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THE

QUARTERLY REVIEW.

No. 436.-JULY, 1913.

Art. 1.-THE PENINSULAR WAR.

1. A History of the Peninsular War. By Charles Oman. Vols II, III and IV. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1903-11. 2. Wellington's Army. By Charles Oman. London: Arnold, 1912.

3. A History of the British Army. By the Hon. J. W. Fortescue. Vol. VII. London: Macmillan, 1912.

4. Wellington's Battlefields illustrated: Bussaco. By Lieut.-Col. G. L. Chambers. London Sonnenschein, 1910.

5. Correspondence of Lord Burghersh. London: Murray, 1912.

6. Napoleon I: a biography. By Auguste Fournier. Translated by Annie E. Adams. London: Longmans, 1911.

7. Weltgeschichte seit der Völkerwanderung. By Theodor Lindner. Vol. VII. Stuttgart and Berlin: Cotta, 1910. And other works.

BEGUN less than ten years after the last shots had been fired at Toulouse and Bayonne, William Napier's great 'History of the War in the Peninsula' was immediately and naturally accepted as the standard authority on that great struggle, nor is it difficult to understand its long and unchallenged retention of that position. Its vivid narrative, its glowing battle-pictures, its wealth of detail, its trenchant arguments and criticisms, the care and research devoted to its production, easily account for the reluctance of writers to challenge comparison with a competitor of a reputation so deservedly high. Since Napier wrote an enormous amount of fresh information has come to light; biographies, memoirs, journals, such volumes as the recently published Correspondence of Vol. 219.-No. 436.

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Lord Burghersh with its forty pages of letters from Wellington, have told the story from the standpoint of the private to that of the general. Wellington's own despatches published by Colonel Gurwood in 1837 are, though none too well edited, a mine of valuable evidence. The Supplementary Despatches brought out by the second Duke between 1858 and 1872, and much better handled, are hardly less important. Yet, despite all this wealth of new material, the 19th century had closed before any real attempt was made to revise the received version of events.

Napier's great reputation would hardly be in itself a sufficient explanation. A military history must satisfy two sets of critics; it must come up to the standard by which scientific histories are judged, and it must also pass muster on the professional side. Civilians, out of touch with military life and thought and writing without experience of war, fail as a rule to appreciate the friction which attends every warlike operation and makes 'the simple' so very difficult.' Soldier-writers have too often lacked the historical training needed for the due appreciation of authorities, and have in consequence relied upon evidence which has not been properly sifted and examined. Hence the inadequacy of much so-called 'military history'; sometimes historical, sometimes military, it is rarely both. Nor did English military history fare much better even after the Prussian victories of 1866 and 1870 had given to scientific military studies that great impetus with which in England Lord Wolseley's name will always be associated. For professional purposes there are obvious advantages in the study of the most recent campaigns; and it was only natural that the attention of English officers should be concentrated on the triumphs of Moltke. German inspiration and guidance, however, were not likely to promote a close acquaintance with those campaigns of the Napoleonic era in which Germans, till near the end, played an unfortunate part. Nor could the military historians of France be expected to devote themselves to the detailed study of the 'Spanish ulcer.' Hence the fields which needed the joint labour of English soldiers and historians were left untilled.

In recent years there has been a marked increase in the output of military literature in England, and a no less

marked improvement in its quality. The soldiers have written better history; some civilian historians have learnt to appreciate the difficulties of soldiers. The importance of military history is much more generally recognised, and the attention which Oxford and Cambridge devote to it shows how far the reaction has spread. Indeed, perhaps the most considerable and ambitious historical work now in progress in England is the 'History of the Peninsular War,' by the Chichele Professor of Modern History at Oxford. And, next after it, one might name a book of the same complexionMr J. W. Fortescue's History of the British Army,' the latest instalment of which reaches 1810. Prof. Oman's first volume (1902), noticed in this Review along with Sir Frederick Maurice's Diary of Sir John Moore,' in April 1904, reached the re-embarkation of Moore's army at Corunna. The second (1903) told the story of Oporto and Talavera; the third (1908) left Massena checked before the lines of Torres Vedras; the fourth and latest (1911), deals with the least known but certainly not the least interesting year of the struggle, 1811.

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It was indeed high time to tell afresh the story of Wellington's campaigns. The mass of new evidence was crying out to be used, and Prof. Oman has used it to good purpose. He has not only sifted the grain from the chaff out of all the new printed sources-diaries like Tomkinson's Diary of a Cavalry Officer;' regimental histories like Colonel Gardyne's 'Life of a Regiment' (the Gordon Highlanders); memoirs like those of Sir Harry Smith and Colborne-but he has had access to much unpublished material, of which perhaps the most important are the D'Urban papers, containing invaluable information about the staff-work of the Portuguese army under Beresford. And he is as well versed in the French

and Spanish sources. Nobody could maintain that Napier does justice to the Spaniards. His prejudice against them is as strong as his predilection in favour of Napoleon and his hatred of the Tory ministers, Perceval and Liverpool. Not the least service which Prof. Oman has done is that he has put the achievements of the Spaniards in their true light. He shows how well many of Blake's regiments fought at Albuera, brings out the heroism of Alvarez, the stubborn defender of Gerona,

the constant good service of la Romana, of Henry O'Donnell in Catalonia and many others. His censure of the headlong folly of Areizaga at Ocana, of the culpable weakness of Imaz at Badajoz, of Cuesta's perverse obstinacy, is all the more severe because he is ready to admit that good could come out of Galicia or Estremadura. His pages may lack the glowing rhetoric which illumines so many of Napier's, but he makes up for it in lucidity. 'Every schoolboy knows' Napier's wonderful word-picture of the crisis at Albuera, but if one would understand how and why the battle was fought and won, it is from Prof. Oman that one will learn it. Where Napier's brilliance dazzles and confuses, Prof. Oman is clearness itself. Moreover, he has a more judicial mind; his criticisms are sane and reasonable; there is no attempt to prove Wellington infallible; and the new sources from which he has drawn have naturally enabled him to clear up many controversial points. If his book is open to criticism, it is in the matter of the maps. There are hardly enough of them; they do not always quite correspond to the text; and the system of indicating heights in the battle-plans is much inferior to that adopted by Mr Fortescue's draughtsman in the History of the British Army,' where the maps are a great feature, and, being bound up separately, are extremely convenient to use.

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In his earlier volumes it has often been Mr Fortescue's good fortune to write the first adequate account of neglected but important episodes like the West Indian expeditions of 1793-97 or the Duke of York's misadventures in the Netherlands. In his latest volume the Walcheren fiasco and Auchmuty's really remarkable achievements in Java supply him with virgin soil, but in the Peninsula he has not the advantage of being a pioneer. His version is none the less welcome and valuable; indeed, one turns to his narrative of the Douro and the Coa all the more eagerly to see how far his conclusions agree with those of Prof. Oman. With a good deal less space at his disposal-he has about 430 pages to give to the events covered by two of the Oxford writer's substantial volumes-he is not obliged to go into the Spanish operations at length, and hence is able to give almost as much space to Talavera and Bussaco. Differences of detail are numerous, as for example over the

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