenschmit the Elder, helped popularize Hermann as the father of the German nation.

Military History

Havoc in the Teutoburger Forest

By Michael D. Greaney

One of the most devastating events to shake the early Roman Empire was the defeat of Legate Publius Quinctilius Varus and his army at the hands of Arminius in the Battle of Teutoburgerwald in 9 ad. Read more

Military History

Zenobia’s Bloody War of Independence

By Glenn Barnett

The pages of history tend to dwell on the men who created empires. No matter how ephemeral may be the famed exploits of an Alexander, Caesar or Napoleon, historians have written volumes on their behalf. Read more

From Around the Network

  • The British fleet (right) and the French fleet are shown engaged at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay on September 5, 1781, in a modern painting by Patrick O’Brien. British Rear Admiral Graves made a number of questionable decisions during the battle that put his fleet at a distinct disadvantage.

    Military History

    Grand Clash on the Chesapeake
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    W.W. Norton’s ‘Beyond Glory’
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    The Corporal M2 Missile
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