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Military History Magazine
To this day, nobody is quite sure of the exact formula for the Dark Ages’ most terrifying ‘weapon of mass destruction.’ The rise of Islam at the be- ginning of the 7th century presaged centuries of conflict with the Byzantine Empire....
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Military History Magazine
The British and Ottoman defenders of Kars were forgotten heroes of the Crimean War. Sometimes in the Caucasus Mountains the sounds of battle can reverberate for a very long distance, leaving the listener with an eerie sense of approaching...
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Military History Magazine
Volunteering to serve the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War, Alun Menai Williams said, ‘I witnessed most of the carnage from a height of six to 12 inches from ground level.’ It made him a criminal in the eyes of his own...
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Military History Magazine
The city of St. Lô was the U.S. Army’s key to breaking out of Normandy into the French hinterland. On the morning of July 11, 1944, the 116th Regiment, 29th Infantry Division, advanced toward Martinville Ridge, two miles east of St....
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Military History Magazine
On August 17, 1657, an English fleet tacked its way up the English Channel toward Plymouth, led by the Parliamentary ship Naseby. A hero’s welcome had been planned by a grateful nation for the commander. As it approached the Sound,...
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Military History Magazine
The American Civil War, especially in its early stages, was notable for its diverse and often bizarre uniforms. New York militia units were especially likely to adopt ethnic uniforms, largely because of New York City’s already polyglot...
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Military History Magazine
In a traditional ceremony, soldiers passed through an arch made of two swords, and Egypt’s Mameluke Sultan Kansuh al-Ghawri swore his officers to loyalty on the Koran. Not far away, the mighty Ottoman army was deployed with its modern...
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Military History Magazine
IMPERIAL DISCREPANCIES I thoroughly enjoyed John Currier’s piece about the conversion of Clovis (“Personality,” October 2005), but the article suffered from two errors concerning the status of the Roman Empire. First, his reference...
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Military History Magazine
Circumstance can make for strange military bedfellows. Peacekeeping in the Balkans in the late fall of 2001 produced some funny feelings in me and some fellow officers and men of the 29th Infantry Division (Light). The older hands among us...
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Military History Magazine
When General Robert E. Lee was engaged at Chancellorsville in May 1863, and when Brigadier General William Barksdale’s Brigade faced an attack by an overwhelming number of Union troops back in Fredericksburg, the man who rode bareback to...
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Military History Magazine
Histories of World War II are seldom complete without mention of the Italian Fascist Grand Council’s vote of no confidence against Benito Mussolini on July 25, 1943, or the assassination attempt against Adolf Hitler by some of his army...
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Military History Magazine
It’s not every day that one discovers an illustrious forebear in the annals of history or literature. But there he was, my ancestor Davy Gam, right there in William Shakespeare’s King Henry V, Act 4, Scene 8: King Henry: “Where is...
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Military History Magazine
Fortress America: The Forts That Defended America, 1600 to the Present by J.E. and H.W. Kaufmann, Da Capo Press, Cambridge, Mass., 2004, $40. I have a thing for coastal defenses and have tracked them from Fort Hunt to Fort Flagler on Puget...
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Military History Magazine
The Devil’s Broker: Seeking Gold, God, and Glory in Fourteenth-Century Italy by Frances Stonor Saunders, Fourth Estate, New York, 2005, $25.95. One of the paintings reproduced in Frances Stonor Saunders’ masterful The Devil’s Broker...
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Military History Magazine
James Stewart (1908-97) was one of the most popular and respected film actors of the 20th century, appearing in 91 films over five decades, from the mid- 1930s to the mid-1980s. Yet for all his fame and popularity there was another side to...
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Military History Magazine
German submariner Peter Petersen survived three patrols aboard U-518. He missed the fourth—during which it was lost with all hands. The tide of war turned in the Atlantic Ocean during the summer of 1943. For three years, Germany’s ping...
