The story of the Battle of Waterloo
- of the ultimate defeat of Napoleon & the French the triumph of Wellington Blucher & their allied armies
- is most often told from the viewpoint of the victors not the vanquished. Even after 200 years of intensive research & the publication of hundreds of books & articles on the battle the French perspective & many of the primary French sources are under-represented in the written record. So it is high time this weakness in the literature
- & in our understanding of the battle
- was addressed & that is the purpose of Andrew Field's thought-provoking new study. He has tracked down over ninety first-hand French accounts most of which have never been previously published in English & he has combined them with accounts from the other participants in order to create a graphic new narrative of one of the world's decisive battles. Virtually all of the hitherto unpublished testimony provides fascinating new detail on the battle & many of the accounts are vivid revealing & exciting.