The Winter Soldiers: Sergeant 'Fancy Jack' Crossman and the Attack on Kertch Harbour [Hardcover]

Garry Douglas Kilworth (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 23, 2002

The grim reality of war after “The Charge of the Light Brigade” and the cameraderie of professional soldiers come to life in award-winning author Garry Douglas Kilworth’s new historical series starring army officer, and occasional espionage agent, “Fancy Jack” Crossman. After the Battle of Inkerman on November 5, 1854, the British Army in the Crimea faces the most terrible ally of the Czar’s army—the Russian winter. With hopelessly inadequate provisions and clothing, Sergeant Jack Crossman and his band of grumblers and stalwarts of the 88th Connaught Rangers are billeted at Kadikoi village near Balaclava harbor, with instructions to blow up the magazine in the Russian Star Fort. Yet Crossman’s true task is to spy on a British general accused of corruption—and to bring about his downfall by any means necessary. As Patrick O’Brian did for the British Navy, Kilworth vividly portrays the friendship and the courage of old soldiers and the brief, thrilling episodes of combat that will eventually determine the outcome of Great Britain’s most grueling war.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In the footsteps of Harry Flashman and Richard Sharpe, Sgt. "Fancy Jack" Crossman has been entertaining British readers for some years. His debut for American history buffs comes via his participation in the Crimean War of 1854. British, French, Turkish and Sardinian troops are fighting Russians, in bitterly cold conditions, the soldiers all hungry, ill and in rags, often under bombardment and directed by generals profligate with the lives of their soldiers. Descriptions of their misery as they are billeted near Balaklava prepare the reader for the climactic charge of the Light Brigade, the novel's climax. Leading up to that event, Fancy Jack, together with his ragtag platoon of soldiers, including Ali, a Turk, and Peterson, a sharpshooter who is actually a woman, are assigned "fox hunts" at night into enemy territory on spying and sabotage forays. In a nail-biting sequence with comedic overtones, Crossman supervises the destruction of a giant Russian crane. He's led to his target by a young, boastful Greek writer called Diodotus. They encounter a Russian lieutenant who advises Diodotus to stick to poetry, not prose. The boy laughs, tells them the officer, Leo Tolstoy, is also a writer, but his work is not good. Another "fox hunt" is the pursuit of a band of marauding British deserters. The combat is offset by strong personal elements. Jack's "natural" father, whom he hates, is a snobbish major who despises him for refusing to be an officer. A one-time sweetheart, Lavinia, now married to an officer, visits, along with "traveling gentlemen," sightseers observing the death and destruction of war. Florence Nightingale is briefly mentioned, and a profusion of other background material contributes to this fast-paced military adventure.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

'Rip-roaring adventure at the times of the brutal Crimean War... Military history vividly brought to life.' - Manchester Evening News --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Carroll & Graf (December 23, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786711116
• ISBN-13: 978-0786711116
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,884,344 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Jack is Back!, February 7, 2008

By 

Jeffrey S. Barrett "Gray Marine" (Morganton,NC USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Winter Soldiers: Sergeant 'Fancy Jack' Crossman and the Attack on Kertch Harbour (Hardcover)

This was the first book that I have read in the Fancy Jack Crossman series and I can honestly compare it favorably to Cornwall's Richard Sharpe series of books.The author does a great job of bringing these characters to life and in describing in great detail the poor conditions that the soldiers lived.
Fancy Jack is a SGT in the British Army stationed in the Crimea 1854-1855.He is part of an SF type unit composed of a wide variety of interesting and roguish type characters.You have a female sniper,an American who is not only a first rate barber and doctor but a highly skilled killer,Ali the fearsome Turk, and a wide variety of other characters.
Fancy Jack's background is that he is the Bastard son of a professional Army officer whom Jack despises.Jack instead of obtaining a commission in the Army enlists under a pseudonym and rises to the rank of SGT.I will stop here.But if you like adventure,action,and interesting characters then this book is for you.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining fictional account of the Crimean War, May 6, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Winter Soldiers: Sergeant 'Fancy Jack' Crossman and the Attack on Kertch Harbour (Hardcover)

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, set during the Crimean War (1854-1855), which focuses upon Sgt. "Fancy Jack" Crossman and his ragtag peloton (platoon) of (misfit) soldiers. Fancy Jack is actually the illegitimate son of a lord who opts for anonimity in the ranks as opposed to being an officer. He is in charge of a peloton of possibly the most unlikely band of soldiers, including a Turk, a Canadian (or American), and a sharpshooter who is actually a woman. They are the prototype of today's special forces, acting as saboteurs behind enemy lines, destroying a Russian crane, as well as performing the less savory tasks of hunting down a band of renegade British army deserters and gathering evidence of a British general's corruption and incompetence. Towards the end of the novel they participate in the attack on Kertch Harbor, but this is the only "traditional" battle that they see.
The author does an excellent job conveying the hopelessness and the futily of the Crimean War--the squalor, the mud, the entrenched lines which cannot be broken, the incompetence of the generals and the waste of lives, as well as descriptions of those Britons who went to Crimea as sightseers, along with servants, picnic baskets, wine, wives and mistresses, to witness the battles. I also like that Kilworth spends time describing the British class system and how it permeated the army (the younger sons of the aristocracy often went into the army as officers; their rank was purchased rather than awarded according to merit), thus keeping the officers forever separated from the men in the ranks and causing a great deal of anomisity on both sides.
I also like that the author has taken the time to develop his characters thoroughly. Readers have a good sense of exactly who Fancy Jack is, his strengths and weaknesses both as a soldier and as a human being, his strained relationship with his father, his love and admiration for his half-brother, his complicated relationship with Lavinia Durham (told with plenty of humor), an old flame now married to an officer, his uncertain feelings about his cousin (he comes across as a bit of a nerd), his good relationships with his superior officers (except Pirce-Smith) and with his peloton. The other characters are also fully developed, from the insecure whiner Wynter to the boastful (been everywhere, seen everything, done everything) Gwilliams to Peterson, the woman sharpshooter. They rag on eachother, pick on eachother, squabble just like siblings, yet when they have to operate as a unit, they do so. This unusual blend of war and personal relationships makes this an interesting change from the usual war novels, which tend to focus much more upon the fighting than the soldiers. I shall look for the earlier novels, and look forward to the further adventures of Fancy Jack and his peloton. Highly recommended.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars READER REVIEW WINTER SOLDIERS, February 18, 2010

By 

Charles L. Chosewood "Anhinga" (Georgia Coastal Island) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Winter Soldiers (Fancy Jack Crossman 4) (Paperback)

Have only read through Chapter Two, but astounded by detail, clarity of plot.
historical accuracy, and knowledge obtained from this book i.e. knew the
area of the Balaclava headgear name, but not how it was invented via necessity
by a British Soldier from items never intended for the purpose. Delighted to
find that I have stumbled onto just one of a series and look forward to not
only reading this volume, but all the others as well!