Historians Laband and Thompson present an updated edition of Field Guide to the War in Zululand, originally printed in 1979 and reprinted three subsequent times with corrections and revisions. Part I covers the Anglo-Zulu war. Part II addresses battlefields and fortifications by sector (coast, Dundee, Estcourt, Greytown, Luneburg, Newcastle, Ulundi, Vryheid, Pietermaritzburg, and Durban). Attractively formatted with quotation boxes, maps, and numerous drawings, reproductions of engravings, and photographs (mostly in bandw). Oversize: 8.50x12". Distributed by ISBS. c. Book News Inc.
"The aim is to lead readers through the history of the campaign and to guide them to the actual sites of the war, while at the same time providing a sense of the human and social context in which military and civilian commentators of a previous century experienced the violence of invasion and war. In all its aspects this book is the essential guide to a full understanding of the Zululand campaign of 1879."--BOOK JACKET.
In 1878 southern Africa’s two most senior figures, army commander General Lord Chelmsford and the High Commissioner Sir Henry Bartle-Frere created a false threat of a Zulu invasion of British Natal. In an astonishing act of over-confidence and without any government permission, Frere and Chelmsford invaded Zululand with five independent columns of troops. Both leaders ignored the serious implications of their two recently failed expeditions against the Zulus’ neighbouring King Sekhukhune and his Pedi people. The Zulu war lasted only six months and witnessed two separate British invasions of Zululand – one catastrophic, one successful. This book gives the reader a general overview of the Anglo-Zulu war of 1879 with descriptive text, location photographs and illuminating map overviews of the twelve main battles including Isandlwana and Rorke’s Drift. The author’s unique maps are based on his own lecture notes and ‘battlefield map handouts’ as a Zulu War battlefield guide for over 25 years. These maps were avidly collected by his many groups and other guides; they clearly explain each battlefield’s layout and sequence of events but also included many little known details of each fierce and bloody engagement. At the suggestion of the Anglo Zulu War Historical Society, these maps are now reproduced in book form. While volumes have been written on the subject, this work gives us an even better insight into these gruelling and complex battles.
The Later Zulu Wars of the 1880s were a last-ditch resistance to colonialism combined with bitter civil war. The consequences proved more devastating for the Zulu people than the famous Anglo-Zulu War of 1879. They took place at a time of changing fighting methods and tactics for both the British and the Zulu; the last time the British Army ever went on campaign still wearing scarlet was in Zululand in 1888. This book explains the nature of the diverse Zulu, British and Boer military forces fighting in Zululand, and the ways in which the British and the Boers fostered and exploited divisions among the Zulu people in order to maintain colonial control. The author's original research (supported by detailed maps in full color) traces the complex series of wars and battles in Zululand during the 1880s. This book places the campaigns in their historical context and assesses their broader significance. The Atlas of the Later Zulu Wars is the sequel to The Illustrated Guide to the Anglo-Zulu War, written by the author and Paul Thompson.
The most commemorated battles of the Anglo-Zulu War occurred at Isandlwana, where the Zulu army gained a great victory over the British Centre Column, and Rorke's Drift, where the small British garrison fought off a determined Zulu assault. This brochure is a 12-page extract from Laband and Thompson's The Illustrated Guide to the Anglo Zulu War, focusing on these two battle sites with accompanying maps and illustrations.
One of the most highly regarded books on the British campaign of the nineteenth-century Anglo-Zulu War fought in southern Africa. Robust and economically self-reliant, the Zulu Kingdom—created by Shaka kaSenzangakhona—was seen as a threat to British colonialism. In December 1878, the British High Commissioner in South Africa, Sir Henry Bartle Frere, picked a quarrel with the Zulu king, Cetshwayo kaMpande, in the belief that the Zulu army—armed primarily with shields and spears—would soon collapse in the face of British Imperial might. The war began in January 1879. Three columns of British troops under the command of Lt. Gen. Lord Chelmsford invaded Zululand. Almost immediately, the war went badly wrong for the British. On January 22, the Centre Column, under Lord Chelmsford’s personal command, was defeated at Isandlwana mountain. In one of the worst disasters of the colonial era, over 1,300 British troops and their African allies were killed. In the aftermath of Isandlwana, the Zulu reserves mounted a raid on the British border post at Rorke’s Drift, which was held by just 145 men. After ten hours of ferocious fighting, the Zulu were driven off. Eleven of the defenders of Rorke’s Drift were awarded the Victoria Cross. These are the best-known episodes of the war, and Rorke’s Drift went on to inspire the classic film Zulu, which established Michael Caine as a star. Drawing on new research performed since the centenary in 1979, the author delves deeply into the causes of the war, the conditions during it, and the aftermath.
