The French Army

[TonyJoe]

Can anyone recommend any good books about the French sector of the western front? I have just found Anthony Claytons book "Paths of Glory", also have Alistair Horne's book on Verdun ("The Price of Glory"). Is there anything else out there? I'm particularly interested in Nivelle's offensive of 1917, about which I know very little.

Cheers

Tony

[Dikke Bertha]

Pyrrhic Victory by Robert Doughty is the war from the French viewpoint. It is a very good book and recommended. It is very recent and should be still in the bookshops.

I know of very few general books on the French army written in English. There is one coffee table book by Yves Buffetaut on the Chemin de Dames Offensive in 1917 which is good. It is heavily illustrated and again is a recent publication and should be readily available.

After that there are specialist books on the Marne such as "My 75" by Paul Lintier or The Marne by Georges Blond. He also wrote a book on Verdun. Joffre's memoirs and biographies of Foch are still available as well.

A list of such books somewhere on the Forum would be a good idea.

[Jonathan Saunders]

I anm sure i saw a new book on the French Army in WW1 on the bookshelves recently so might be worth taking a look on Amazon for details. Unfortunately there isnt a great deal printed in English. There is a chap, Bill ... cant remember, an academic, and I know he has been drafting a book on the French army, dont know his expected publication date, but having heard him talk on the French army, I am looking forward to the publication.

[Halder]

Dare Call It Treason by Richard Watt on the 1917 mutinies is good, as is Leonard Smith Between Mutiny and Obedience

As far as English-speaking writers go, the French Army has never received the treatment the German Army has, sadly. Also available is Hanotaux's account of the campaign of 1914 in umpteen volumes, all online.

[Redradial]

The Marne: The Battle That Saved Paris and Changed the Course of the First World War (Prion Lost Treasures) (Paperback) by Georges Blond.

This is available from Amazon. Georges Blond also wrote "Verdun" which I cannot find in English but it may exist. Excellent history from the French Viewpoint.

Red

[Robert Dunlop]

'Prelude to Victory' by Spears will give you some valuable insights into the French Army. He covered the lead-up to Nivelle's Chemin des Dames offensive. As a liaison officer, Spears provides a unique perspective.

Robert

[duckman]

Histoires et Collections* have a "double" book on Arras and Chemin des Dames. My copy is in storage at the moment, and I couldn't find details on the web, but will post again here when I've hauled it out. My French is iffy, but there is a lot of graphical content, and I leaned much from it (although I was really trying to get the lay of the land for 1918's events in the same sector).

Duckman

* I think I have that right - they have a range of moderately large format picture-and-map-heavy hardbacks, mostly Napoleonic (that I've seen), but covering other topics.

edit - found some details here: http://www.scholarsbookshelf.com/item.asp?...amp;itemid=3419

[Charles Fair]

I woud recommend anything by Douglas Porch. He has written several journal articles as well as "The Long March to the Marne" which is about the French Army 1870-1914, pub Cambridge UP in 1981. ISBN 0521238838. Heres the blurb...

"The relationship between the French army and the regime provides one of the central themes in the history of the Third Republic. From its foundation in 1870, the republic sought to integrate the army of Louis-Napoleon into a left-leaning, democratic political system. This experiment failed, historians have argued, because the social origins, political attitudes and professional values of the officer corps sabotaged cooperation with the republic. The nation paid a bloody price for this failure on the battlefields of the Great War. Dr Porch's book challenges many standard assumptions about the place of the army in French political life between 1871 and 1914. The events of the 'Dreyfus years' are examined from the army's standpoint. Dr Porch examines the impact of the Dreyfus affair on the crucial tactical and armaments debates of the immediate pre-war years, tracing the origins of the costly 'spirit of the offensive' while providing the answer to the French army's near disastrous failure to the development of the colonial army and its place within the military structure is also assessed for the first time."