STUART REID

With the exception of the key royal sites, such as Stirling and Edinburgh, few Scottish castles were located at strategic points, or were intended to house garrisons required to defend or subjugate towns. Instead they were primarily fortified dwelling houses, erected in an environment of weak Royal authority and endemic feuding between rival clans and groups, in both Highland and Lowland areas. Although some enceinte castles were developed during the 16th and 17th centuries, most defensive construction focused on the tower house, a distinctive vernacular style of Scottish fortification. This book examines the design, development, and purpose of these quintessentially Scottish buildings, and also covers larger sites such as Urquhart and Blackness.

'What a scene!' wrote Horace Walpole. 'An army in the night dragging itself up a precipice by stumps of trees to assault a town and attack an enemy strongly entrenched and double in numbers!' In one short sharp exchange of fire Major-General James Wolfe's men tumbled the Marquis de Montcalm's French army into bloody ruin. Sir John Fortescue famously described it as the 'most perfect volley ever fired on a battlefield'. In this book Stuart Reid details how one of the British Army's consummate professionals literally beat the King's enemies before breakfast and in so doing decided the fate of a continent.

Having already allied with his father, the Scots' acceptance of Charles II as king in 1649 caused deep suspicion in England. In July 1650, Oliver Cromwell led a powerful force across the Scottish border to remove the problem. For six weeks Cromwell waged a frustrating campaign against a Scots enemy that refused to meet him in battle. By the beginning of September Cromwell's army, poorly supplied, exhausted and ravaged by sickness, was apparently trapped at Dunbar by a powerful Scots army. On 3 September he won his greatest military victory just outside the town, but in this book Stuart Reid suggests that his triumph may in fact have begun as a breakout attempt.

On 23 September 1642 Prince Ruperts cavalry triumphed outside Worcester in the first major clash on the English Civil War. Almost precisely nine years later, on 3 September 1651, that war was won by Oliver Cromwells famous Ironsides outside the same city and in part upon the same ground. Stuart Reid provides a detailed yet readable new military history the first to be published for over twenty years of the three conflicts between 1642 and 1651 known as the English Civil War. Prince Rupert, Oliver Cromwell Patrick Ruthven, Alexander Leslie and Sir Thomas Fairfax all play their parts in this fast-moving narrative. At the heart of the book are fresh interpretations, not only of the key battles such as Marston Moor in 1644, but also of the technical and economic factors which helped shape strategy and tactics, making this a truly comprehensive study of one of the most famous conflicts in British history. This book is a must for all historians and enthusiasts of seventeenth-century English history.