ebooks Charge!: Great Cavalry Charges of the Napoleonic Wars by Digby Smith in History

Review

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful. Run away! Run away!By Tom L.Can a book be both overdone and underdone? Yup; this one. Digby Smith aka Otto von Pivka slapped this together to add to his pile of Nappy publications; some 50+ at this point. You wouldn't be able to guess from this book that France under Napoleon beat the crap out of everybody for 12 years and that the French cavalry had a lot to do with it. Even in France's decline the cavalry under Murat performs terrifically at Dresden; but this is not mentioned in this book. A huge amount of space goes into explaining the run up to Marengo; much of which is tangential to the subject of the title.Want to find out how the various participants' cavalries perform at Waterloo? Read Barbero's 'The Battle; a New History of Waterloo'.23 of 25 people found the following review helpful. Disappointing to say the leastBy RickWhen one first glances at the title; great expectations are evoked. While the book indeed covers selected cavalry charges; it mostly is just another outlet for a rabid Napoleon hater. He doesn't let an opportunity go by without insulting Napoleon --which is sad when one considers that a historian is supposed to above such childishness.For OOBs; the author uses the Austrian method of listing Infantry Regiments as "IR" for French (as well as other nation's) infantry regiments. For some odd reason; he doesn't use the Austrian method for British units.Some maps are clearly unintuitive and hard to read at times. The map for the Battle of Fere-Champenoise is a great example. What should have been put onto 3 or 4 maps is crushed into a single map leaving the reader to have to decypher it.Given the above; the book is not totally worthless. The narrative adds "some" historical background and the OOBs can be used if you can overlook his obvious anti-French bias. Lastly; the bargain bin is a great place for this book.0 of 0 people found the following review helpful. Three StarsBy HansluneOkay a repeat of earlier material