Chesterfield's military heritage, from the Romans to the present day.

In the century following the Norman invasion, a castle was built at the confluence of the rivers Sheaf and Don, an early recognition of Sheffields strategic importance. Destroyed in the thirteenth century during the Second Barons War, a second castle was built on the site, but in 1647, it was ordered to be demolished immediately after the cessation of the Civil War, thereby negating any future tactical use by either Parliamentarian or Royalist.Steel production and downstream manufacturing would, however, be perpetually embedded in the military legacy of this seat of industrial innovation and production. The Vickers steel foundry was established in Sheffield in 1828. Following the manufacture of the factorys first artillery in 1890, Sheffield expanded to find itself a leading supplier in the First World War, feeding the military with shells, artillery, naval guns, armor plating, aircraft parts, torpedoes, helmets and bayonets. Sheffields contribution to the British war machine in the Second World War quickly attracted the attention of Nazi Germany. In December 1940, in an operation appropriately code-named Schmelztiegel, or Crucible, Sheffield suffered two major raids aimed primarily at steel and munitions factories.A proud tradition of answering a call to the colors spawned the 84th Regiment of Foot, the Loyal Independent Sheffield Volunteers of the 1700s, the Hallamshire Rifle Volunteers raised in 1859, and the Sheffield Squadron, Yeomanry Cavalry. The 18991902 Anglo-Boer War would also have an enduring legacy: the Sheffield Wednesday football stadium was named Spioen Kop, while local road names include Ladysmith Avenue and Mafeking Place. On 1 July 1916, the Sheffield City Battalion fought in an heroic and costly, but hopeless, action on the Somme to capture the village of Serre. Through the Second World War right up to Afghanistan, Sheffields men and women in uniform have not been found wanting.Sheffields rich military legacy portrayed in this publication is drawn from a cross section of representative units, home and foreign actions, uniformed personalities, barracks at the hub of musters, the caliber of gallantry including six Victoria Crosses as well as the immortality of names on memorials, such as the Sheffield Memorial Park in France.

Two years after landing on English soil in 1066, William of Normandy erected a strategic castle at Nottingham, thereby creating an enduring military nexus through to the modern era.On 22 August 1642, in his endeavours to quash Parliamentarian insurrection in the Midlands, King Charles raised his standard over Nottingham Castle, a rallying call to all Royalists to support their monarch. Loyalty to the Crown was, however, divided, and before long Parliamentarian forces garrisoned the castle. Late in the eighteenth century, a town troop of Yeomanry was raised in Nottingham, the foundation of the future South Notts Yeomanry. The yeomanry assisted regular troops by helping restore peace during the so-called Bread Riots of 1795, at a time when many of the towns men had been committed to military duty during the French Revolutionary Wars. Five troops of the towns yeomanry were again called up for service during the civil unrest of the Luddite Riots of 181118. This pattern of service continued over several decades. Evolving into a regiment, the yeomanry were repeatedly deployed against civil dissenters the Nottingham Riot, and the Reform Bill and Chartist Riots.After seeing combat during the Peninsula Wars in 1815, in the latter half of the 1800s, the 59th (2nd Nottinghamshire) Regiment of Foot formed part of a British invasion force into Afghanistan from India, to curb Russian interventionism in this remote and desolate region. The outbreak of war in distant South Africa in 1899 placed enormous strain on Britains military capability. From Nottingham and other county towns, regiments of yeomanry, Hussars and Sherwood Rangers were dispatched to the hostile environment of the African veld. Nottinghams sons then answered a call to arms in their thousands, only to also perish in their thousands on the Godforsaken soils of France and Flanders during the holocaust that was the Great War. Through the Second World War to the present, Nottinghams military units underwent successive phases of metamorphosis from infantry to antiaircraft and searchlight formations, followed by the relatively recent absorption into a regional entity: the Mercian Regiment. Today, Nottinghams castle and surrounds bear the symbols of a rich and diverse military legacy symbols of remembrance, of tribute, and of a tableau of military pride from ancient times.

A history of the controversial underground group that employed political violence in its quest to create an independent Israel. Includes photos. In October 1944, the US Office of Strategic Services described the Irgun Tsvai Leumi—National Military Organization—as “an underground, quasi-military organization with headquarters in Palestine . . . fanatical Zionists who wish to convert Palestine and Transjordan into an independent Jewish state [and] advocate the use of force both against the Arabs and the British to achieve this maximal political goal.” This book delves into the origins and history of Irgun. In 1925, Ze’ev Jabotinsky founded the Revisionist Zionism organization, whose secular, right-wing ideology would lead to the formation of the Irgun and, ultimately, of the Likud Party. Commencing operations in the British Mandate of Palestine in 1931, Irgun adopted a mainly guarding role, while facilitating the ongoing immigration of Jews into Palestine. In 1936, Irgun guerrillas started attacking Arab targets. The British White Paper of 1939 rejected the establishment of a Jewish nation, and as a direct consequence, Irgun guerrillas started targeting the British. The authorities executed captured Irgun operatives found guilty of terrorism, while deporting hundreds to internment camps overseas. As details of Jewish genocide—the Holocaust—emerged, Irgun declared war on the British in Palestine. Acts of infrastructural sabotage gave way to the bombing of buildings and police stations, the worst being the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem—the hub of British operations and administration—in July 1946, killing ninety-one. Freedom fighters or terrorists, Irgun was only dissolved when the independent Jewish state of Israel was born on May 14, 1948. This is their story.

An examination of the causes and the direct outcome of North Korea’s seemingly unstoppable thrust down the Korean Peninsula in 1950. In his first four volumes on the Korean War, the author traces the war’s progress from the North Korean invasion of June 1950, the desperate American defense of the Pusan Perimeter, General Douglas MacArthur’s daring and highly successful amphibious offensive at Inch’on, and his subsequent advance across the 38th Parallel to the Yalu River on the Chinese Manchurian border Communist Chinese forces, that have been secretly infiltrating North Korean territory by slipping across the Yalu from mid-October 1950, ambush a South Korean regiment in the mountains of central North Korea. This is the first of several Chinese victories over unsuspecting and overstretched South Korean and American units in the winter of 1950-1951. On November 27, 1950, Chinese leader Mao Zedong, ostensibly fearful of the consequences of hostile American forces on his country’s border along the Yalu River, orders 250,000 troops into Korea, with express orders to annihilate the UN forces. In the western half of the theater, U.S. General Walton H. Walker’s Eighth Army front along the Ch’ongch’on axis is breached, while to the east, the U.S. X Corps suffers a series of crushing defeats, including at the Chosin Reservoir, precipitating a massive evacuation from the North Korean port of Hungnam. Praise for Korean War - Chinese Invasion "An extraordinarily informative and exceptionally well written, deftly organized and presented, detailed history.” —Midwest Book Review

A history of this dramatic and risky amphibious invasion, with photos included. In the previous two volumes in the author’s series on battles of the Korean War, North Korean ground forces, armor and artillery cross the 38th Parallel into South Korea, inflicting successive ignominious defeats on the ill-prepared US-led UN troops, pushing them ever southward into a tiny defensive enclave—the Pusan Perimeter—on the tip of the Korean Peninsula. The story continues as General Douglas MacArthur, Second World War veteran of the South East Asia and Pacific theaters, meets with considerable resistance to his plans for a counteroffensive, from both Washington and his staff in South Korea and Japan: it is typhoon season, the approaches to the South Korean port city of Inch’on are not conducive to amphibious assault, and it will leave the besieged Pusan Perimeter in great danger of being overrun. However, the controversial MacArthur’s obstinate persistence prevails and, with a mere three weeks to go, the US X Corps is activated to execute the invasion on D-Day, September 15, 1950. Elements of the US Marine Corps land successfully on the scheduled day, and with the element of surprise on their side, immediately strike east to Seoul, only fifteen miles away. The next day, General Walker’s Eighth US Army breaks out of Pusan to complete the southerly envelopment of the North Korean forces. Seoul falls on the 25th. MacArthur’s impulsive gamble has paid off, and the South Korean government moves back to their capital. The North Koreans have been driven north of the 38th Parallel, effectively bringing to an end their invasion of the south that started on June 25, 1950. With a timeline and photos included, this book tells the compelling story.

Smoke rises in the City of Three Spires, the smouldering remnant of the Nazi hate. Coventry and England will remember and repay.From August 1940, Hitlers Luftwaffe mercilessly and indiscriminately bombed cities and towns in Britain. The historic West Midlands city of Coventry did not escape the carnage as, night after night, high-explosive and incendiary bombs rained down on the hapless production centre of cars, munitions and aero engines.Today, the iconic shell of Coventrys once majestic medieval cathedral offers a silent memorial of remembrance to that dreadful night. For the citys residents of now, it is a poignant echo of a violent and destructive part of their history.With carefully selected photographs, Gerry van Tonder tells the story of Coventrys blitz through a series of ghost photographs, where historic wartime images are blended with their modern counterpart to create a fascinating window in to Coventrys past. Also drawing from contemporary press accounts of the Coventry Blitz, this book presents a totally unique comparative insight into the Nazi bombing of Coventry in the Second World War.

Cold War crescendo: in the author’s first three volumes in a series on battles of the Korean War, North Korean forces cross the 38th Parallel, rolling back US and South Korean forces into a small corner of the Korean peninsula. Months later, commander of the United Nations Command (UNC) in Korea, General Douglas MacArthur, launches a daring counteroffensive invasion at Inchon, enveloping North Korea. Despite a warning from Beijing that it will intervene if US forces cross the 38th, MacArthur uses the UN’s conditional authorization to land elements of the US X Corps at Wonsan and Riwon in North Korea. The Eighth US Army and South Korean forces capture the North Korean capital, P’yngyang, while American paratroops make the first combat jump of the conflict at Sunch’n and Sukch’n, cutting the road to the Chinese border. While MacArthur’s ground forces edge closer to the Yalu River, and the general having designs of chasing the retiring North Koreans across the river into China, in October 1950 the Chinese politburo immediately deploys 200,000 members of the 13th Army Group of the newly titled People’s Volunteer Army (PLA) on a pre-emptive ‘defensive’ operation into North Korea.

When the world held its breath It is 25 years since the end of the Cold War, now a generation old. It began over 75 years ago, in 1944long before the last shots of the Second World War had echoed across the wastelands of Eastern Europewith the brutal Greek Civil War. The battle lines are no longer drawn, but they linger on, unwittingly or not, in conflict zones such as Iraq, Somalia and Ukraine. In an era of mass-produced AK-47s and ICBMs, one such flashpoint was Berlin.Allied agreements entered into at Teheran, Yalta and Potsdam for the carving up of postwar Berlin now meant nothing to the Soviet conquerors. Their victory had cost millions of Russian lives troops and civilians so the hammer and sickle hoisted atop the Reichstag was more a claim to ownership than success. Moscows agenda was clear and simple: the Western Allies had to leave Berlin. The blockade ensued as the Soviets orchestrated a determined program of harassment, intimidation, flexing of muscle, and Socialist propaganda to force the Allies out. Truman had already used the atomic bomb: Britain and America would not be cowed. Historys largest airborne relief program was introduced to save the beleaguered city. In a war of attrition, diplomatic bluff and backstabbing, and mobilizing of forces, the West braced itself for a third world war.

When the world held its breath It is 25 years since the end of the Cold War, now a generation old. It began over 75 years ago, in 1944long before the last shots of the Second World War had echoed across the wastelands of Eastern Europewith the brutal Greek Civil War. The battle lines are no longer drawn, but they linger on, unwittingly or not, in conflict zones such as Iraq, Somalia and Ukraine. In an era of mass-produced AK-47s and ICBMs, one such flashpoint was Malaya By the time of the 1942 Japanese occupation of the Malay Peninsula and Singapore, the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) had already been fomenting merdeka independence from Britain. The Japanese conquerors, however, were also the loathsome enemies of the MCPs ideological brothers in China. An alliance of convenience with the British was the outcome. Britain armed and trained the MCPs military wing, the Malayan Peoples Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA), to essentially wage jungle guerrilla warfare against Japanese occupying forces. With the cessation of hostilities, anti-Japanese became anti-British, and, using the same weapons and training fortuitously provided by the British army during the war, the MCP launched a guerrilla war of insurgency.Malaya was of significant strategic and economic importance to Britain. In the face of an emerging communist regime in China, a British presence in Southeast Asia was imperative. Equally, rubber and tin, largely produced in Malaya by British expatriates, were important inputs for British industry. Typically, the insurgents, dubbed Communist Terrorists, or simply CTs, went about attacking soft targets in remote areas: the rubber plantations and tin mines. In conjunction with this, was the implementation of Maos dictate of subverting the rural, largely peasant, population to the cause. Twelve years of counterinsurgency operations ensued, as a wide range of British forces were joined in the conflict by ground, air and sea units from Australia, New Zealand, Southern and Northern Rhodesia, Fiji and Nyasaland.