The Crimean War is famous as a source of heroic and horrific legend. Philip Warner's concern in his reassessment of the campaign has been to uncover the true course of the war, to place the heroics in their proper context and to show how General Simpson's description of the assault on the Redan can be applied to the whole war. Warner also brings together the initial strands of the conflict and its escalation to involve many of the Great Powers of the day. He is also able to bring in the other locations of the conflict as the two sides poured men and resources into containing the other. The author, Philip Warner, quotes extensively from contemporary sources and especially from previously unpublished Allied and Russian soldiers letters and diaries which provide haunting glimpses of the realities of war. His expert knowledge of fortification and siege warfare and his understanding of nineteenth century armies have combined to make this book both a valuable work of scholarship and an intensely readable account of the battles. Philip Warner is a former senior lecturer at the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst and author of forty books in the field of military history and biography. He joined the army after graduating from Cambridge in 1939 and served in the Far East throughout Would War II. The book includes an extensive picture gallery and author biography and bibliography.