Allan Mallinson: 14 books

‘War is too important to be left to the generals’ snapped future French prime minister Georges Clemenceau on learning of yet another bloody and futile offensive on the Western Front. One of the great questions in the ongoing discussions and debate about the First World War is why did winning take...

‘No part of the Great War compares in interest with its opening’, wrote Churchill. ‘The measured, silent drawing together of gigantic forces, the uncertainty of their movements and positions, the number of unknown and unknowable facts made the first collision a drama never surpassed…in fact...

Although only formed in December 1992, The Light Dragoons look back to a history that began in the days of the first Jacobite rebellion. In 1922 a reduction in the Army’s strength saw the amalgamation of four regiments of Hussars into the 13th/18th Hussars and the 15th/19th Hussars. Now they too...

India 1819 Matthew Hervey is charged with raising a new troop, and organising transport for India - for he, his men and their horses are to set sail with immediate effect. What Hervey and his greenhorn soldiers cannot know is that in India they will face a trial for which they are ill...

January 1829: George IV is on the throne, Wellington is England's prime-minister, and snow is falling thickly on the London streets as Lieutenant-Colonel Matthew Hervey is summoned to the Horse Guards in the expectation of command of his regiment, the 6th Light Dragoons. But the benefits of...

January 1830, and one of the hardest winters in memory . . . And the prime minister, the Iron Duke, is resisting growing calls for parliamentary reform, provoking scenes of violent unrest in the countryside. But there are no police outside London and most of the yeomanry regiments, to whom the authorities...

Waterloo**, 1815** As the war against Bonaparte rages to its bloody end upon the field of Waterloo, a young officer goes about his duty in the ranks of Wellington's army. He is Cornet Matthew Hervey of the 6th Light Dragoons - a soldier, gentleman and man or honour, who suddenly finds himself...

Canada 1817 Captain Matthew Hervey is suffering the effects of unrest within his beloved regiment, the 6th Light Dragoons. Their new commanding officer - wealthy, arrogant and cruel - has taken an immediate dislike to him. Somehow, Hervey must earn promotion while retaining his integrity...

1827, and Matthew Hervey is on the look out for a new posting. He soon finds one in the Cape Colonies, where there is need of a man to re-organise the local forces, and in particular to form a new company of horse. Accompanied by a mixed-race captain from the disbanded Royal African...

Portugal 1826 Newly returned from India, Matthew Hervey joins a party of officers sent to lend support to the Portugese regent. But the Peninsula is a place redolent with memories. For it was here as a seventeen-year-old cornet that Hervey had his first taste of military action. The French...

Matthew Hervey of the 6th Light Dragoons is urgently summoned to the Cape Colony when he learns that the Zulu warrior King Shaka is about to wage war. Soon Hervey, his old friend Eyre Somervile and their escort of dragoons and mounted rifles are riding north. When they arrive at Shaka's kraal...

Badajoz: Christmas 1826 Matthew Hervey of the 6th Light Dragoons is a prisoner of the Spanish, incarcerated in the infamous fortress of Badajoz. As he plans his escape, his thoughts return to the year 1812 when he was a cornet in Wellington's Peninsular Army. He and the Sixth had survived...

India**, 1824** Matthew Hervey and the 6th Light Dragoons are stationed in India, where conflagration looks set to flair. The usurper prince, Durjan Sal, has taken refuge in the infamous fortress of Bhurtpore.A deep ditch, which can be flooded at a moment's notice, runs round it - and...

India**, 1816** Fresh from the field of Waterloo, Matthew Hervey is dispatched on a mission of the utmost secrecy. Leaving behind his fianc�e, Lady Henrietta Lindsey, he must journey across tempestuous seas to India, an alien, exotic and beguiling land that will test his mettle to...