The definitive history of the Crimean War from world-renowned historian Trevor Royle.The Crimean War is one of history's most compelling subjects. It encompassed human suffering, woeful leadership and maladministration on a grand scale. It created a heroic myth out of the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade and, in Florence Nightingale, it produced one of history's great heroes. New weapons were introduced; trench combat became a fact of daily warfare outside Sebastopol; medical innovation saved countless soldiers' lives that would otherwise have been lost. The war paved the way for the greater conflagration which broke out in 1914 and greatly prefigured the current situation in Eastern Europe.

Preface * Prologue: 1851 Part IA Churchwardens' Quarrel * Menshikov's Mission * Getting into Deep Waters * The Thousand and One Notes * Phoney War * The Affair at Sinope * Drifting Towards War * "Our Beautiful Guards" * Uneasy Partners * Opening Shots * Varna Interlude * Hurrah for the Crimea! Part II Advance to Contact * The Alma: The Infantry Will Advance * Missed Opportunities * Ladies with Lamps * Balaklava: A Cavalryman's Battle * Inkerman: An Infantryman's Battle * Arrival of General Winter * Muddle in Washington, Progress in Vienna * "Pam Enters the Fray" * Spring Stalemate * Todleben's Triumph * Spring Cruise, Summer Success * Trench Warfare: Massacre in the Redoubts * Sevastopol Falls * The Forgotten War: Kars and Erzerum * A Second Winter Part IIIPeace Feelers * Tying Up Some Loose Ends * Peacetime in Paris * The New World Order * Learning the Lessons the Hard WayEpilogue: 1914