Customer Reviews

Napoleon and Austerlitz (Armies of the Napoleonic Wars Research Series)

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The best Napoleonic book that I have read in years! Scott Bowden has done it again. He has provided the serious Napoleonic student with one of the best books on strategic and tactical history of perhaps Napoleon's great campaign. I recommend this book to all interested in Napoleonic history. I must have!

Having read everything I can on Napoleon's 1805 Ulm-Austerlitz campaigns, I have to rank this work as the best. The details about the organization and tactics of the armies, combined with the specifics of the Ulm and the Austerlitz campaigns which include the very detailed tactical description of the fighting (especially the combats around Ulm) simply cannot be found anywhere else. What's more, the text is complimented by a great number of maps and artwork, making the layout what I wish every military history book looked like. It is a splendid work that deserves inclusion in any Napoleonic library.

Oh, yes...a word about some of the "hit reviews" previously posted. I, too, have a copy of Sutterheim's 1807 English TRANSLATED piece on Austerlitz, and Scott Bowden is absolutely correct in his citation. Also, I had an opportunity to hear the author when he spoke in Hawai'i in 2002, and one of those talks included, in part, a detailed presentation on Napoleon. In that presentation, I saw a lot of the archival documents used by the author in putting together NAPOLEON AND AUSTERLITZ---documents that others making "hit reviews" say he never possessed. That speaks volumes about the credibility of those who posted those remarks.

JS

I am not an historian, but I love to read history and this book is the most reader friendly campaign account I have read, Napoleonic or any other period. Charts, pictures,and maps are in the wide margins on either side of the text, right where the eye can find them. Notes are on the bottom of the page. Maps are drawn clearly and easy to grasp, as are diagrams of unit movement, whether they be corps or battalions. It is a joy to read. Publishers take note.

Bowden's Austerlitz is a fine book and I recommed it to everyone. Although author is rather anti-Russian his book is very good. After all he titled it "Napoleon and Austerlitz" and not "Tsar Alexander and Austerlitz". Right ?

The amount of information is breath-taking, the maps are excellent and extremaly detailed showing even the positions of individual battalions and squadrons. This is hard to find in other books where one see only very general positions of troops, and only positions of armies and corps and divisions.

The amount of illustrations and their quality is fascinating !

Scott Bowden's NAPOLEON AND AUSTERLITZ is, by far, the best combat narrative of any Napoleonic conflict yet written. The author's extensive use of the French army archives and resulting gleaning of the after-action reports therefrom, is a welcome breath of fresh air amidst a field of poorly-written, heavily anti-Napoleon biased works dominated by British historians. I wish every Napoleonic campaign and battle history was this well researched and thoughtfully analyzed. Bowden's work is a masterpiece, and I look forward to his subsequent volumes.

When I read on page 101 a capton "Ochakov - another Suvorov's victory" I thought for a moment that it was a little mistake that could be found even at best-researched books. Suvorov was present at the siege of the fortress under command of prince Potyomkin, but did not take part in the final storm of Ochakov in December 1788 being severely wounded in a Turkish sortie. Author defenitely mistook the storm of Ochakov with the storm of another strong Turkish fortress - Izmail, which was a really great Suvorov's victory. But as read the book more I understood that it was not a chance mistake, because Mr.Bowden demonstrated a lack of knowledge of Russian military history, and a lot of false statements proved it. Just one example - he stated, that Emperor Paul disbanded all jager units of the Russian Army and there remained only several companies. It's just not true, because in 1797 Paul reorganised ten jager corps he inherited from the Catherine the Great (each corps consisted of four battalions) into twenty small regiments. When explaining the reason for ferocity of Russian soldiers Mr.Bowden says it was the heritage of wars with Turkey and "take-no-prisoners" nature of that wars. False statement again - there were excessions in wars of XVII - early XVIII centures, but in later conflicts (wars of 1768-74 and 1787-91) excessins were rare. One example - many Turks, taken prisoner in the 1787-91 war, served at Russian galleys at the Baltic and were decorated for the bravery in actions against Sweden. And only as bad-tasted jokes can be described stories of Inspector of Russian artillery Arakcheev with his hands cutting heads of his unfortunate officers, burying them alive etc. Such anecdotes were very good for XVIII centure propaganda, but in a XXI century historic research they look rather misplaced. Generally speaking, Mr.Bowden gives his readers a picture in the "French heroes against Russian hordes" style. Historians can have their preferences, but solid works shoud not be such one-sided. Author preferred to forget (or may be ignorant of) that in 1799 Russian Army soundly defeated French armies in Italy. In that campaign with great distinction fought the same regiments that fought in 1805 - Apsheron, Butyrsk, Ryazan, Novgorod musketeers, and much maligned by Bowden Russian jagers outfought French infantry in every aspect. I'd like to ask Mr.Bowden a question - if the Russian Army was so bad as he described, how come that just in a year when Russians and French met on the battlefield again, just the same French Army after several months of bitter fighting failed to produce another Austerlitz and had a victory only after a fatal blunder by Russian C-in-C, Hanoverian mercenary Bennigsen at Friedland? "General Winter" again? Definetly not. Russian army had many faults, but it was not a band of bad-disciplined savages, led by ignorant officers as Mr.Bowden tries to convince us.

For the first time in 30 years, after reading over 80 titles regarding the Napoleonic era, do I thoroughly understand the machinations used by this God of War. Brilliant analytics. Accept no substitute!

I bought this book many years ago, and still use it very frequently in referencing one of my very favorite Napoleonic campaigns. Superb battle descriptions and detailed orders of battle compliment the other.

I think it is a welcome change to see a pro-french work about Napoleon. I'm tired of the British hegemony on world history and it is quite refreshing to hear a different side to history.

This book contains excellent maps, organization of the armies, even their characteristics. I fully agree with the reader from Rancho Mirage. Why the British monopolized the Napoleonic history ? I can understand why some don't like Bowden's point of view of the diplomatic wars (with the perfidious Albion ready to fight Napoleon to the last drop of Austrian and Russian blood). I recommend this entertaining and historically acurate book to anyone.

Ps. Chandler is grossly overplayed, his "Dictiobnary of Napoleonic Wars" contains many errors. Siborne and Chesney are better.