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Books > Humanities > History > European history > 1750 to 1900
A powerful and frightening account - based on fresh research and
eye-witness accounts - of the great Terror that swept France after
the Revolution From early 1793 to the summer of 1794, the young
French Republic was subject to a reign of institutionalised terror
which grew ever more bloodthirsty and paranoid in its actions.
Personified by Robespierre and the "Angel of Death", Saint-Just,
the Terror convulsed and very nearly ruined France - until they too
met their fate under the guillotine. That extraordinary period - in
many ways the precursor of Stalin's Great Terror of the 1930s - is
vividly re-created by Graeme Fife. He has used contemporary
documents, eye-witness accounts, and reports from the dreaded
Committee of Public Safety, to show the atmosphere of fear,
suspicion and betrayal that gripped France. But amidst the horror
there was also great heroism and pathos - the author includes
heartbreaking letters written by those awaiting execution.
There were many elements to British Napoleonic naval success but
one of the key factors was gunnery. Other countries developed
different naval weapons to fit their maritime strategy. The French
and Spanish systems developed on similar lines, while those of the
Baltic navies tended to rely on smaller craft and weapons. Holland,
during this period, was part of the French sphere of influence and
this had an effect on the development of naval weapons. This title
describes the systems of all these countries as well as the
fledgling navy of America, detailing the gunnery skills that
embarrassed the Royal Navy at the height of their dominance.
Winner of the J. Russell Major Prize, American Historical
Association Best Book on the First Empire by a Foreigner, Napoleon
Foundation "Englund has written a most distinguished book
recounting Bonaparte's life with clarity and ease...This
magnificent book tells us much that we did not know and gives us a
great deal to think about."-Douglas Johnson, Los Angeles Times Book
Review "Englund, in his lively biography...seeks less to
rehabilitate Napoleon's reputation and legacy than to provide
readers with a fuller view of the man and his actions."-Paula
Friedman, New York Times "Napoleon: A Political Life is a veritable
tour de force: the general reader will enjoy it immensely, and
learn a great deal from it. But the book also has much to offer
historians of modern France."-Sudhir Hazareesingh, Times Literary
Supplement "Englund's incisive forays into political theory don't
diminish the force of his narrative, which impressively conveys the
epochal changes confronting both France and Europe...A strikingly
argued biography."-Matthew Price, Washington Post This
sophisticated and masterful biography brings new and remarkable
analysis to the study of modern history's most famous general and
statesman. As Englund charts Napoleon's dramatic rise and fall-from
his Corsican boyhood, his French education, his astonishing
military victories and no less astonishing acts of reform as First
Consul (1799-1804) to his controversial record as Emperor and,
finally, to his exile and death-he explores the unprecedented power
Napoleon maintains over the popular imagination.
John Hatsell (1733-1820) held the office of Clerk of the House of
Commons from 1768 to 1820. In his letters and Memorabilia entries -
published here for the first time - Hatsell brought to bear his
intimate familiarity with high politics during the reign of George
III. Hatsell's expertise in financial policy inspired him to offer
counsel to Pitt the Younger during Pitt's first premiership
(1783-1801). Hatsell's other correspondents include Henry Addington
(speaker 1789-1801 and prime minister 1801-1804), Charles Abbot
(speaker 1802-1817), and William Eden (diplomat and President of
the Board of Trade in the Ministry of All the Talents, 1806-1807).
Hatsell centres his attention on the enduring constitutional
significance of the changes he experienced in his public and
private life. Hatsell's wry humour is often on display as he
reveals the lighter side of social and political life in Great
Britain.
How Soviet scientists and pseudoscientists pursued telepathic
research, cybernetic simulations, and mass hyptonism over
television to control the minds of citizens. In October 1989, as
the Cold War was ending and the Berlin Wall about to crumble,
television viewers in the Soviet Union tuned in to the first of a
series of unusual broadcasts. "Relax, let your thoughts wander
free..." intoned the host, the physician and clinical
psychotherapist Anatoly Mikhailovich Kashpirovsky. Moscow's Channel
One was attempting mass hypnosis over television, a therapeutic
session aimed at reassuring citizens panicked over the ongoing
political upheaval-and aimed at taking control of their responses
to it. Incredibly enough, this last-ditch effort to rally the
citizenry was the culmination of decades of official telepathic
research, cybernetic simulations, and coded messages undertaken to
reinforce ideological conformity. In Homo Sovieticus, the art and
media scholar Wladimir Velminski explores these scientific and
pseudoscientific efforts at mind control. In a fascinating series
of anecdotes, Velminski describes such phenomena as the conflation
of mental energy and electromagnetism; the investigation of aura
fields through the "Aurathron"; a laboratory that practiced mind
control methods on dogs; and attempts to calibrate the thought
processes of laborers. "Scientific" diagrams from the period
accompany the text. In all of the experimental methods for
implanting thoughts into a brain, Velminski finds political and
metaphorical contaminations. These apparently technological
experiments in telepathy and telekinesis were deployed for purely
political purposes.
The Mediterranean was one of Napoleon's greatest spheres of
influence. With territory in Spain, Italy and, of course, France,
Napoleon's regime dominated the Great Sea for much of the early
nineteenth century. The 'Napoleonic Mediterranean' was composed of
almost the entirety of the western, European lands bordering its
northern shores, however tenuously many of those shores were held.
The disastrous attempt to conquer Egypt in 1798-99, and the rapid
loss of Malta to the British, sealed its eastward and southern
limits. None of Napoleon's Mediterranean possessions were easily
held; they were volatile societies which showed determined
resistance to the new state forged by the French Revolution. In
this book, acclaimed historian and biographer of Napoleon, Michael
Broers looks at the similarities and differences between Napoleon's
Mediterranean imperial possessions. He considers the process of
political, military and legal administration as well as the
challenges faced by Napoleon's Prefects in overcoming hostility in
the local population. With chapters covering a range of imperial
territories, this book is a unique and valuable addition to the
historical literature on Napoleonic Europe and the process and
practice of imperialism.
The news of Wellington's momentous victory at Vitoria on 21 June
1813 reached London in early July. Celebration spawned an
expectation of a rapid conclusion to events in the Peninsula. His
Majesty's Government gave authority for Wellington to invade France
and made noises and plans for the redeployment of the Peninsular
Army in support of Russia and Prussia. Wellington, however, did not
see things in quite the same way. His army was worn out and there
remained sizeable French forces in Spain, so what followed had to
be a carefully thought out and planned campaign. The invasion
itself commenced with the daring Allied crossing of the Bidassoa
estuary in early October 1813 and was followed by an operational
pause prior to the Battle of Nivelle in November. The subsequent
operations, which commenced early in 1814, provided the aftermath
to the invasion and the conclusion to the Peninsular War. These
actions focus primarily on the investment of Bayonne and the
pursuit of Soult's army east, and include the battles and
engagements at Garris, Orthez, Aire, Tarbes and the final showdown
at Toulouse in April 1814.
Immortalized in literature through such characters as C. S.
Forester's 'Horatio Hornblower' and Patrick O'Brian's 'Jack
Aubrey', the officers and midshipmen of the Royal Navy during the
Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars ran the ships that defended Great
Britain against the threat of French invasion. This period saw the
Royal Navy achieve its most momentous victories at the Nile,
Copenhagen and Trafalgar, victories that laid the basis for a
period of British naval and imperial supremacy that would last a
century.
The men who commanded these ships went through a long
apprenticeship, often going to sea at the age of 12 or younger.
They could serve for up to 60 years, progressing through the ranks
in a service that rewarded success in battle and merit to a much
larger extent than the contemporary British Army.
This title, the companion volume to Warrior 100: " Nelson's
Sailors," describes the harsh realities of life in the Georgian
Royal Navy for all ranks of officer from the lowest midshipman to
the most senior admiral and covers the exploits of men such as
Horatio Nelson and Thomas Cochrane who provided the basis for the
fictional figures that remain so popular to this day.
The book provides an insight into the lives of Khusro Mirza Beg, a
scion of a princely family of Georgia, who was adopted by Mir Karam
Ali Khan Talpur, and Fareedun, also from Georgia, whose paths
fatefully crossed thousands of miles away, in distant Sindh. The
author traces the historical background that led to the author's
ancestors migration from Georgia in the early 1800's to Sindh, and
focuses on Khusro's life as a young man, and his relationship with
the Mirs of Sindh, and continues with the family history until the
twentieth century.
Wellington's Men Remembered is a reference work which has been
compiled on behalf of the Association of Friends of the Waterloo
Committee and contains over 3,000 memorials to soldiers who fought
in the Peninsular War and at Waterloo between 1808 and 1815,
together with 150 battlefield and regimental memorials in 24
countries worldwide. Photographs of memorials are included in a CD
Rom inserted in each
Portraits were the most widely commissioned paintings in
18th-century France, but most portraits were produced for private
consumption, and were therefore seen as inferior to art designed
for public exhibition. The French Revolution endowed private values
with an unprecedented significance, and the way people responded to
portraits changed as a result. This is an area which has largely
been ignored by art historians, who have concentrated on art
associated with the public events of the Revolution. Seen from the
perspective of portrait production, the history of art during the
Revolution looks very different, and the significance of the
Revolution for attitudes to art and artists in the 19th century and
beyond becomes clearer.
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