Browsing by Author "Caddick-Adams, P"
Now showing 1 - 2 of 2
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item Open Access Footsteps across time : the evolution, use and relevance of battlefield visits to the British Armed Forces(2010-11-03) Caddick-Adams, P; Bellamy, Prof C DThis study examines the educational use made by military forces around the world, but primarily those of the United Kingdom, of visits to past battlefields. Investigation suggests this practice commenced formally in Prussia and may be nearing its 200th anniversary; certainly the British Army’s Staff College at Camberley has been visiting battlefields for educational purposes since at least 1885. To date, no extended academic study of this practice has been undertaken, and no specific use of the Staff College Battlefield Tour Archive has been made in this context. An examination is made of educational theory, by which the effectiveness and value of battlefield visiting can be measured. This study creates a typology of battlefield visiting, and thus acknowledges a much older civilian tradition of making pilgrimages to past scenes of conflict (initially to pray for the souls of the dead), which later evolved into civilian battlefield tourism to destinations such as Waterloo and Gettysburg. The work examines the nature of British battlefield visiting, using the Staff College Battlefield Tour Archive, in four phases: before the First World War; during the inter-war period; during the post-Second World War and Cold War periods, and at the time of writing. Throughout the study, parallels are drawn with military battlefield visits undertaken by the American and German armed forces. The conclusion is made that battlefield visiting is a unique and valuable tool in military education that is not well managed, and that no recognition is given to its value in terms of classic education theory.Item Open Access Wolsey, Wilson and the failure of the Khartoum campaign: an exercise in scapegoating and abrogation of command responsibility(2014-08-15) Snook, M; Caddick-Adams, PThis thesis is an exercise in military history and takes the form of an investigation into a notable late-nineteenth century blunder; the British Army’s failure to relieve Gordon at Khartoum. It seeks to lay bare operational realities which to date have been obfuscated by substantially successful acts of scapegoating and cover-up. Although political procrastination in Whitehall did not abate until August, the thesis contends that a timely operation of war would still have been possible, if only General Lord Wolseley had recognized that the campaign plan he had designed in April might not, some four months later, be fit for purpose. It proceeds to demonstrate that given revised constraints on time, a full-length Nile Expedition was no longer tenable. Alternative courses of action are also tested. Popular myth would have it that the relief expedition arrived at Khartoum only two days too late. The thesis contends that this is a contrivance propagated by Wolseley out of selfishly motivated concern for his place in history. Wolseley explained away the purportedly critical 48-hours by asserting that Colonel Sir Charles Wilson had unnecessarily stalled the campaign for two days. It was inferred that Wilson was professionally inept, lost his nerve and did not press far enough upriver to be certain that Khartoum had fallen. The thesis traces the course of the ‘Wilson Controversy’, analyses ‘Campaign Design’ and ‘Campaign Management’ in order to identify how and why the relief expedition went awry, and culminates in a closely reasoned adjudication on the validity of the allegations levelled against Wilson. The thesis concludes that the true extent of the British failure was in the order of 60 days; that the failure occurred at the operational level of war, not the tactical; and that accordingly culpability should properly be attributed to Wolseley.