Customer Reviews

Waterloo Companion, The: The Complete Guide to History's Most Famous Land Battle

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Napoleonic land warfare is not a particularly strong interest of mine except as it pertains to the evolution of tactics used half a century later during the American Civil War. However, once in a while something on the subject will catch my eye. And extraordinarily eye-catching is Mark Adkin's "The Waterloo Companion" - over 400 large-format pages on glossy paper, a volume crammed with highly informative text and informative illustrations. Too often, the illustrations in such over-sized volumes as this seem to exist for no other purpose than to fill up space and look pretty. But this is not the case in "The Waterloo Companion." There are dozens of exquisite small-scale topographical maps depicting various critical moments of the battle. Photographs either focus in upon key terrain features or, in the case of panoramic images, are overlaid with markings to show the position and movements of troops during the battle. The course and form of the famous struggle are made very clear through such devices. Rather than employing a standard narrative structure, Adkin uses a more nearly encyclopedic approach. There are biographical essays on numerous general officers on both sides (or all three sides, if the Prussians are counted separately). Terrain features are individually discussed. Tactical methods and weapons are analyzed in depth. Army organization is examined. The battles for such key locations as La Haye Sainte and Hougoumont are presented in great detail, with multiple maps and photographs showing each phase of fighting. Orders of battle are given in a readily comprehended fashion, and the history and experiences of the various major subordinate units in all three armies are described. Physically, this is an extremely handsome volume. In terms of information presented, it is a treasure trove. For a military history buff, this is a book to provide many hours of happy browsing.

This book is not just another book on the Waterloo campaign. As the author states this book is not meant as a blow by blow account of the action but rather a look at different aspects of the battle including: The campaign, Orders of Battle, Command & Control, the battlefield, the various arms of the armies, and of course the main highlights of the battle. The last section takes an impartial look at the predominate myths and controversies surrounding the battle of Waterloo and the author comes up with his own conclusions in regards to them.

The book is massive (432pages) and makes superb use of colourful maps and photographs of the battlefield which explain the battle situation at key times, the deployment and various formations of forces.

The book also provides additional curious information by the use of text boxes including some first account experiences of the battle.

All in all this is an absolutely superb book, well researched using various sources of information, beautifully presented and printed on high quality paper. I have found it hard to put down , as I keep poring over the maps and digesting all the wonderful information to found in this book. This is a must buy for anyone with an interest in the Waterloo campaign. Lets hope Mark Adkin will do the same with other Napoleonic battles.

I give this book 5 stars because of it's overall unique contribution to the battle as an "all in one" volume for those who do not own (or wish to own) any of the available books on the army's, the weapons, and soldiers, and also because it's treatment of the main phases of the battle in color coded maps is essentially unbeatable. It also contains the mother of all Orders of Battle for the Waterloo Campaign. That being said the narrative of the battle is NOT for the seriously interested as it only briefly covers the highpoints of the battle very near the end of the book, and much of that in anecdotal format. The problem with Adkin's Waterloo is it's inherent omissions give the false impression that the battle was not the "damned near-run affair" that it actually was. This is found in the author's faulty statement that the height of D'Erlon's assault was the closest Napoleon ever came to winning the battle. Yet the reader is dismayed to find that excepting a goodly amount of schematic detail on the assaults against La Haye Sainte, the whole remainder of the battle (hours worth) against Wellington's lines after Ney's cavaly charge all the way to the assault by the Old and Middle Guard is all but completely omitted. The Prussian contribution, though respected, is treated as a separate affair altogether. The reader also picks up a pro-anglo, pro-Cops-of-the-World slant in the narrative too probably in part because practically all of the author's sources came from previously published works in English, and most of his sources for the stories of the battle are from the English soldiers who fought in it. Some of the personal stories quoted sound rediculous, no doubt exaggerated over the years.

As a Waterloo enthusiast, I was highly impressed with the outstanding quality of the 'Waterloo Companion'. I'm interested in uniform details, the campaign itself, units on the battlefield, tactics of the period, etc.. and this book has it all. I took the book to the battlefield and compared the landscape with the pictures in the book and the location of the different units, which made my understanding of the battle much better. Also, the accurate sequence of events and description and plans of fights around the farms is excellent. Highly recommended.

My interest in military history has primarily been reserved for The American Civil War. However, I always harbored an underlying interest in The Napoleonic wars (especially after seeing the movie "Waterloo" starring Rod Stieger when I was a youngster)...

So, a while back, I finally decided to delve further into this realm of military history. What better battle to kick off my new interest than the Battle of Waterloo. When I found this book on Amazon.com, it appeared as if I had found what I had been looking for in "The Waterloo Companion: The Complete Guide to History's Most Famous Battle"...

... and I had - and THEN some! There is a LOT of information between the covers of this book! But, the author does a good job at presenting it all in as organized a way as I could have hoped for. The book is divided into sections like "the battlefield", "the infantry", "the cavalry", "the artillery", etc... Even a section of myths surrounding the battle, and the dispelling of these myths.

This book is like a text/reference book. It's not the kind of book you will sit back and relax with! It is far too text-heavy for that. However, the text is broken up with many blurbs and vignettes, set off from the rest of the text in separate boxes. For these, I am grateful to the author! I have found myself going directly to THESE bits more than the main body text when I pick the book up.

The author also does a decent job with timelines via maps, etc. Also, diagrams on how squares were formed, how cavalry would attack squares, and the best way to fire artillery at an opponet of the Napoleonic era, etc., etc... help one to better understand key tactits of Napoleonic warfare like those that were employed at Waterloo.

Now, the reason why I gave this book 4 stars and not five (I'd have given it 4.5 if I could have) is striclty a personal one: I love seeing art inside of books. Particularly military books. There are so many great works of art done on the battles of Waterloo, Quatre Bras, etc... But, I was left high and dry upon opening the book. The cover image of the Currasiers assaulting the Highlander squares, by Felix Phillapateux, sucked me into the book in the first place. I thought there'd be more of these images within... paintings by Thomas Gibb and Lady Butler - even more contemporary artists like Keith Rocco (who has done some great peices on Waterloo), etc... would have rounded out this book for me and lead me to give it five solid stars. There are several color "plates" of soldiers in their uniforms included. But, not nearly enough to wet my pallett.

Over all, a great work! Any and every person with an interest in The Battle of Waterloo should have this in their bookcase!

Finally someone took the time to truly invest in making a standardwork for the Battle of Waterloo. My congratulations to its makers, the book is a very good and honoust work based on facts. I could argue about some detail, but if you are going to visit the battle fields of Waterloo, or are simply interested in its history, this is the book to start with. I am deeply impressed, are there any plans to do the same thing for Ligny and Quatre Bras?

Mr. Adkin's book "The Waterloo Companion" is one of the BEST Waterloo reference sources I have ever seen or possessed (I have two copies)......I have visited the Waterloo Battlefield a total of 5 times. Each time that I look through this book, I find myself immediately back there on the battlefield itself. I simply can't say enough on how thoroughly impressive this MASSIVE book is (but I'll try briefly):

It is a VERY, VERY colorful book (432 pages) with many uniform plates, TONS of photos in color of pretty much every part of the battlefield including the buildings, museums, monuments and fields (some of the photos of the fields have permanent colored overlays which show certain troop positions and the locations and movements of them within the photographed area of the battlefield). The orders of battle are superb and will be most helpful to anyone doing research. One of MANY things that I liked about the Orders of Battle was the fantastic detail and how they have been organized. It is so detailed that even the regiments are broken down into Batallions with the NAME OF EACH BATALLION COMMANDER listed and also stating if the man was wounded or killed in battle; this same info is also provided for the commanders at all levels (regimental, brigade, division and corps as well). There is an INCREDIBLE amount of information regarding all of the individual units that were present at the battle describing the EXACT role that they played. MUCH detailed information is also provided regarding all of the commanders (from General of Division and up). Many lesser-known tales from the battle based on eye-witness accounts are listed throughout the book......The NUMEROUS COLORED MAPS are also spectacular and I personally put them to good use...... The last 4 times I was at Waterloo(between 2003-2005), I went relic hunting with my Belgian friends (we only hunt property where we have the landowners permission)......I used these EXCELLENT maps within this book as a most successful guide in finding certain locations on the battlefield that I wanted to hunt.

There are just far too many wonderful things to be said and my few words have not even come close in giving it the complete praise that it deserves. Let me conclude by saying this....."The Waterloo Companion" is a MUST for anyone with the slightest interest in the Napoleonic Wars. Not meaning to sound melo-dramatic but for those who have an interest in the Battle of Waterloo, I honestly think it would be a tragedy if you did not obtain this book. It is so PACKED full of every possible bit of info that one could imagine regarding this most famous battle. This is one of these rare types of books that once you pick up, it is most difficult to put down. I have recommended this masterpiece to all of my Napoleonic friends and I have never heard the slightest complaint from them; only praise on the book and a friendly appreciation toward me for turning them onto it......Again, for those with the slightest interest in the Battle of Waterloo, PLEASE DO NOT HESITATE - Obtain this fantastic book as soon as possible. You WILL NOT be disappointed!

I wish many other authors who understake the task of writing a "companion" book to a specific venture would first take a page from Mark Adkin. He has set about to compile a book FULL of information both relevant to the Battle of Waterloo itself as well as the necessary and informative background on several aspects related to the battle. He does this in a most readable format and writing style as well. I only wish I had purchased this book prior to reading Alessandro Barbero's The Battle: A New History of Waterloo. It would have really helped fill in the voids left by the lack of maps and information in that particular book.

Adkin breaks down the book and deals in detail with The Campaign, Orders of Battle, Command and Control, The Battlefield, The Infantry, The Calvary, The Artillery, Other Arms and Services (such as medical and engineering services), The Highlights and finally Myths and Controversies.

As each section is recorded, Adkin lays out the required information for a full grasp of the subject matter and how it relates to the strategy and tatics of the era as well as the specific battle itself. It is this "background" information that I personally found to be worth every penny of the price of the book. On many areas he delves into the debate of the times as to different views on several tatics (such as whether to slice or thrust with the sabres of the calvary). This is often complimented by actual first hand source material of the day.

The book shines in very unique way as well in that it contains many photographs of the actual physical battlefield onto which troop placement and movements have been superimpossed. This really allows the viewer as clear a picture of the battlefield area as one can possibly hope to get. Add in the many anecdotes for each section of the book and one cannot help but come away with a very clear picture of the battle and also the Napoleonic era itself.

If you are interested in this battle or of the Napoleonic Era itself, then I would say this a "must have" book for your personal library.

This title covers all views of the arms branches involved (infantry, cavalry, and artillery) from the different combatants of the battle of waterloo. This book contains lots of pictures of the battlefield today. It has the air of a battlefield guide but due to the size and weight of this "tome" it would be impractical to carry this volume with you on a plane or in the car if you planned to visit the battlefield. Having visited the battlefield about five times about 20 years ago I can say it fills in the blanks. On the negative side, if you have not been to Waterloo or Brussels you may not be able to appreciate the scale of the battlefield and surrounding distances if you only reference this book. The volume also contains some repeated information in areas that makes reading the book cover to cover a bit like Groundhog Day. The book also uses some questionable information that is used as fact in one area without questioning the source and later questions the fact and source. One particular incident has to do with the "guide" that was used by Napoleon in order to navigate the area. It was later disclosed that although the unwilling guide was from the area he had hid in a barn some 10 kilometers away during the battle and used the money he made later in life sowing tales and guiding tours to keep the mouths shut of those he sheltered with least they expose his lies. Beforehand this person gave "eyewitness" accounts of what happened at Napoleons HQ. The story was taken as fact and without dispute although it is clear the guide probably was not present. There are also terrain maps with side views of the dead space as seen by artillery etc. When reading about construction of the Lion Mount it is clear that the battlefield terrain has changed due to the amount of soil removed from Wellington's left flank transforming the terrain. The terrain maps with unit overlays appear to be from modern times (as it is today) which does little to support the side views, facts or assumptions. This is probably not too useful of a book for a dire hard board gamer which I am not. The book is a good study but with some errors.

This book is bigger and has more information than most Peninsular War or Napolionic books put together. It has all the facts that are unparalled and includes the myths like "Would Napoleon have won if he started the battle early" and so forth. The battle maps have been put on a modern level showing motorways and contours and in the 1815 level how it looked then both are excellent. The battle movements are also put in the 1815 map to make it easy to see where every body is. It has a blow by blow account of the battle in the most detail and shows the Infantry, Cavalry and Artillary moving around the battle zone. The photos are from the present battle field but also have the 1815 troop dispostitions superimposed on them which is very informative. You get an idea of what was going on and where. It also has great plates (16 in all), diagrams and army's personal equipment including the weapons and how to form infantry squares, Cavalry movements, helmets style and Artillary firing positions. The text boxes are very informative and a brilliant addition to the book. It is a very big and thick volume which makes it hefty to take with you to the site but you can get the full information more than any other book.

This book could be used as a Napoleonic book in it's own right and you can never put it down.

Exciting to read and look over, informative and an excellent book to take with you to Waterloo.