Ian Hamilton's March

Project GutenbergProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.7

Word count: 405K words
Chapters: 41

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Ian Hamilton's March by Winston ChurchillAuthor: ,Language: English, Class: DT: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Africa, Release Date: Nov 17, 2012

Editor's review

This book is Churchill's historical account of a military campaign during the Second Boer War, a public-domain text in Project Gutenberg's free ebook program. Its value lies in presenting, from a participant's perspective, the military detail and atmosphere of late nineteenth-century colonial warfare in southern Africa, making it a primary source for the study of Churchill's early career, the Boer War, and British imperial military history. The text is in the original English and bears the stylistic marks of Victorian reportage: detailed in content, though slow in pace. It suits use as supplementary reading for a history-themed course, or as a case study comparing imperial narrative with war writing; it can also be read alongside maps and a background chronology to compensate for the text's limited spatial information. As a public-domain ebook it is free and easy to obtain, convenient for excerpting and searching, but it lacks the notes and introduction of a modern scholarly edition.

Who it's for

A good fit for

University students and researchers studying the Boer War or British imperial military history
Biography readers interested in Churchill's early life and war writing
Those needing public-domain English historical sources for textual analysis or translation practice
Military history enthusiasts who enjoy late nineteenth-century war reportage

Not a good fit for

Beginners seeking a modern annotated edition of military history
Chinese readers unaccustomed to the original English and Victorian style
Casual readers expecting fast-paced war-novel narrative

Reading tips

Consult a Boer War timeline and relevant place names before starting the text to reduce obstacles of space and background.
Trace the march route on a map of southern Africa while reading to aid understanding of the campaign.
Excerpt Churchill's descriptions of the battlefield environment and the soldiers' condition as material for stylistic analysis.
For research, read alongside other wartime accounts of the same period to compare narrative stances.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a historical account?

It is a factual account of a military campaign written by Churchill from firsthand experience, a historical account rather than a novel, centered on a campaign of the Boer War and colored by battlefield observation and personal narrative.

What level of English is needed to read it?

The original is late nineteenth- to early twentieth-century English reportage, with long sentences and many place names and military ranks. Upper-intermediate to advanced reading ability is recommended, and having a dictionary and map at hand will make reading smoother.

Does this edition include notes or an introduction?

This edition comes from Project Gutenberg's public-domain ebook program and generally provides only the original text, without modern scholarly notes, introduction, or chronology; readers must supply background information themselves.

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