The Great Retreat

1812: The Great Retreat the third and final volume in Austins magisterial trilogy concludes the story of one of history's most disastrous campaigns. The author's previous books brought the Grand Army to the head-on battle at Malo-Jaroslavetz after withdrawing sixty miles from the burnt down capital, and for the first time in his meteoric career Napoleon had to order a retreat. This volume follows the army's withdrawal through 800 miles of devastated countryside, crossing the horrific relics of the Borodino battlefield, fighting its way through the Russian General Kutusov's successive attempts to cut it off, and winning, against overwhelming odds, the three-day battle of the Berezina crossing. First-hand narratives, many published in English for the first time, describe Marshal Ney's astounding achievement in holding together the rear-guard until he himself, musket in hand, was the last man to re-cross the Niemen into Poland.Using the words of the participants themselves, Paul Britten Austin brings unparalleled authenticity and immediacy to his unique account of the closing stages of Napoleon's dramatic and tragic 1812 campaign.

Written as a sequel to the award winning German Failure in Belgium which won the Tomlinson Book Award for the best book on World War I in the English language for 2020, this book stands alone as the German army chases the well documented "Great Retreat." We focus on the German side of the retreat of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF). We show that the Great War should have ended on 23 August 1914 but, due to the 'fog and friction of war', as explained by General Carl Graf von Clausewitz, it did not. So, Chasing the Great Retreat was born. This is an incredible story of missed opportunities made more astonishing by the amount of propaganda extolled by some British authors. This propaganda line generally purported the story that British firepower dealt a great blow to the German army at the Battle of Mons. Clearly in their eyes, the British won that battle. Much is told about the British soldiers' ability to fire 15 rounds of aimed shooting in a minute, which allegedly the Germans mistook for machine-gun fire. This is a myth that many readers grew up learning. Britain, in fact, lost the Battle of Mons and should have lost the war on 23 August. Germany missed a wide-open door that would have spelled disaster for the BEF and the entire Left Flank of the French army.We focus on the role of the German cavalry. This arm is seriously understudied and has had little place in some official histories. In general, both British and German works ignore the role the cavalry played in the war. We are talking about the Right Wing of the German army only, consisting of the German First Army, Second Army and two cavalry organizations known as Höherer Kavallerie-Kommandeur (HKK 1 and HKK 2 ). The HKK were ad hoc organizations that had never been tested before the war. They are often wrongly referred to as a cavalry corps - the cavalry did not become a corps until 1915 - but neither were they similar to an infantry corps. However, many authors do not understand the concept of the HKK and therefore do not address the cavalry in operational maneuvers. This oversight is truly bizarre: The most mobile forces in warfare are given short shrift. Why?

More than a third of a million men set out on that midsummer day of 1812: none can have imagined the terrors and hardships to come. They would be lured all the way to Moscow without having achieved the decisive battle Napoleon sought; and by the time they reached the city their numbers would already have dwindled by more than a third. One of the greatest disasters in military history was in the making. The fruit of more than twenty years of research, this superbly crafted work skilfully blends the memoirs and diaries of more than a hundred eyewitnesses, all of whom took part in the Grand Army’s doomed march to Moscow, to reveal the inside story of this landmark military campaign. The result is a uniquely authentic account in which the reader sees and experiences the campaign through the eyes of participants at each stage of the advance in enthralling day-by-day, sometimes hour-by-hour detail.

The Great Retreat: Napoleon's Grande Armee in Russia is a remarkable new record of one of history's most famous military campaigns. In 1812, no fewer than 570,000 troops from 19 countries battled for the soul of Europe of the 450,000 men to cross the River Nieman in June 1812, only about 60,000 returned.

1812: The Great Retreat – the third and final volume in Austin’s magisterial trilogy – concludes the story of one of history’s most disastrous campaigns. The author's previous books brought the Grand Army to the head-on battle at Malo-Jaroslavetz after withdrawing sixty miles from the burnt down capital, and for the first time in his meteoric career Napoleon had to order a retreat. This volume follows the army's withdrawal through 800 miles of devastated countryside, crossing the horrific relics of the Borodino battlefield, fighting its way through the Russian General Kutusov's successive attempts to cut it off, and winning, against overwhelming odds, the three-day battle of the Berezina crossing. First-hand narratives, many published in English for the first time, describe Marshal Ney's astounding achievement in holding together the rear-guard until he himself, musket in hand, was the last man to re-cross the Niemen into Poland. Using the words of the participants themselves, Paul Britten Austin brings unparalleled authenticity and immediacy to his unique account of the closing stages of Napoleon's dramatic and tragic 1812 campaign.

Many historians, not least Winston Churchill, agree that The Great War was decided during the first month of fighting. Fortunately a young highly literate and talented British officer was superbly well placed to witness this historic period. Thanks to his fluent French Edward Louis Spears was sent in mid August 1914 to liaise between Field Marshal Sir John French and the French High Command. In the weeks that followed, events moved at lightning speed and decisions were made without consulting or informing their counterparts. It fell to Spears to update the British of their allysmoves. Without modern communication this often involved Spears travelling on clogged roads between head quarters. As the sole British representative at, first, HQ Fifth French Army and then Tenth Army, the influence of this 28 year old author was immense and Spears on many occasions proved unworried about speaking his mind. Clearly his efforts were appreciated; he was made a Chevalier de la Legion dhoneur and awarded the Military Cross (he was wounded four times). Churchill, who became a life long friend, wrote the Foreword to the original edition of this truly extraordinary account which anyone who wishes to understand the events of 1914 must read.