A portrait of Jane Austen’s England told through the career paths of younger sons—men of good family but small fortune   In Regency England the eldest son usually inherited almost everything while his younger brothers, left with little inheritance, had to make a crucial decision: What should they do to make an independent living? Rory Muir weaves together the stories of many obscure and well-known young men, shedding light on an overlooked aspect of Regency society. This is the first scholarly yet accessible exploration of the lifestyle and prospects of these younger sons.

What was it like to be a soldier on a Napoleonic battlefield? What happened when cavalry regiments charged directly at one another? What did the generals do during battle? Drawing on memoirs, diaries, and letters of the time, this dramatic book explores what actually happened in battle and how the participants' feelings and reactions influenced the outcome. Rory Muir focuses on the dynamics of combat in the age of Napoleon, enhancing his analysis with vivid accounts of those who were there-the frightened foot soldier, the general in command, the young cavalry officer whose boils made it impossible to ride, and the smartly dressed aide-de-camp, tripped up by his voluminous pantaloons. This book sheds new light on how military tactics worked by concentrating on the experience of soldiers in the firing line. Muir considers the interaction of artillery, infantry, and cavalry; the role of the general, subordinate commanders, staff officers, and aides; morale, esprit de corps, and the role of regimental officers; soldiers' attitudes toward death and feelings about the enemy; the plight of the wounded; the difficulty of surrendering; and the way victories were finally decided. He discusses the mechanics of musketry, artillery, and cavalry charges and shows how they influenced the morale, discipline, and resolution of the opposing armies. This is a volume that will fascinate all readers with an interest in military history, European history, or the psychology of combat.

A landmark contribution to understanding the real man behind the heroic legend inspired by the triumph at Waterloo The Duke of Wellington was not just Britain's greatest soldier, although his seismic struggles as leader of the Allied forces against Napoleon in the Peninsular War deservedly became the stuff of British national legend. Wellington was much more: a man of vision beyond purely military matters, a politically astute thinker, and a canny diplomat as well as lover, husband, and friend. Rory Muir's masterful new biography, the first of a two-volume set, is the fruit of a lifetime's research and discovery into Wellington and his times. The author brings Wellington into much sharper focus than ever before, addressing his masterstrokes and mistakes in equal measure. Muir looks at all aspects of Wellington's career, from his unpromising youth through his remarkable successes in India and his role as junior minister in charge of Ireland, to his controversial military campaigns. With dramatic descriptions of major battles and how they might have turned out differently, the author underscores the magnitude of Wellington's achievements. The biography is the first to address the major significance of Wellington's political connections and shrewdness, and to set his career within the wider history of British politics and the war against Napoleon. The volume also revises Wellington's reputation for being cold and aloof, showing instead a man of far more complex and interesting character.

From the leading Wellington historian, a fascinating reassessment of the Duke's most famous victory and his role in the turbulent politics after Waterloo Wellington's momentous victory over Napoleon was the culminating point of a brilliant military career. Yet Wellington's achievements were far from over: he commanded the allied army of occupation in France to the end of 1818, returned home to a seat in Lord Liverpool's cabinet, and became prime minister in 1828. He later served as a senior minister in Peel's government and remained Commander-in-Chief of the Army for a decade until his death in 1852. In this richly detailed work, the second and concluding volume of Rory Muir's definitive biography, the author offers a substantial reassessment of Wellington's significance as a politician and a nuanced view of the private man behind the legend of the selfless hero. Muir presents new insights into Wellington's determination to keep peace at home and abroad, achieved by maintaining good relations with the Continental powers and resisting radical agitation while granting political equality to the Catholics in Ireland rather than risk civil war. And countering one-dimensional pictures of Wellington as a national hero, Muir paints a portrait of a well-rounded man whose austere demeanor on the public stage belied his entertaining, gossipy, generous, and unpretentious private self.

This account of the final years of Britain's long war against Revolutionary and Napoleonic France places the conflict in a new - and wholly modern - perspective. Rory Muir looks beyond the purely military aspects of the struggle to show how the entire British nation played a part in the victory. His book provides a total assessment of how politicians, the press, the crown, civilians, soldiers and commanders together defeated France. Beginning in 1807 when all of continental Europe was under Napoleon's control, the author traces the course of the war throughout the Spanish uprising of 1808, the campaigns of the Duke of Wellington and Sir John Moore in Portugal and Spain, and the crossing of the Pyrenees by the British army, to the invasion of southern France and the defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo. Muir sets Britain's military operations on the Iberian Peninsula within the context of the wider European conflict, and examines how diplomatic, financial, military and political considerations combined to shape policies and priorities.Just as political factors influenced strategic military decisions, Muir contends, fluctuations of the war affected British political decisions. The book is based on a comprehensive investigation of primary and secondary sources, and on a thorough examination of the vast archives left by the Duke of Wellington. Muir offers vivid new insights into the personalities of Canning, Castlereagh, Perceval, Lord Wellesly, Wellington and the Prince Regent, along with fresh information on the financial background of Britain's campaigns. This vigorous narrative account will appeal to general readers and military enthusiasts, as well as to students of early nineteenth-century British politics and military history. Rory Muir is the author of 'Salamanca 1812' and 'Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon', both also published by Yale University Press.

22 July 1812. Salamanca, Spain. Frustrated at their first advance, British forces under Wellington's command have spent the last four days manoeuvring and retreating from the French army. Patient and cautious, Wellington is determined not to make a fatal mistake. He glimpses a moment of opportunity and grasps it, committing all of his troops to a sudden devastating attack. At the end of the day, the French army is broken, panic-stricken and reeling; Wellington has achieved the finest victory of his brilliant military career. This book examines in unprecedented detail the celebrated battle of Salamanca, the critical British victory that proved crushing to French pride and morale during the Peninsular War (1808-14). Focusing on the day of the battle, Rory Muir skilfully conveys the experience of ordinary soldiers on both sides, dissects each phase of the fighting and explores the crucial decisions made by each commander. He employs wide-ranging British and French sources - many unpublished or obscure - to reconstruct every aspect of the battle. Having walked the battlefield himself, a site which remains today much as it was in 1812, Muir relates the ebb and flow of the battle with particular vividness. In separate commentary sections he evaluates the sources and indicates the inevitable contradictions and gaps in evidence that have emerged during his research. Complete with maps, battleground plans, line drawings and photographs, this compelling book provides acute analysis of a single day in Salamanca that changed European history. Rory Muir is visiting research fellow in the department of history, University of Adelaide. He is the author of 'Britain and the Defeat of Napoleon, 1807-1815', which won the best book of the year award of the International Napoleonic Society, and 'Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon', both published by Yale University Press.