Great Canadian Battles

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Great Canadian Battles

Author : Edward Humphreys
Publisher : Arcturus Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1784040983
Total Pages : 255 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Great Canadian Battles by : Edward Humphreys

Download or read book Great Canadian Battles written by Edward Humphreys and published by Arcturus Publishing. This book was released on 2013-12-05 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Wars, raids and rebellions have driven the history of Canada forward from the earliest days of New France, through the two world wars to the present day. Beginning with the Battle of Lake Champlain in 1609 and ending with the second Battle of Panjwaye in 2006 (part of the war in Afghanistan), Great Canadian Battles features conflicts in Canada and abroad. Author Edward Humphreys analyses the tactics, tragedies and triumphs of Canadian warfare, including military feats such as Colonel de Salaberry's unlikely victory at Chateaugay and the famous Battle of Vimy Ridge. Battles Include: - Quebec, 1775 The New Year's Eve assault, fought during a blizzard, that marked the final attempt to capture the fortified city. - Cut Knife, 1885 The brilliant victory of Poundmaker over the united forces of the North-West Mounted Police, Canadian Army and local militias. - The Somme, 1916 The horrific battle in which tanks were deployed for the first time.

Ridgeway

Author : Peter Vronsky
Publisher : Penguin Canada
ISBN 13 : 0143182846
Total Pages : 326 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (431 download)

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Book Synopsis Ridgeway by : Peter Vronsky

Download or read book Ridgeway written by Peter Vronsky and published by Penguin Canada. This book was released on 2011-11-01 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this groundbreaking narrative, historian, investigative journalist and filmmaker Peter Vronsky uncovers the hidden history of the Battle of Ridgeway and explores its significance to Canada’s nation-building myths and traditions. On June 1, 1866, more than 1,000 Fenian insurgents invaded Canada across the Niagara River from Buffalo, N.Y. The Fenians were mostly battle-hardened Civil War veterans; the Canadian troops sent to fight them came from a generation that had not seen combat at home for more than 30 years. Led by inexperienced upper-class officers, the volunteer soldiers were mostly young, some as young as 15 years old. They were farm boys, shopkeepers, apprentices, schoolteachers, store clerks and two rifle companies of University of Toronto students hastily called out from their final exams. Many had not fired live rounds from their rifles even once. When they fought the Fenians near the village of Ridgeway the next day, a single rifle company of 28 students took the brunt of a counter-attack by 800 insurgents and suffered the most killed and wounded. The events of June 2, 1866, were covered up by the Macdonald government. The story was falsified so thoroughly that most Canadians today have not heard of the first modern battle in which Canadians died.

Breakout From Juno

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : Douglas & McIntyre
ISBN 13 : 1553659724
Total Pages : 1 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (536 download)

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Book Synopsis Breakout From Juno by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book Breakout From Juno written by Mark Zuehlke and published by Douglas & McIntyre. This book was released on 2011-11-08 with total page 1 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The ninth book in the Canadian Battle Series, Breakout from Juno, is the first dramatic chronicling of Canada's pivotal role throughout the entire Normandy Campaign following the D-Day landings. On July 4, 1944, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division won the village of Carpiquet but not the adjacent airfield. Instead of a speedy victory, the men faced a bloody fight. The Canadians advanced relentlessly at a great cost in bloodshed. Within 2 weeks the 2nd Infantry and 4th Armoured divisions joined coming together as the First Canadian Army. The soldiers fought within a narrow landscape extending a mere 21 miles from Caen to Falaise. They won a two-day battle for Verrières Ridge starting on July 21, after 1,500 casualties. More bloody battles followed, until finally, on August 21, the narrowing gap that had been developing at Falaise closed when American and Canadian troops shook hands. The German army in Normandy had been destroyed, only 18,000 of about 400,000 men escaping. The Allies suffered 206,000 casualties, of which 18,444 were Canadians. Breakout from Juno is a story of uncommon heroism, endurance and sacrifice by Canada's World War II volunteer army and pays tribute to Canada's veterans.

Vimy

Author : Tim Cook
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0735233179
Total Pages : 472 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (352 download)

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Book Synopsis Vimy by : Tim Cook

Download or read book Vimy written by Tim Cook and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2017-03-07 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: #1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER Winner of the 2018 JW Dafoe Book Prize Longlisted for British Columbia's National Award for Canadian Non-Fiction 2018 Runner-up for the 2018 Templer Medal Book Prize Finalist for the 2018 Ottawa Book Awards A bold new telling of the defining battle of the Great War, and how it came to signify and solidify Canada’s national identity Why does Vimy matter? How did a four-day battle at the midpoint of the Great War, a clash that had little strategic impact on the larger Allied war effort, become elevated to a national symbol of Canadian identity? Tim Cook, Canada’s foremost military historian and a Charles Taylor Prize winner, examines the Battle of Vimy Ridge and the way the memory of it has evolved over 100 years. The operation that began April 9, 1917, was the first time the four divisions of the Canadian Corps fought together. More than 10,000 Canadian soldiers were killed or injured over four days—twice the casualty rate of the Dieppe Raid in August 1942. The Corps’ victory solidified its reputation among allies and opponents as an elite fighting force. In the wars’ aftermath, Vimy was chosen as the site for the country’s strikingly beautiful monument to mark Canadian sacrifice and service. Over time, the legend of Vimy took on new meaning, with some calling it the “birth of the nation.” The remarkable story of Vimy is a layered skein of facts, myths, wishful thinking, and conflicting narratives. Award-winning writer Tim Cook explores why the battle continues to resonate with Canadians a century later. He has uncovered fresh material and photographs from official archives and private collections across Canada and from around the world. On the 100th anniversary of the event, and as Canada celebrates 150 years as a country, Vimy is a fitting tribute to those who fought the country’s defining battle. It is also a stirring account of Canadian identity and memory, told by a masterful storyteller.

Toronto’s Fighting 75th in the Great War 1915–1919

Author : Timothy J. Stewart
Publisher : Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press
ISBN 13 : 177112184X
Total Pages : 722 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (711 download)

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Book Synopsis Toronto’s Fighting 75th in the Great War 1915–1919 by : Timothy J. Stewart

Download or read book Toronto’s Fighting 75th in the Great War 1915–1919 written by Timothy J. Stewart and published by Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Press. This book was released on 2017-09-21 with total page 722 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Foreword by His Royal Highness Charles, Prince of Wales Hospital ships filled the harbour of Le Havre as the 75th Mississauga Battalion arrived on 13 August 1916. Those soldiers who survived would spend almost three years in a tiny corner of northeastern France and northwestern Belgium (Flanders), where many of their comrades still lie. And they would serve in many of the most horrific battles of that long, bloody conflict—Saint Eloi, the Somme, Arras, Vimy, Hill 70, Lens, Passchendaele, Amiens, Drocourt-Quéant, Canal du Nord, Cambrai, and Valenciennes. This book tells the story of the 75th Battalion (later the Toronto Scottish Regiment) and the five thousand men who formed it—most from Toronto—from all walks of life. They included professionals, university graduates, white- and blue-collar workers, labourers, and the unemployed, some illiterate. They left a comfortable existence in the prosperous, strongly pro-British provincial capital for life in the trenches of France and Flanders. Tommy Church, mayor of Toronto from 1915 to 1921, sought to include his city’s name in the unit’s name because of the many city officials and local residents who served in it. Three years later Church accepted the 75th’s now heavily emblazoned colours for safekeeping at City Hall from Lieutenant-Colonel Colin Harbottle, who returned with his bloodied but successful survivors. The author pulls no punches in recounting their labours, triumphs, and travails. Timothy J. Stewart undertook exhaustive research for this first-ever history of the 75th, drawing from archival sources (focusing on critical decisions by Brigadier Victor Oldum, General Officer Commanding 11th Brigade), diaries, letters, newspaper accounts, and interviews.

Stopping the Panzers

Author : Marc Milner
Publisher : University Press of Kansas
ISBN 13 : 0700625240
Total Pages : 396 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (6 download)

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Book Synopsis Stopping the Panzers by : Marc Milner

Download or read book Stopping the Panzers written by Marc Milner and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2017-05-26 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the narrative of D-Day the Canadians figure chiefly—if at all—as an ineffective force bungling their part in the early phase of Operation Overlord. The reality is quite another story. As both the Allies and the Germans knew, only Germany’s Panzers could crush Overlord in its tracks. The Canadians’ job was to stop the Panzers—which, as this book finally makes clear, is precisely what they did. Rescuing from obscurity one of the least understood and most important chapters in the history of D-Day, Stopping the Panzers is the first full account of how the Allies planned for and met the Panzer threat to Operation Overlord. As such, this book marks nothing less than a paradigm shift in our understanding of the Normandy campaign. Beginning with the Allied planning for Operation Overlord in 1943, historian Marc Milner tracks changing and expanding assessments of the Panzer threat, and the preparations of the men and units tasked with handling that threat. Featured in this was the 3rd Canadian Division, which, treated so dismissively by history, was actually the most powerful Allied formation to land on D-Day, with a full armored brigade and nearly 300 artillery and antitank guns under command. Milner describes how, over four days of intense and often brutal battle, the Canadians fought to a literal standstill the 1st SS Panzer Corps—which included the Wehrmacht’s 21st Panzer Division; its vaunted elite Panzer Lehr Division; and the rabidly zealous 12th SS Hitler Youth Panzer Division, whose murder of 157 Canadian POWs accounted for nearly a quarter of Canadian fatalities during the fighting. Stopping the Panzers sets this murderous battle within the wider context of the Overlord assault, offering a perspective that challenges the conventional wisdom about Allied and German combat efficiency, and leads to one of the freshest assessments of the D-Day landings and their pre-attack planning in more than a decade.

Operation Husky

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1926685776
Total Pages : 506 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis Operation Husky by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book Operation Husky written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 506 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On July 10, 1943, two great Allied armadas of over 2,000 ships readied to invade Sicily. This was Operation Husky, the first step toward winning a toehold in fascist-occupied Europe. Among the invaders were 20,000 Canadian troops serving in the First Canadian Infantry Division and First Canadian Tank Brigade — in their first combat experience. Over the next 28 days, the Allied troops carved a path through the rugged land, despite fierce German opposition. Drawing on firsthand accounts of veterans and official military records, Operation Husky offers a gripping, meticulous account of this seminal operation and the young men who fought, died, and survived it.

Juno Beach

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1926685709
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis Juno Beach by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book Juno Beach written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On June 6, 1944 the greatest armada in history stood off Normandy and the largest amphibious invasion ever began as 107,000 men aboard 6,000 ships pressed toward the coast. Among this number were 18,000 Canadians, who were to land on a five-mile long stretch of rocky ledges fronted by a wide expanse of sand. Code named Juno Beach. Here, sheltered inside concrete bunkers and deep trenches, hundreds of German soldiers waited to strike the first assault wave with some ninety 88-millimetre guns, fifty mortars, and four hundred machineguns. A four-foot-high sea wall ran across the breadth of the beach and extending from it into the surf itself were ranks of tangled barbed wire, tank and vessel obstacles, and a maze of mines. Of the five Allied forces landing that day, they were scheduled to be the last to reach the sand. Juno was also the most exposed beach, their day’s objectives eleven miles inland were farther away than any others, and the opposition awaiting them was believed greater than that facing any other force. At battle's end one out of every six Canadians in the invasion force was either dead or wounded. Yet their grip on Juno Beach was firm.

On to Victory

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1553656199
Total Pages : 538 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (536 download)

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Book Synopsis On to Victory by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book On to Victory written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2010-08-01 with total page 538 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The eighth Canadian Battle Series volume is the little-told story of the tense final days of World War II, remembered in the Netherlands as “the sweetest of springs,” which saw the country’s liberation from German occupation. The Liberation Campaign, a series of fierce, desperate battles during the last three months of the war, was bittersweet. A nation’s freedom was won and the war concluded, but these final hostilities cost Canada 6,298 casualties, including 1,482 dead. With his trademark “you are there” style that draws upon official records, veteran memories, and a keen understanding of the combat experience, Mark Zuehlke brings to life this concluding chapter in the story of Canada in World War II. May 4, 2010, will mark the 65th anniversary of the Netherlands’ liberation.

Jackson's Wars

Author : Douglas Hunter
Publisher : McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN 13 : 0228012937
Total Pages : 545 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (28 download)

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Book Synopsis Jackson's Wars by : Douglas Hunter

Download or read book Jackson's Wars written by Douglas Hunter and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2022-05-15 with total page 545 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A captivating account of the formative years of one of Canada’s best-known artists, Jackson’s Wars follows A.Y. Jackson’s education and progress as a painter before he was a well-known artist and his time on the battlefield in Europe, before he cast his lot in with a group of like-minded Toronto artists. Jackson fought many battles: he was a feisty and opinionated combatant when he crossed swords with critics, collectors, museums, galleries, and fellow painters as an emerging artist. Moving from Montreal to Toronto in 1913, he became a key figure in a landscape movement that was determined to depict Canada in a bold new way, only to have a war dash the group's collective ambitions. Alone among his close associates, Jackson enlisted to fight with the 60th Infantry Battalion. Wounded at Sanctuary Wood in 1916, he returned to the field of combat as an official war artist – the first Canadian artist appointed, the only infantryman in the program – and militated for other Canadian appointments to what is now a storied moment of creation for such artists as F.H. Varley and Arthur Lismer. Jackson produced some of Canada’s most memorable depictions of the world’s first industrial-scale conflict, even as he reckoned with the anguish caused by the mysterious death of his close friend Tom Thomson. A life-changing event for soldiers, families, and nations alike, the First World War has been understood as a moment of stasis in the visual arts in Canada – the dead ground from which the Group of Seven emerged in the early 1920s. Douglas Hunter shows how Jackson’s war was a moment of intense transformation and artistic development on the canvas as well as an experience that tempered a young man into a constructive elder statesman for Canadian art. On his return home he was not only instrumental in the formation of the Group of Seven in Toronto, but a key figure for the Beaver Hall Group in Montreal. Jackson’s Wars is a story of brotherhoods of painters and soldiers, shot through with inspiration, ambition, trauma, and loss, on the home front as well as on the battlefield. Hunter widens and deepens A.Y. Jackson’s world of friends, family, and colleagues to capture the life of a complex man and the crucial events and relationships behind the creation of Canada’s best-known art collective.

Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1919

Author : G.W.L. Nicholson
Publisher : McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN 13 : 0773597905
Total Pages : 709 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (735 download)

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Book Synopsis Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1919 by : G.W.L. Nicholson

Download or read book Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1919 written by G.W.L. Nicholson and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2015-11-01 with total page 709 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Colonel G.W.L. Nicholson's Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1919 was first published by the Department of National Defence in 1962 as the official history of the Canadian Army’s involvement in the First World War. Immediately after the war ended Colonel A. Fortescue Duguid made a first attempt to write an official history of the war, but the ill-fated project produced only the first of an anticipated eight volumes. Decades later, G.W.L. Nicholson - already the author of an official history of the Second World War - was commissioned to write a new official history of the First. Illustrated with numerous photographs and full-colour maps, Nicholson’s text offers an authoritative account of the war effort, while also discussing politics on the home front, including debates around conscription in 1917. With a new critical introduction by Mark Osborne Humphries that traces the development of Nicholson’s text and analyzes its legacy, Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914-1919 is an essential resource for both professional historians and military history enthusiasts.

Ortona

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1926706021
Total Pages : 474 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis Ortona by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book Ortona written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A masterful retelling one of the major victories of Canadian troops over the German army’s elite division during WWII. In one blood-soaked, furious week of fighting, from December 20 to December 27, 1943, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division took the town of Ortona, Italy, from elite German paratroopers ordered to hold the medieval port town at all costs. Infantrymen serving in the Loyal Edmonton Regiment and the Seaforth Highlanders, supported by tankers of the Three Rivers Regiment, moved from house to house in hand-to-hand combat amid heavy shelling and wrested the town from the grip of the fierce German defenders. Getting into Ortona had been a battle of its own. Ortona, the pearl of the Adriatic, stands on a promontory impregnable from three sides, with seacliffs on the north and east, and a deep ravine on the west. The Canadian infantrymen, drawn from virtually every corner of Canada, attacked from the south under the command of Major-General Chris Vokes, fighting across narrow gullies, mud-choked vineyards and olive groves, into the narrow streets of Ortona itself. When the vicious battle was over, 2605 Canadians were dead or wounded. But the town that had become known as "Little Stalingrad" was now in Allied hands.

Capturing Hill 70

Author : Douglas E. Delaney
Publisher : UBC Press
ISBN 13 : 0774833629
Total Pages : 333 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (748 download)

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Book Synopsis Capturing Hill 70 by : Douglas E. Delaney

Download or read book Capturing Hill 70 written by Douglas E. Delaney and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2016-11-07 with total page 333 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In August 1917, the Canadian Corps captured Hill 70, a vital piece of ground just north of the French industrial town of Lens. The Canadians suffered some 5,400 casualties and defeated three days of determined German counter attacks. This spectacularly successful but shockingly costly battle was as innovative as Vimy, yet only a handful of Canadians have heard of it or of subsequent attempts to capture Lens, which resulted in nearly 3,300 more casualties. In Capturing Hill 70, leading military historians mark the centenary of this triumph by dissecting different facets of the battle, from planning and the conduct of operations to long-term repercussions and commemoration. This richly illustrated and thought-provoking book reinstates Hill 70 to its rightful place among the pantheon of battles that helped forge the reputation of the famed Canadian Corps during the First World War, and it sheds new light on the key role played by Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Currie, who fought his first major action as commander of the Canadian Corps.

The Gothic Line

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1926685814
Total Pages : 594 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis The Gothic Line by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book The Gothic Line written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-07-01 with total page 594 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Like an armor-toothed belt across Italy’s upper thigh, the Gothic Line was the most fortified and fiercely defended position the German army had yet thrown in the path of the Allied forces. On August 25, 1944, it fell to I Canadian Corps to spearhead the famed Eighth Army’s major offensive, intended to rip through it. The 1st Infantry and 5th Armored Divisions advanced into a killing ground covered by thousands of machine-gun, antitank gun positions, and pillboxes expertly sited behind minefields and dense thickets of barbed wire. Never had the Germans in Italy brought so much artillery to bear or deployed such a great number of tanks. For 28 days, the battle raged as the Allied troops slugged an ever deeper hole into the German defences. The Metauro River, the Foglia River, Point 204, Tomba Di Pesaro, Coriano Ridge, San Martino, and San Fortunato became place names seared into the memories of those who fought there. They fought in a dust-choked land under a searing sun which by battle's end was reduced to a guagmire by rain. But they prevailed and on September 22 won the ground overlooking the Po River Valley, opening the way for the next phase of the Allied advance.

Holding Juno

Author : Mark Zuehlke
Publisher : D & M Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1926685954
Total Pages : 467 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis Holding Juno by : Mark Zuehlke

Download or read book Holding Juno written by Mark Zuehlke and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-12-01 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Following his national best-seller, Juno Beach, and with his usual verve and narrative skill, historian Mark Zuehlke chronicles the crucial six days when Canadians saved the vulnerable beachheads they had won during the D-Day landings. D-Day ended with the Canadians six miles inland — the deepest penetration achieved by Allied forces during this longest day in history. But for all the horror endured on June 6 every soldier knew the worst was yet to come. The Germans began probing the Canadian lines early in the morning of June 7 and shortly after dawn counter attacked in force. The ensuing six days of battle was to prove bloodier than D-Day itself. Although battered and bloody, the Canadians had held their ground and made it possible for the slow advance toward Germany and eventual Allied victory to begin. Holding Juno recreates this pivotal battle through the eyes of the soldiers who fought it, with the same dramatic intensity and factual detail that made Juno Beach, in the words of Quill & Quire reviewer Michael Clark, “the defining popular history of Canada’s D-Day battle.”

Triumph at Kapyong

Author : Dan Bjarnason
Publisher : Dundurn
ISBN 13 : 1459700139
Total Pages : 202 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (597 download)

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Book Synopsis Triumph at Kapyong by : Dan Bjarnason

Download or read book Triumph at Kapyong written by Dan Bjarnason and published by Dundurn. This book was released on 2011-03-02 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: April 24th, 1951,was a lonely, moon-lit night in Korea. On a godforsaken hill, a few hundred surrounded Canadian soldiers waited for the fight of their lives to begin. Soon, Chinese communist troops in their thousands, swarmed around them, plunging straight towards the Korean capital, Seoul. These Canadians were all that blocked the way. This is the story of the first battle by Canada’s first soldiers in the Korean War: the 2nd Battalion of Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. These volunteers were straight from Central Casting: truck drivers, construction workers, kids just out of high school, and bored farm boys. Outnumbered and outgunned, this people’s army of amateurs beat off some of the toughest troops on earth. This battle that’s become a legend takes its name from a nearby peanut-sized village: Kapyong. It’s become a mythic Canadian story, except this is mythology that is true and real.

Niagara, 1814

Author : Richard V. Barbuto
Publisher : Lawrence : University Press of Kansas
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 456 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (91 download)

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Book Synopsis Niagara, 1814 by : Richard V. Barbuto

Download or read book Niagara, 1814 written by Richard V. Barbuto and published by Lawrence : University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2000 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most books on the War of 1812 focus on the burning of Washington, D.C., the Battles of Baltimore and New Orleans, and the war in the Old Northwest. Scant attention, however, has been paid the Niagara Campaign of 1814-the American army's ambitious but failed attempt to wrest Canada from British control. While a few writers have dealt with aspects of this effort, Richard Barbuto is the first to offer a comprehensive study of the entire campaign. Barbuto covers every aspect of a campaign that saw the American army come of age, even as its military leaders blundered away potential victory and the acquisition of a coveted expanse of North American territory. Vividly recreating the major battles on the Niagara peninsula—at Chippawa, Lundy's Lane, Fort Erie, and Cook's Mill—Barbuto also clarifies the role of these engagements within the overall framework of American strategy. Despite early success at Chippawa, four long months of fighting finally ended in something like a draw, with the British still in control of Canada. Barbuto argues convincingly that the American government was never really able to harness, coordinate, and focus its tremendous resources in ways that would have allowed the campaign to succeed. Much of the blame, he shows, can be attributed to the poor leadership and confused strategic thinking of President James Madison and his secretary of war, John Armstrong. The American effort was further undermined by manpower shortages, a few ineffective field commanders, and the army and navy's inability to coordinate their objectives and operations. Even so, Barbuto contends that the American soldier, led by the likes of Jacob Brown and the legendary Winfield Scott, performed surprisingly well against one of the great armies of the nineteenth century. Barbuto's analysis, unmarred by national bias, presents a balanced picture of these events from the perspective of all participants—American, British, Canadian, and Native American. He also fills an important gap by providing the first ever capsule histories of all regimental-sized units involved in the campaign. Breathing new life into these events, his far-ranging study should become the definitive work on this long-neglected campaign.