Featured battle : Mantua, second siege of

Part of The French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars

Date : 24 August 1796 - 02 February 1797

The Austrian Garrison suffered enormous privations and many died of sickness rather than by the actions of the enemy. The relief column of the 15th September 1796, lead by Würmser, had failed to relieve but had been forced into the fortress. On the 16th January 1797 a relief column under Provera supported by a strong sally from the fortress again failed to relieve Mantua and the surrender came on the 2nd February. Würmser, his staff and 700 men were allowed to march out free with six guns. The remainder of the Garrison about 20,000 men marched out with honours of war paroled not to fight again until exchanged. The French took 325 Austrian guns and recaptured 179 of their own guns.

United States Marine Corps in the Korean War

Michael Green
As with all of this series of ‘Images of War’ the pictures with their appropriate annotations are the story. However the supporting text places the sets of photographs in their context. All aspects of the marines involvement in the war are covered and this clearly spells out their special role. In addition to the photographs of the marines in action there are pictures of their equipment from carbines to aircraft. There also many photographs of the weapons used by their opponents. Michael Green has done a superb job in pulling these together from many disparate sources.
The final impression of the Korean conflict is that the fighting was tough and at times the weather was tougher. But the real ‘grit’ of the book comes in the final paragraph. Although there were rarely as many as 20,000 marines in Korea at any one time there were over 30,000 casualties in the course of the conflict among which were 436 aircraft of the marines airwing.
We warmly recommend this book to all our readers and especially those unfamiliar with this ‘sideshow’ of a war. Having read this you will want to go on and read more about this conflict.

Pen & Sword Military, 2021