The Longest Afternoon

The 400 Men Who Decided the Battle of Waterloo

Europe had been at war for over twenty years. After a short respite in exile, Napoleon had returned to France and threatened another generation of fighting across the devastated and exhausted continent. At the small Belgian village of Waterloo two large, hastily mobilized armies faced each other to decide the future of Europe.

This book tells their extraordinary story, brilliantly recapturing the fear, chaos and chanciness of battle and using previously untapped eye-witness reports. Through determination, cunning and fighting spirit, some four hundred soldiers held off many thousands of French and changed the course of history.

The brevity of this remarkable book belies the amount of work that went into it. One can only marvel at how well Professor Simms has gone through the original sources - the surviving journals, reminiscences and letters of the individual combatants - to produce a coherent and gripping narrative

Nick Lezard, The Guardian

About Brendan Simms

Brendan Simms is Professor of the History of International Relations at the University of Cambridge. His major books include Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia (shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize), Europe: The Struggle for Supremacy, 1453 to the Present, and Hitler: Only the World Was Enough.
Details
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • ISBN: 9780141979267
  • Length: 160 pages
  • Dimensions: 199mm x 10mm x 129mm
  • Weight: 125g
  • Price: £10.99
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