Product Description

There's a commonly held view that Douglas Haig was a bone-headed, callous butcher, who through his incompetence as commander of the British Army in WWI, killed a generation of young men on the Somme and Passchendaele. On the other hand there are those who view Haig as a man who successfully struggled with appalling difficulties to produce an army which took the lead in defeating Germany in 1918. Just as the success of the Alanbrooke war diaries can be put down to its 'horse's mouth' view of Churchill and the conduct of WWII, so Haig's Diaries, hitherto only previously available in bowdlerised form, give the C-in-C's view of Asquith - he records him getting drunk and incapable - and his successor Lloyd George, of whom he was highly critical. As Haig records the relationship it was stormy ('I have no great opinion of L.G as a man or leader' - Sept 1916). The diaries show him intriguing with the King (George V) vs. Lloyd George. Additional - and never previously published - are his day by day accounts of the key battles of the war, not least the Somme campaign of 1916.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #49759 in Books
• Published on: 2006-05-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 560 pages

About the Author
Gary Sheffield is Professor of Modern History at King's College, London. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and author of Forgotten Victory: The First World War - Myths and Realities and The Somme. He broadcasts regularly on television and radio, and writes for the national press. He lives in Oxfordshire. Dr John Bourne is Director of the Centre for First World War Studies at the University of Birmingham. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and Vice-President of the Western Front Association. He has written widely on the First World War, including Britain and the Great War 1914-1918 and Who's Who in the First World War. He lives in Birmingham.