For the US Army to succeed in the 21st Century, Soldiers of all ranks must understand and use Mission Command. Mission Command empowers leaders at all levels, allowing them to synchronize all warfighting functions and information systems to seize, retain, and exploit the initiative against a range of adversaries. This collection of historical vignettes seeks to sharpen our understanding of Mission Command philosophy and practice by providing examples from the past in which Mission Command principles played a decisive role. Some vignettes show junior officers following their commander's intent and exercising disciplined initiative in very chaotic combat operations. Others recount how field grade officers built cohesive teams that relied on mutual trust to achieve key operational objectives. Each historical account is complemented by an annotated explanation of how the six Mission Command principles shaped the action. For this reason, the collection is ideal for leader development in the Army school system as well as for unit and individual professional development. Mission Command places great responsibility on our Soldiers.

This book constitutes a major reappraisal of the late Anglo-Saxon state on the eve of its demise. Its principal focus is the family of Ealdorman Leofwine, which obtained power in Mercia and retained it throughout an extraordinary period of political upheaval between 994 and 1071. In doing so it explores a paradox: that earls were extraordinarily wealthy and powerful yet distinctly insecure. The book contains the first extended treatment of earls' powers in late Anglo-Saxon England and shows that although they wielded considerable military, administrative and political powers, they remained vulnerable to exile and other forms of political punishment including loss of territory. The book also offers a path-breaking analysis of land tenure and the mechanics of royal patronage, and argues that the majority of earls' estates were held from the king on a revocable basis for the duration of their period in office. In order to compensate for such insecurities, earls used lordship and religious patronage to construct local networks of power. The book uses innovative methods for interpreting the representation of lordship in Domesday Book to reconstruct the affinity of the earls of Mercia. It also examines how the house of Leofwine made strategic use of religious patronage to cement local power structures. All this created intense competition between the earls of Mercia and their rivals for power, both at court and in the localities, and the book explores how factional rivalry determined the course of politics, and ultimately the fate of the late Anglo-Saxon state.

When Peter Stannard inherits a Yorkshire estate from his uncle, he does not expect a proposal of marriage from a lady. Lady MacDonald's father and Peter's uncle once planned to unite the estates, until Edward Stannard eloped to Gretna with the Rector's daughter. Now Edward is dead, so is Lady Macdonald's husband. And her cousin Gabrielle proves to be a serious rival for Peter's affections.

The Fitz Gerald family of England and Kildare, Ireland between 1057 and and 1773; the family immigrated from England to Ireland about 1176, having been granted a barony there by the King. Some of the family during the 1200s used the surname Fitz Maurice. "The Fitz Geralds, or Geraldines, are descended from 'Dominus Otho,' or Other, who in 1057 (16th Edward the Confessor) was an honorary Baron of England. He is said to have been one of the family of the Gherardini of Florence ...".

The Governor-General of Canada was an influential political figure of major significance at the turn of the century. The Fourth Earl of Minto, who held this office from 1898 to 1904, is regarded by some Canadian historians as a romantic hero and by others as a bungling instrument of British imperialist designs. According to the author of this monograph, he was neither. Aided by an examination of Minto's early life and personal character and an analysis of the existing political institutions, the author describes the way in which Minto discharged his duties as Governor General during this period of political change in Canada and Britain. Informative and well documented, the study will be useful to students of Canadian history and politics.

The Fourth Earl of Sandwich was First Lord of the Admiralty (for the third time in his long career) from 1771 to 1782. Blamed by the Whig opposition for many of the disasters of the American War, he was additionally loaded by 19th-century Whig historians with the false image of a corrupt libertine. It was the publication of these volumes of his correspondence and papers (then in the family home, now in the National Maritime Museum), covering the years 1771 to 1782, which restored his reputation as a conscientious and imaginative naval administrator and reformer, especially of the dockyards and of the timber question. Without entirely rescuing his status as a strategist, they showed very clearly the weaknesses at the heart of the North administration which damaged its handling of the war, and undermined Sandwich’s efforts. A fifth volume intended to cover his handling of naval patronage was overtaken by the war. This volume is from May 1779 to December 1780.