Phil Carradice

Almost comic. The 1797, Directory government of Revolutionary France came up with a plan to invade England. The French navy would land 12000 men in Galway, Ireland, and doubtless the disaffected Irish would flock to the Tricolor and achieve Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity. Simultaneous other fleets would land a few thousand each on the East Coast of England and in Wales, as diversions. There being a shortage of regulars, most of the invaders were convicts who were promised freedom and glory in exchange.

This actually got started; the fleet showed up in Galway Bay. But the commanding officer, General Hoche, had been blown well out into the Atlantic, and his second in command was unwilling to take over; thus disgruntled French troops sat it in their ships waiting for Hoche to show up, and eventually sailed back to France. The eastern diversion never got out of port. But the western one did, and landed at Fishguard in Wales. What they were supposed to do was march to Bristol, burn it, and then go north to Liverpool and burn that too; what they actually did is loot farmhouses, get drunk, and wander around Wales robbing, pillaging, and raping. Eventually enough militia showed up to overawe the French and they surrendered. Thus ended the Battle of Fishguard, the last invasion of the British Isles.

Phil Carradice’s book on the subject is entertaining and an easy read. The situation was pretty confusing, with neither the French nor English nor Welsh really understanding what was going on, but Carradice does manage to make sense of it. Unfortunately, book does suffer from a lack of maps; the only one that shows the battle area doesn’t have a scale, a North arrow, or any relation to the larger area. Carradice does apologize for his illustrations, noting that there are no known pictures of most of the participants and has to be content with what he can scrape up (David’s Death of Marat, for example). End notes and a good bibliography.… (más)

In A Hundred Years of Spying Phil Carradice gives a nice overview of intelligence work during, primarily, the 20th century. This is a good introduction and suggests many opportunities for a reader to explore certain people or aspects more fully.

As he makes clear, the act of spying did not originate in the early 20th century, but that is when it became a standard arm of a nation's defense. Prior to that spies were usually employed for specific purposes rather than an organization of spies maintaining a flow of information as a matter of course.

Carridice manages to tell the story as a coherent narrative while also highlighting certain spies and incidents. In this way the reader sees both the bigger picture of how the intelligence community developed over the years as well as the personal aspects of some of the people who played key roles.

I would recommend this for anyone wanting a good introduction and overview of modern intelligence gathering. While some with more background may not learn a lot new I think even they will appreciate the way in which this book brings the separate strands together.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.… (más)

"History as written by the victor" that famous remark by Winston Churchill can be aptly applied to our appreciation of certain English monarchs that have been derived and influenced by the writings of subsequent writers who either out of inclination or necessity supported the subsequent winning side. Think of how the reputation of Richard the III has been influenced by the portrayal of him in the Shakespeare play and how it contrasts to the writings of several of Richard's contemporaneous observers who praised his statesmanship. A similar monarch who is viewed less than favourably is Mary I of England who is still today better known by the "Bloody Mary" sobriquet given to her by her Protestant opponents. Reigning only between 1553 and 1558 her monarchy is synonymous with the burning at the stake of over 280 Protestant martyrs during the English Counter Reformation that she was principally responsible for. What were the causes and motivations of her actions together with a chronological narrative can be found in the latest Pen and Sword publication by Phil Carradice who has published several previous historical works and hosts a history series on BBC Radio Wales.

I have now read several historic books published by Pen & Sword and I have always found them to be well written and informative and this is no exception. Due to the concise nature of their books (I read this in the course of an afternoon) you can quickly gain a basic appreciation of a subject which can then lead you if desired to further reading and research as may well be the case here. Like in other Pen & Sword books there is here an interesting and fairly comprehensive collection of photographs of paintings, engravings and martyr sites and memorials that lend credence to the text. The conclusion is that Mary was sad rather than bad which was primarily derived from the traumatic effects of her upbringing.

Saddled with inadequate advisers and an ill judged marriage to a Spanish royal the chances of a successful reign were always fairly minimal. In truth there was little public appetite for a counter reformation and a full return to the old ways and a more astute monarch would have realised this as was the case with her successor Elizabeth the great fence sitter who steered a course between Puritanism and Catholicism. In truth it can be argued that the middle way Anglicanism that would eventually emerge would be nearer to Roman Catholicism than Calvinism as opposed to the result of the Reformation in Scotland. For Mary though there could be no compromises and this was perhaps her tragedy.

If you have an interest in this period of history then this I believe is a good basic introduction that you can subsequently build upon.

A review copy was provided by the publisher.… (más)