Blenheim has gone down in history as one of the turning points of the War of the Spanish Succession – and some would say in the history of conflict in Europe. The overwhelming Allied victory ensured the safety of Vienna from the Franco-Bavarian army, thus preventing the collapse of the Grand Alliance. Bavaria was knocked out of the war, and Louis XIV's hopes for a quick victory came to an end. France suffered over 30,000 casualties. If you truly want to understand what happened and why – read Battle Story.

The author of The War of the Spanish Succession analyzes the inner workings of the army led into battle by General John Churchill. Blenheim, Ramilles, Oudenarde, Malplaquet—much has been written about the brilliant victories of the Duke of Marlborough’s Anglo-Dutch army over the armies of Louis XIV of France during the War of the Spanish Succession. Less attention has been focused on the men and the military organization that made these achievements possible—the soldiers, the commanders, the army structure and administration, the logistics, engineering, weapons and finance. That is why James Falkner’s penetrating account of the composition and operation of Marlborough’s army is of such value. His clear analysis gives a fascinating insight into Marlborough’s war machine and into the conduct of war in Europe 300 years ago. “I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it, particularly if you are embarking on a visit to the battlefields of the War of the Spanish Succession.”—Army Rumour Service “This perceptively written book tells us about the war machine that backed up Marlborough’s strategic and tactical genius . . . An excellent book.”—Classic Arms and Militaria “The author, having written a number of books on the period, knows his subject and this certainly shows in this, his latest contribution to the history of the British army in the early 18th century.”—Military Modelling Magazine

Scholars of British America generally conclude that the early eighteenth-century Anglo-American empire was commercial in economics, liberal in politics, and parochial in policy, somnambulant in an era of “salutary neglect,” but Stephen Saunders Webb here demonstrates that the American provinces, under the spur of war, became capitalist, coercive, and aggressive, owing to the vigorous leadership of career army officers, trained and nominated to American government by the captain general of the allied armies, the first duke of Marlborough, and that his influence, and that of his legates, prevailed through the entire century in America. Webb’s work follows the duke, whom an eloquent enemy described as “the greatest statesman and the greatest general that this country or any other country has produced,” his staff and soldiers, through the ten campaigns, which, by defanging France, made the union with Scotland possible and made “Great Britain” preeminent in the Atlantic world. Then Webb demonstrates that the duke’s legates transformed American colonies into provinces of empire. Marlborough’s America, fifty years in the making, is the fourth volume of The Governors-General.