Pen Sword: 3374 books

In 1643 and again in 1644 the forces of King Charles I and Parliament clashed at Newbury in a bloody fight. Each time the fate of the country hung in the balance. Chris Scott retells the story of these two complex and exciting battles and provides a fascinating guided tour of the surviving battlefields.

Through a series of five walks this book discovers the sights, sounds and experience of the capital at war; it details the remaining tangible evidence of the dark days via air raid shelter signs, bomb damage on buildings and memorials detailing heroic and often tragic events. The new routes cover...

How the experience of war impacted on the town, from the initial enthusiasm for sorting out the German kaiser in time for Christmas 1914, to the gradual realization of the enormity of human sacrifice the families of Brighton were committed to as the war s

When news of the war broke out in 1914, nothing could prepare the citizens of Aberdeen for the changes that would envelop their city over the next four years. The story of Aberdeen in the Great War is both an interesting and intriguing one. The city played a key role in the deployment of troops to...

Dawyck Haig, the only son of the great Field Marshal, was born in 1918, the year of his father's victory. His life has been hugely influenced by the legendary status accorded to his father and, after 1932, to himself. This unique memoir reveals a side of the Field Marshal that has never been seen...

**“**Wilkes makes the world of Jane Austen come to life . . . from travel to fashion, shopping, leisure, and, of course, finding a mate” (Britain Express). Immerse yourself in the vanished world inhabited by Austen’s contemporaries. Packed with detail and anecdotes, this is an intimate...

Unlike its near neighbor, working-class Salford, Manchester proved able to raise eight Pals battalions. Initially, these battalions were composed of middle-class men who experience before the war years was within the commercial, financial and manufacturing interests which formed the foundations of...

Archibald Wavell’s life and career makes a marvelous subject. Not only did he reach the highest rank (Field Marshal) and become an Earl and Viceroy of India but his character was complex. He joined the Black Watch in 1901. He stood out during the Great War, quickly earning the Military Cross but...

After an immense but useless bombardment, at 7.30 am. On 1 July 1916 the British Army went over the top and attacked the German trenches. It was the first day of the battle of the Somme, and on that day the British suffered nearly 60,000 casualties, two for every yard of their front. With more than...

Passchendaele In Perspective explores the context and real nature of the participants’ experience, evaluates British and German High Command, the aerial and maritime dimensions of the battle, the politicians and manpower debates on the home front and it looks at the tactics employed, the weapons...

Villers-Bretonneux was the key to the strategically important communications centre of Amiens, a principal objective of the German offensive that began in March 1918. Until the Germans took the town, Amiens would remain beyond their grasp. The successful defence of Villers-Bretonneux has come to be regarded as an Australian battle but British formations were heavily involved as wel

In Kitchener's Men John Hutton provides a absorbing account of the raising, training and fighting experiences of the Service and Territorial battalions of the King’s Own Royal Lancasters in France during the Great War. His book gives a graphic insight into the daily routine and grim reality of warfare...

The Royal Norfolk Regiment is one of the oldest and most distinguished fighting forces in the British army. Its line of descent can be traced back for over three centuries, all the way from modern Afghanistan to Monmouth’s rebellion in 1685. Throughout these years, and many campaigns, the...

Made up entirely of volunteer civil servants and their friends and despite the Government's reluctance to release them, the Prince of Wales' Own Civil Service Rifles fought with distinction at Loos, the Somme, Messines, Cambrai, Salonika and Palestine. As casualties mounted, the Rifles' spirit and...