Napoleonic Wars History

This is one soldier's story of Napoleon's fateful invasion of Egypt and Syria. In this book, Lieutenant Philippe Fourier and his fellow officers storm Alexandria and defeat the combined armies of the Mameluke Beys in the Battle of the Pyramids. But rather than submit to the French, the Mamelukes retreat into the desert and begin waging a vicious insurgency supported by the British and the Ottomans. As the French pursue them, marching deeper into the remote deserts and mountains of Egypt and Syria, their goal turns from victory to survival.

Tragedy has struck His Majesty's Aerial Corps, whose magnificent fleet of fighting dragons and their human captains valiantly defend England's shores against the encroaching armies of Napoleon Bonaparte. An epidemic of unknown origin and no known cure is decimating the noble dragons' ranks, forcing the hopelessly stricken into quarantine. Now, only Temeraire and a pack of newly recruited dragons remain uninfected; they stand as the only means of an airborne defense against France's ever-bolder sorties.

Napoleon’s surrender and retreat from Moscow in 1812 is a pinnacle of military horror. Of the 600,000 men who crossed into Russia in June of 1812, only 25,000 would survive. Jakob Walter, a conscript soldier, was one of those survivors. His observant diary captures the everyday circumstances that soldiers suffered during the campaign.

In the tradition of Antony Beevor's Stalingrad, Nelson's Trafalgar presents the definitive blow-by-blow account of the world's most famous naval battle, when the British Royal Navy, under Lord Horatio Nelson, dealt a decisive blow to the forces of Napoleon. The Battle of Trafalgar comes boldly to life in this definitive work that recreates those five momentous, earsplitting hours with unrivaled detail and intensity.

The story of Napoleon has been written many times. In some versions, he is a military genius, in others a war-obsessed tyrant. Here, historian Adam Zamoyski cuts through the mythology and explains Napoleon against the background of the European Enlightenment and what he was himself seeking to achieve. This most famous of men is also the most hidden of men, and Zamoyski dives deeper than any previous biographer to find him. Beautifully written, Napoleon brilliantly sets the man in his European context.

Napoleon Bonaparte's ascent to power was meteoric. Ever the outsider and regarded by many as an upstart, his extraordinary determination, courage, and tactical skill saw him rise from ordinary beginnings to become the greatest military commander of his age. A brigadier general by the age of 24, crowned Emperor of France by age 35, he had conquered most of the countries of Europe by the time he was 45.

Beginning with Charlemagne, the great and educated king who would serve as an inspiration for world leaders from Frederick II to Adolf Hitler, the Holy Roman Empire’s intricate ties with the Roman Catholic Church would provide for plenty of excitement and drama in its early years. However, as the empire staggered through the Middle Ages and into the Renaissance, it would eventually be forced to declare its allegiance with a new way of thinking: Protestantism.

These are entirely Napoleon Bonaparte's own words, written and spoken, and collected in journal form. A particular focus here has been put on Napoleon's writings that pertain to military and state matters. The dates in terms of the revolutionary calendar have been modernized, and names and titles of individuals mentioned have been maintained with no attempt at uniformity. This production was begun on the 250th year of Napoleon's birth.

In the most definitive account to date, respected historian Charles Esdaile argues that the chief motivating factor for Napoleon was his insatiable desire for fame. More than a myth-busting portrait of Napoleon, however, this volume offers a panoramic view of the armed conflicts that spread so quickly out of revolutionary France to countries as remote as Sweden and Egypt.

Napoleon Bonaparte lived one of the most extraordinary of all human lives. In the space of just 20 years, from October 1795, when as a young artillery captain he cleared the streets of Paris of insurrectionists, to his final defeat at the (horribly mismanaged) battle of Waterloo in June 1815, Napoleon transformed France and Europe. After seizing power in a coup d'état, he ended the corruption and incompetence into which the revolution had descended.

In fiction, the spy is a glamorous figure whose secrets make or break peace, but, historically, has intelligence really been a vital step to military victories? In this breakthrough study, the preeminent war historian John Keegan goes to the heart of a series of important conflicts to develop a powerful argument about military intelligence. In his characteristically wry and perceptive prose, Keegan offers us nothing short of a new history of war through the prism of intelligence.

May 1806 The War of the Third Coalition continues to rage across Europe. Following the Battle of Austerlitz, Olmutz, Prerau, and Buda, the Austrian Empire has surrendered and accepted Franco-Turkish peace terms. The Habsburgs are out of the equation, and half of their territory is now occupied by either France or Turkey. However, Prussia and Russia, encouraged by continued British gold and support, remains defiant. Their armies have retreated to Berlin, while the Tsar is sending more troops from Mother Russia. Napoleon’s “Grande Armée” follows to give battle, and the Swedes join the ...

This is the true story of the Battle of Trafalgar, Britain's most significant sea battle, as seen through the smoke-hazed gunports of the fighting ships. In an atmosphere of choking fumes from cannon and musket fire, amid noise so intense it was almost tangible, the crews of the British, French and Spanish ships did their best to carry out their allotted tasks. For over five hours they were in constant danger from a terrifying array of iron and lead missiles fired from enemy guns, as well as the deadly wooden splinters smashed from the ships' hulls by the cannon-balls.

Witness Napoleon Bonaparte's Rise and Fall: From an outsider on Corsica to the Emperor of France, Napoleon's journey is a tale of ambition, strategy, and leadership. This book delves deep into his life, revealing a story that transcends history and offers timeless lessons.

The theories and observations in this abridged version of Prussian soldier Carl von Clausewitz's magnum opus have been heeded by military strategists for nearly 200 years. Most have considered this to be the "Bible" of military strategy and tactics.

Napoleon Bonaparte's rise from common origins to the pinnacle of power, as well as his defeat at Waterloo, still influences our daily lives, from the map of Europe to the metric system. Here's the fascinating story of the great soldier-statesman.

Aerial combat brings a thrilling new dimension to the Napoleonic Wars as valiant warriors rise to Britain’s defense by taking to the skies . . . not aboard aircraft but atop the mighty backs of fighting dragons.

The twentieth century is usually seen as "the century of total war." But as the historian David A. Bell argues in this landmark work, the phenomenon actually began much earlier, in the era of muskets, cannons, and sailing ships—in the age of Napoleon. In a sweeping, evocative narrative, Bell takes us from campaigns of "extermination" in the blood-soaked fields of western France to savage street fighting in ruined Spanish cities to central European battlefields where tens of thousands died in a single day. Between 1792 and 1815, Europe plunged into an abyss of destruction.

Paul Johnson's book is a refreshing return to a concept whose time has come once again: the Great Man theory of biography. It serves as "the greatest possible refutation of those who hold that events are governed by forces, classes, economics, and geography rather than the powerful wills of men and women". Napoleon truly was the Great Man of his age, a towering and terrible genius who managed to conquer the Continent.

In this seventh volume, a detailed examination is made of the period from August 1813 to Aril 1814, the end of the war. This history, written many years after Napier's, draws its information from more firsthand accounts and corrects some of the more glaring mistakes and biases of Napier. Although this audiobook is slightly abridged, the only text removed is a small number of footnotes written entirely in French. All English text from the appendices and footnotes is present.