INVASION OF ZULULAND 1879

Standard Edition: 295 pages, colour frontispiece, 30 plates - 7 colour, 6 maps, 2 diagrams, green cloth boards with red title label gilt on the spine, a very good copy in the slightly worn dust jacket.

Brenthurst Press First Series Volume 5. Standard edition - limited to 850 copies.

Editor's Note: 'In 1879 a war was waged in southern Africa: the British army of Queen Victoria invaded Zululand, and the Zulu king, Cetshwayo, retaliated with such force, skill and discipline that the British sustained an initial defeat of dimensions never before encountered by Her Majesty's Imperial army. 

'Fresh and unprejudiced insight into the notoriously controversial Anglo-Zulu War is given, highlighted by the Battle of Isandhlwana, the defence of Rorke's Drift, the death of the Prince Imperial, and the Battle of Ulundi. 

'Accounts of the war are given by three British officers and officials: Arthur Harness, a lieutenant-colonel in the Royal Artillery, describes the war in letters to his family: he was one of the few British officers to be present during the entire campaign, and became a controversial figure when he tried to avert the defeat at Isandhlwana by returning to the battlefield with his guns – this brave attempt being thwarted by superior orders.

'John Jervis, 4th Viscount St Vincent, an aristocratic cavalry officer attached to the 17th Lancers, kept a diary of events subsequent to the disaster at Isandhlwana; he describes critically the role of horses in warfare as well as the many 'scares', or false alarms, suffered by the British army in Zululand.

'Sir Henry Bulwer, lieutenant-governor of Natal, wrote letters to a brother and vividly portrays the frustrations of a colonial administrator during a war; being in a position to view events in a wider context than most, he forecast with accuracy the troubles that would, in the future, befall southern Africa.

'Illustrative material, much of it previously unpublished, provides an exciting visual impression of the Anglo-Zulu War.'