Title: The Cavalry
Editor: LT-COL James Lawford
Contributors: Brigadier Peter Young, R.A. Crosbie-Weston, Curt Johnson, Dr T. A. Heathcote, Lt-Col Alan Shepperd and David Chandler.
Publisher: Sampson Low
Year: 1976

‘In war he was swift into action, instant of decision, careless of consequences. In his passing he has left behind him a tradition of light-hearted, debonair elegance, and a reckless courage in battle that is still far from dead.’

James Lawford, in the book’s concluding chapters, pinpoints some enduring traits of the horsed cavalryman. Whether a hussar, a lancer or a cuirasser, whether mounted on a small darting pony or a majestic, heavy charger, his enthusiasm for combat was prodigious.

Ironsides charge into a troop of Royalist cavalry

This book unites two enthralling aspects of military life before the advent of the tank: the functions and behaviour of cavalry horses in war, and the duties, training, traditions and deeds of the men who rode them into battle. From the mounted archers of Assyria to the lancers of World War I, the story has a span of some 3,000 years.

Brigadier Peter Young

Lt-Col James Lawford was a Senior Lecturer at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. Brigadier Peter Young during World War II was an outstanding colonel, and is now one of Britain’s best known military historians. He is a regular broadcaster and Captain-General of The Sealed Knot, an organisation that re-enacts battles of the English Civil War.

This book is twinned with Villiers Path by Lucy Furlong (pub. 2017), read more about it here.