SHARPSHOOTER IN THE CRIMEA: The Letters of Captain Gerald Goodlake VC

A shattering new insight into the incompetently conducted Crimean War via the letters home of Captain Gerald Goodlake, not only one of our first VCs - but one of the first British officers to conduct behind-the-lines sniping too.

Captain Gerald Goodlake, the author of the letters collected in this fascinating revelation of a largely unknown side of the Crimean War - was by no means a run-of-the-mill officer of the Coldstream Guards, as the book’s editor, Michael Springman points out. Not only was Goodlake one of the first recipients of the newly-created Victoria Cross, Britain’s highest award for gallantry, but he was one of the British Army’s first exponents of what we know today as ‘special operations’. He persuaded his sceptical superiors to let him lead small groups of snipers behind the Russian lines where they operated independently to lethal effect. His exploits - and the more orthodox operations in which he also played a leading part - including the battles of the Alma, Balaclava, Inkerman and the siege of Sebastopol - are all modestly but vividly described in the series of superb letters to his family ably edited and presented in this book by Michael Springman, himself a former Guards’ officer. The letters are a masterpiece of brutal honesty, in which this fearless officer spares no-one from his fierce criticism of the incompetence with which the Army conducted the Crimean campaign. Offering a new and shattering insight into a terrible war, this book should be read by Crimean and VC enthusiasts, and anyone interested in a brave and talented soldier’s no-holds-barred view of war.

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Product Code:	10857
Author:	Michael Springman
Format:	228pp, b/w photographs, hb. Published Price £19.99
Shipping Time:	This item is usually dispatched Next Day
Retail Price:	~~£19.99~~
Our Price:	£6.95 save 65%

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