Thursday, 23 July 2020

Fighting For Liberty by Stephen Carter

This is a fantastic book and to my mind a welcome addition to anybody's library. It brings fresh insight into the rebellion and a new way of telling the story of the two expeditions of 1685.  One of the novel approaches of this book is it deals with the Argyll venture in Scotland on an equal footing as the more famous rebellion in the West. Battles north of the border hitherto forgotten are examined and presented. 
    I would say the nature of this book is detailed military history - a particular good feature of this book is the many skilled maps of the events and skirmishes. Ideal for wargamers. I would say this is probably the most detailed book on the Rebellion out there - I believe it has taken many years to put this together and it shows by being full of useful information. Of course it's not just archives that feature in this book the author has been out travelling and visiting the sites of events photographing them and this is a another useful feature. 
   I feel like I have learnt a lot about the Monmouth episode that I didn't know so full marks for that. It has a lively style that keeps you reading and seeing what happens next. The colour plates are very good and useful as well as the many monochrome images from the era that pepper the text.  If you have an interest in the events of 1685 then this book should be on your shelves.