Napoleon's Marshals

by R.P. Dunn-Pattison

The long-awaited reprint of this classic book provides a detailed account of the men selected by Napoleon to lead his armies in Europe. It reveals the bravery, incompetence, loyalty, and strategic brilliance of these opportunity-hungry nobles as they helped Napoleon retain the imperial crown.

436 pages, Hardcover

First published September 11, 1996

Reviews

[Koeneman · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good book about all the Marshals of Napoleon. Every Marshal’s got his own little biography, their personal life and military accomplishments or failures. The more well-known get around 20 pages and the lesser known around 10 pages or less which is fair, although sometimes I missed some interesting information for example: The mistress that Massena took with him to Spain which caused some upset in the army, the eye incident of Massena, Soult his project of getting Napoleon his body back to France in 1840, Marmont his vote for the death penalty against Ney, Oudinot his last stand in a wooden house during the Russian Retreat and some other pretty big things.

So many different characters, backgrounds, personalities, desires, ambitions and glamour were leading the troops of the French. One thing they all had in common though was when they were leading the troops they did it in the best interrest of France.

So all in all it is a really good book and definitely worth 4 stars.

[Sheffielder · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a very well-written series of biographies, dealing in turn with each of the Marshals appointed by Bonaparte. Each Marshal is covered by a separate chapter, dealing with their background, promotion, character, actions and the circumstances of their death. Interesting stuff. [Read for the Smooth Reading phase of Distributed Proofreaders.]