Hail Caesar France

The community of the very active forum Hail Caesar France welcomes you to share their passion and play aids for Hail Caesar, Black Powder and Pike & Shotte.

Hail Caesar France

Pyrrhus of Epirus

Pyrrhus was born into the royal house of Epirus, northwest Greece, but his mother was forced to flee into exile to protect his life when he was a mere infant.

Yet he prospered in troubled times and rose from a refugee to a king. Always an adventurer he was deeply involved in the cut-and-thrust campaigning, coups and subterfuges of the Successor kingdoms.

 At various times he was king of Epirus (twice), Macedon (twice) and Sicily, as well as overlord of much of southern Italy. In 281 BC he was invited by the southern Italian states to defend them against the aggressive expansion of the Rome.

His early victories at Heraclea and Asculum were so hard-fought that a 'Pyrrhic victory' still means one gained at crippling cost. These were the first fascinating duels between the developing Roman legions and the hitherto-dominant Hellenistic way of war with its pike phalanxes and elephants. Pyrrhus ultimately failed in Italy and Sicily but went on to further military adventures in Greece, eventually being killed while storming the city of Argos.

Monty's Highlanders: 51st Highland Division in the Second World War

The 51st Highland Division was the most famous infantry division that fought with the British Army in WW2.

It was the only infantry division in the armies of the British Empire that accompanied Monty from during Alamein to Berlin. After the 1940 disaster at St Valery when many were killed or captured, the re-formed 51st were a superlative division, brilliantly inspired and led. The 'Highway Decorators' (after their famous HD cypher) fought with consummate success through North Africa and Tunisia and from Normandy into the heart of Germany. Blooded at Alamein - where they suffered over 2000 casualties - they pursued the Afrika Korps via Tripoli and Tunis fighting fierce battles along the way. They lost 1,500 men helping to liberate Sicily. Back to the UK for the second front, the Highlanders battled their way through Normandy bocage, the break-out to the Seine, triumphal re-occupation of St Valery, and were the first troops to cross the Rhine, fighting on to Bremen and Bremerhaven. In the eleven months fighting in NW Europe in 1944 and 1945 the Highlanders suffered more than 9000 casualties.

The Battle of Montgomery, 1644 - The English Civil War in the Welsh Borderlands

Reflecting on the battle of Montgomery, Sir Thomas Myddelton, who had jointly commanded the victorious Parliamentarian army, later described it as: 'as great a victory as hath been gained in any part of the kingdom'. Fought on 18 September 1644 in mid Wales, Montgomery was the largest engagement in the Principality during the First English Civil War of 1642 to 1646. In terms of numbers engaged, in its outcome and impact, it was also a particularly significant regional battle of the war. Notwithstanding its importance, historians have largely overlooked Montgomery. Consequently it is rarely mentioned in studies of the mid seventeenth-century British Civil Wars. Moreover, where attention has been accorded to the battle and the preceding campaign both have often been sketched over or misinterpreted.

To fully explain the course and context of events, "The Battle of Montgomery, 1644: The English Civil War in the Welsh Borderlands" therefore presents the most detailed reconstruction and interpretation of this important battle published to date. An addition to Helion & Company's Century of the Soldier series, comprising titles breaking new ground in exploring seventeenth-century military history, The Battle of Montgomery similarly adopts a fresh approach. Making extensive use of contemporary sources - many of which are referenced here for the first time - the campaign, the armies and their commanders are fully considered before the battle is investigated; here, because the site has not been certainly located, the author uses fieldwork and archival information to propose the most likely battlefield, before examining the course of the engagement in the context of contemporary tactics and weaponry. While the battle is the main subject, Montgomery, 1644 also considers the wider war in northerly Wales and the northwest and west midlands of England - a region that remains underrepresented in Civil War historiography. Extensively illustrated, including specially commissioned artwork, The Battle of Montgomery, 1644: The English Civil War in the Welsh Borderlands will be welcomed by readers interested in the history of the British Civil Wars; by living history enthusiasts of the period; by wargamers and model makers; and by those curious about the history of Wales and the English borderlands.

Churchill's Last Wartime Secret: The 1943 German Raid Airbrushed from History

It's been a State secret for more than 70 years: The official line in the UK has always been that it never happened - but this new work challenges the assertion that no German force set foot on British soil during World War Two (the Channel Islands excepted), on active military service. Churchill's Last Wartime Secret reveals the remarkable story of a mid-war seaborne enemy raid on an Isle of Wight radar station. It describes the purpose and scope of the attack, the composition of the raiding German force and how it was immediately, and understandably, 'hushed-up' by Winston Churchill's wartime administration, in order to safeguard public morale. Circumventing the almost complete lack of official British archival documentation, the author relies on compelling and previously undisclosed first-hand evidence from Germany to underpin the book's narrative and claims; thus distinguishing it from other tales of rumoured seaborne enemy assaults on British soil during the 1939-45 conflict. After examining the outcome and repercussions of this astonishing incident, what emerges is an event of major symbolic significance in the annals of wartime history.

The RAF Air Sea Rescue Service in the Second World War (Images of War)

When the Second World War began in 1939 it was thought that it would be fought along the same lines as the First World War, with the Allied air forces operating from both Britain and France.

With the fall of Britain's Northern European Allies in May 1940, all that changed. From then onwards, RAF aircraft operating over enemy and enemy-held territory necessitated flights across both the North Sea and the English Channel.

This meant that aircrew in difficulties would be forced to come down in both of these bodies of water. Therefore it was essential that some form of rescue service be made available to fish these airman from the water.

But there were no aircraft in existence at that time that were designed for such a task: initially all that could be done was to use land 'planes to help locate anyone in the water, drop a dinghy to them, and then guide a boat to their position.

Obviously a quicker and more reliable means of rescue was needed, and this came in the shape of the Supermarine Walrus, an amphibian aeroplane that could land on both sea and land.Several Flights of these aeroplanes were set up around the coast of Britain, concentrated mainly around the south and south-east of England.

The Air Sea Rescue airmen did a magnificent job from 1941-45, rescuing hundreds of downed RAF and USAAF aircrew. It took a special type of airman to undertake these rescues - and another kind of courage. As the war in North Africa developed, Walrus aircraft were needed in the Mediterranean, and later on either side of the Italian coast.

Walrus squadrons operated just as successfully in this theatre as around Britain. Aircrew operating over any stretch of water could always count on the ASR boys coming to their aid. This is their story.

Last Stand at Zandvoore 1914: Lord Hugh Grosvenor's Noble Sacrifice

Being the son of the Duke of Westminster, whose family traces its lineage back to 1066, Lord Hugh Grosvenor was destined to become a cavalry officer in the prestigious 1st Regiment of Life Guards.

Using unpublished letters home and contemporary accounts Noble Sacrifice describes Lord Hugh's embarkation for France and the early mounted encounters which halted the enemy onslaught against the 'contemptible little army'.

These led to the stalemate of trench warfare and found Lord Hugh and his Squadron holding out at Zandvoorde during the First Battle of Ypres 1914 and being annihilated by superior numbers of enemy forces in some of the most desperate fighting of the First World War.

Due to the advances in military hardware, the war for Lord Hugh and his comrades marked a turning point in cavalry tactics. As well as being a dramatic account of Lord Hugh Grosvenor's last stand, Noble Sacrifice is a very personal story of courage and self-sacrifice.

This heroic yet tragic story has a mysterious twist. The bodies of Lord Hugh and his 100 soldiers were never found - it was as if they had never existed.