Thursday 6 September 2018

German Auxiliaries with the British Army 1793-95

The very nice people at Helion sent me this book earlier this week to review. Its full title is "We are accustomed to do our duty" by Paul Demet and very nice it is too.


The book covers the significant contribution played by German auxiliaries to supplement Britain's army in the Low Countries. The first part of the book covers the campaigns in the Low Countries from 1793-95, including the highs and lows of the campaign culminating in the retreat back into Germany.

Part two is going to be very useful to anyone (like me?)who fancies including some of these units in their Allied army for fighting the French in Flanders. Troops were recruited from Hanover, Hesse Cassel, Baden, Hesse Darmstadt and Brunswick, and the composition of the various contingents is covered in detail, including for each unit its organisation, uniforms and where appropriate its flags. I've always been aware that, rather obviously, Hanover provided troops to the British, given that George III was the Elector of Hanover, but it is interesting to read about the terms upon which this arrangement was made. The same applies to the other armies, and the Subsidy Treaties  between Britain and Hesse Cassel and Brunswick are included.

The book contains many lovely contemporary colour uniform plates as well as black and white illustrations and a number of useful maps and diagrams. It has been extensively and exhaustively researched from both English and German language sources including previously unpublished materiel and contains a helpful bibliography for any more serious scholars out there.

In short, an excellent book and well worth the money, especially for those of us who wargame the War of the First Coalition. For me this is the best (by which I mean most useful from a collecting and gaming point of view) book so far in Helion's From Reason to Revolution 1721-1815 series.

8 comments:

  1. Looks like a good volume. I'm very jealous that you got a review copy, but it's certainly right up your alley.

    Cheers
    Peter

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  2. Those Helion chaps are certainly producing some interesting stuff of late and long may it continue, especially if it is as good as this seems to be.

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  3. Too expensive for we poor pensioners sadly!

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    1. Sadly spent this month’s budget on a preorder of the new BP rule book.

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    2. There's always next month. Or I could lend it you.

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  4. Hi sounds a good investment then, I had a quick peak at the Gateshead show. They certainly are knocking out a fair number of new and interesting books. I ll be getting a copy. Thanks for the review Colin

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    1. This one is well worth the money imho. It is a bit of a sausage machine and the subject matter not always to my taste even if a fascinating subject , I.e WW2 but each to his own.

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