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Action at Badama Post published


pjwmacro

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My book, Action at Badama Post has just been published by Casemate UK. Details to follow in the book reviews topic. In the meantime, I remain very keen to establish contact with any other descendants of officers and soldiers of 22 Battery MMGS (see my thread below) or of anyone involved in the action at Badama Post.banner.jpg.96fc8ca00d6d5af60ad20f59e65cd8e5.jpg

 

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I posted a short review on "What are you reading" about this book. Thought I would post here as well.

 

Action at Badama Post by Paul Macro.

 

There aren’t many First World War books published that cover operations on the North West Frontier during the war and the Third Afghan War that followed shortly afterwards. In fact, looking through my book collection, C.P Mills ‘A Strange War’, which was published in 1988, may be the last book published which looks at the life of particular soldiers on the frontier so closely. So, when this book was published last year it went on to the Christmas list.

 

I think what Paul Macro has done with this book is what many of us on this forum have attempted to do over the years, that is to put some context around an action where a relative served. In Paul’s case it is his grandfather, Sergeant Bill Macro, who at the time was serving with 22nd Battery Motor Machine Gun Service. The book is centred on a report Bill Macro wrote concerning his involvement with the downing of an RAF Bristol Fighter towards the very end of the Third Afghan War near the foot of a post at Badama, near the Afghanistan border, in late July 1919.

 

The crew of the plane were injured and rescued by men of the MMGS and the Kurram Militia shortly after the crash. The following day was spent salvaging gear from the downed aircraft. The action as the author puts ‘changed nothing in the overall impact of the Third Afghan War but was typical of the minor actions fought throughout its course. It was also typical of many of the actions fought all along the North West Frontier, both before the war and subsequently’.

 

What the author does is break down the reasons for the war, the course of the war, the units and men involved and their lives before and after the war into a lot of detail. He also writes very clearly and lays a logical and directed path through the book (perhaps his military background coming through) which makes it a very easy book to read. I would, however, recommend copying the maps from the book and keeping them near whilst reading.

 

What I liked most about the book was the details of and the actions of the main characters, MMGS men, 20 Squadron RAF men and the Kurram Militia. Paul Macro had to piece a lot of the story together and doesn’t shy away from that in the book and overall I think he has done a fine job with the story. The point is made in the foreword that the story could have come from any age. In 1919 it was a contemporary fighter aircraft that fell to a single Pathan bullet. The book is a reminder of how little has changed with conflict in that area of the world.

 

Recommended if you have an interest in a lesser known theatre of the war.

 

Scott

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