Warfare in News

Posted on Friday 2nd May

Hear the roar of cannons, the thunder of horse's hooves and hundreds of clashing soldiers clashing in battle at the Muddy Good Weekend 2014. The Civil War Battle Re-enactment and All Makes 4x4 Show will be taking place this Bank Holiday weekend at Billing Aerodrome, Northampton (postcode for sat nav's: NN3 9DA).

The Sealed Knot – the oldest and re-enactment society in the UK – will be holding a 3 day battle re-enactment, bringing alive the Great Civil War and recreating the 'Civil War' history and taking visitors through a timeline back to the 1600s.

The event opens on Saturday, 3 May and runs until Monday, 5 May, with attractions including Living History camps - where visitors are encouraged to wander and experience life in the 17th Century; the 4x4 Twist off Challenge and extreme winching and obstacle course; the Sealed Knot Drill and Pre Battle Displays (includes visitor participation) and the Sealed Knot Main Battle – with Infantry, horse and Artillery.

Drill displays will demonstrate the weapons that were in use and basic tactics of the period, including a fully interactive session for the visitors to 'have a go'. Each day a spectacular battle siege re-enactment with hundreds of soldiers, cannons and horses will take place.

Alongside the Sealed Knot will be the All Makes 4x4 Show with trade stalls, main arena entertainment, Club challenges, Club displays, food and drink court and onsite camping. Full details can be found on the What's On Guide.

Further Reading

Decisive Battles of the English Civil War

Only £14.99

Decisive Battles of the English Civil War

(Paperback - 246 pages)
by Malcolm Wanklyn

In this stimulating and original investigation of the decisive battles of
the English Civil War, Malcolm Wanklyn reassesses what actually happened on the battlefield and as a result sheds new light on the causes of the eventual defeat of Charles I. Taking each major battle in turn - Edgehill, Newbury I, Cheriton, Marston Moor, Newbury II, Naseby, and Preston - he looks critically at contemporary accounts and at historians' narratives, explores the surviving battlegrounds… Read more...

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The Lengthening War

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nation in Conflict - The Battle of Towton

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Dates in History

German forces cross the Somme River

24th March 1918

On March 24, 1918, German forces cross the Somme River, achieving their first goal of the major spring offensive begun three days earlier on the Western Front. Operation Michael, engineered by the German chief of the general staff, Erich von Ludendorff, aimed to decisively break through the Allied lines on the Western Front and destroy the British and French forces. The offensive began on the morning of March 21, 1918, with an aggressive bombardment. The brunt of the attack that followed was directed at the British 5th Army, commanded by General Sir Hubert Gough, stationed along the Somme River in northwestern France. This section was the most poorly defended of any spot on the British lines, due to the fact that it had been held by the French until only a few weeks before and its defensive positions were not yet fully fortified. Panic spread up and down the British lines of command, intensified by communications failures between Gough and his subordinates in the field, and German gains increased over the subsequent days of battle. On March 23, Crown Prince Rupprecht, on the German side of the line, remarked that The progress of our offensive is so quick, that one cannot follow it with a pen. The next day, German troops stormed across the Somme, having previously captured its bridges before French troops could destroy them. Despite having resolved to concentrate on weaker points of the enemy lines, Ludendorff continued to throw his armies against the crucial villages of Amiens (a railway junction) and Arras—which the British and French were instructed to hold at all costs—hoping to break through and push on towards Paris. By that time, German troops were exhausted, and transportation and supply lines had begun to break down in the cold and bad weather. Meanwhile, Allied forces had recovered from the initial disadvantage and had begun to gain the upper hand, halting the Germans at Moreuil Wood on March 30. On April 5, Ludendorff called off Operation Michael. It had yielded nearly 40 miles of territory, the greatest gains for either side on the Western Front since 1914. He would launch four more offensive pushes over the course of the spring and summer, throwing all of the German army’s resources into this last, desperate attempt to win the war. (www.history.com)

Further Reading

The Somme
(Paperback - 355 pages)
by Richard van Emden

The offensive on the Somme took place between July and November 1916 and is perhaps the most iconic battle of the Great War. It was there that Kitchener’s famous ‘Pals’ Battalions were first sent into action en masse and it was a battlefield where many of the dreams and aspirations… Read more at Pen & Sword...

Only £14.99 at Pen & Sword Books.

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