This thesis is an exercise in military history and takes the form of an investigation into a notable late-nineteenth century blunder; the British Army’s failure to relieve Gordon at Khartoum. It seeks to lay bare operational realities which to date have been obfuscated by substantially successful acts of scapegoating and cover-up. Although political procrastination in Whitehall did not abate until August, the thesis contends that a timely operation of war would still have been possible, if only General Lord Wolseley had recognized that the campaign plan he had designed in April might not, some four months later, be fit for purpose. It proceeds to demonstrate that given revised constraints on time, a full-length Nile Expedition was no longer tenable. Alternative courses of action are also tested. Popular myth would have it that the relief expedition arrived at Khartoum only two days too late. The thesis contends that this is a contrivance propagated by Wolseley out of selfishly motivated concern for his place in history. Wolseley explained away the purportedly critical 48-hours by asserting that Colonel Sir Charles Wilson had unnecessarily stalled the campaign for two days. It was inferred that Wilson was professionally inept, lost his nerve and did not press far enough upriver to be certain that Khartoum had fallen. The thesis traces the course of the ‘Wilson Controversy’, analyses ‘Campaign Design’ and ‘Campaign Management’ in order to identify how and why the relief expedition went awry, and culminates in a closely reasoned adjudication on the validity of the allegations levelled against Wilson. The thesis concludes that the true extent of the British failure was in the order of 60 days; that the failure occurred at the operational level of war, not the tactical; and that accordingly culpability should properly be attributed to Wolseley.

<p> The paper focuses on the Battle of Peleliu and how it was interpret throughout the decades following World War 2. While doing so the paper will answer the question on why the Battle was overshadowed and forgotten through history.</p><p>

Thesis: The local dimensions of defence: the standing army and militia in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex 1649-1660. Par t l: Interregnum governments faced numerous threats to their security and military power: internally from Royalist conspiracies and political dissidence, and externally from the danger of a combined Royalist and foreign invasion. The Eastern Counties were of strategic importance to Interregnum governments because of their proximity to London and the Continent, and because of their considerable economic resources. Interregnum governments were able to maintain their control over the region, and draw upon its resources for defence through the region's local and central administrative structures. Part II: The first arm of the Interregnum system of defence was the standing army. This consisted first of the units of horse and foot stationed in the region. The horse were used primarily to respond quickly to internal threats. The foot were stationed in the region primarily to await embarkation for foreign service. The coast was protected by a series of fortifieti garrisons, the governors of which played a key role in coordinating the defence and security of the region. A uniform assessment was levied which provided a sound basis for the pay and supply of the standing forces. Part Ill: The standing army was complemented by the militia. Like the standing forces, the traditional county and borough forces were reorganized and put on a sound basis after the Civil War. The new organization provided the framework for local defence up to and after the Restoration. Within this framework, Interregnum gover nments experimented with various select militias, but with only limited success. Both the 'general' and 'select' militias were administered in the localities by a group of trusted appointees, who worked closely with the garrison governors, and later with the Major-Generals of 1655 and 1659 to coordinate the regions' defence and security. The financial structure of the militia was based on a uniform and statutorily defined scale of rates. Conclusion: Together the standing army and militia formed part of a single system comprised of three mutually dependent elements: the deployment of men and materials , the maintenance of security, and the raising of funds. The system was put on an efficient basis during the Interregnum and embodied the ideal of publicly uniform administration which characterized Interregnum government as a whole.

In the spring and summer of 1655, Oliver Cromwell, as Lord Protector of England and with the authority of the Council of State, dispatched an English fleet under the command of Sea General William Penn and General Robert Venables to conquer and settle the target of their choosing among Spain's colonies in the Caribbean. A Spanish defending force of perhaps 400-600 men, mostly militia, repulsed a landing force of 9,000 men. Demoralized and defeated, the much-reduced force boarded their ships and sailed to the more weakly held island of Jamaica, where the Spanish who chose not to surrender faded into the interior to join their runaway slaves in a guerrilla campaign that would last five years before the English completed their conquest of the island. When Oliver Cromwell heard the news of the defeat at Hispaniola, observers in London reported that he shut himself in his room for an afternoon, before placing Penn and Venables in the Tower of London; but later recovered to call for godly Englishmen to settle the new colony of Jamaica. Few chose to answer, while most followed the example of the New England colonists, who felt they had enough trouble fulfilling God's mission in the North American wilderness, without sailing through a war zone to an uncertain future in disease and hunger-ridden Jamaica. Meanwhile, the war Cromwell felt he could avoid in Europe broke out with Spain, gaining him Dunkirk but costing money and men. This ambitious and spectacularly unsuccessful project to colonize the Spanish Caribbean has come to be known as the Western Design. The Western Design represents a key turning point in the history of the Caribbean and development of England's American colonial empire. Through an unprecedented use of state-commissioned force, England struck against a continental enemy across the Atlantic, and added what would become a valuable sugar island and buccaneering base to a growing American empire. The event has long been looked at by historians of Commonwealth England, both in exploring Cromwell's religious psychology, and in debating its foreign policy. However, with the growth of an Atlantic approach to history, new fields have opened within which the Western Design should be considered. One development has been the blurring of the formerly rigid historiographical distinctions of what constituted English, colonial American, and Caribbean history. A growing Atlantic empire including all three areas has begun to be explored, and events in one place have been examined as to how they affected events in the others. One example has been an analysis of the early seventeenth-century Caribbean as a target for Puritan colonization, much as New England has been viewed for decades and even centuries. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Summer Semester, 2004. / May 26, 2004. / History England Colonies Spain Western Design Nava / Includes bibliographical references. / Matt D. Childs, Professor Directing Thesis; Rodney D. Anderson, Committee Member; Paul Strait, Committee Member.

Committee Chair - Michael Creswell Committee Member - Edward D. Wynot Committee Member - Jonathan Grant / A Thesis Submitted to the Department of History in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts. / Fall Semester, 2004. / July 27, 2004. / MI5, Tomas Harris, Juan Pujol, ARABEL, GARBO, MI6, Abwehr, Double-Cross, Double Agent, Twenty Committee, XX, Wilhelm Canaris / Includes bibliographical references. / Michael Creswell, Professor Directing Thesis; Jonathan Grant, Committee Member; Edward D. Wynot, Committee Member.

This thesis covers two critical time periods of the history of Pensacola, Florida. The first examines the Civil War and the second covers Reconstruction. The study begins with the Union's occupation of Fort Pickens located on Santa Rosa Island and evaluate's the North's strategy in occupying the position. To illustrate the fort's strengths, the thesis provides accounts of the battle of Santa Rosa Island and the subsequent artillery duels. Because of its limited importance during the war, neither side placed much emphasis on Pensacola. As a result, the city was not the site of a major engagement. In 1862, the Confederates abandoned the city and the Union quickly took over, but limited manpower prevented an adequate occupation forcing the federals to remain within the safety of their installations until the end of the war. Pensacola had an easier transition to the post war nation, because of two factors, the military and the timber industry. The federal government kept enough personnel to properly man the forts and Navy Yard, and as a result the soldiers' presence prevented lawlessness and ensured the enforcement of the Reconstruction Acts. While other areas of the South endured poverty due to the failure of cotton crops, Pensacola's economy grew as the demand for lumber increased. West Florida's vast longleaf pine forests provided an almost unlimited supply of timber, and the region's sawmills flourished. This provided a large number of wage paying jobs that kept Pensacola's residents out of poverty. Along with providing employment, the timber industry boosted the shipping traffic entering and leaving the city's port. The city also faced other issues that affected its events between 1861 and 1877 such as yellow fever, railroads, and the possibility of annexation to Alabama. Each of these aspects influenced the development of Pensacola and its residents. Yellow fever prevented the city from becoming a haven for tourists seeking a healthier climate, and the lack of a railroad connection with Tallahassee prompted Alabama to propose annexation. The combination of these factors along with the military and timber industry gave Pensacola a unique situation during the Civil War and Reconstruction. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2005. / March 3, 2005. / Fort Pickens, Florida, Reconstruction, Civil War, Pensacola / Includes bibliographical references. / Joe M. Richardson, Professor Directing Thesis; James P. Jones, Jr., Committee Member; Paul W. Strait, Committee Member.

The French Revolution had a tremendous impact on the social, political, and cultural development of the western world. Similarly, it had a revolutionary impact on warfare in both Europe and the United States. Although the U.S. had a distinctly British military tradition through the War of 1812, in the span of a single year, the U.S. Army adopted the French system of warfare or French Combat Method as the intellectual framework for the American way of warfare. This French Combat Method informed and guided the way in which American officers conceptualized the battlefield, how they organized their formations and their regulations, how they equipped them, and how they learned lessons from their experiences on the battlefield. This French influence dominated the American way of warfare from 1814 through the Civil War and World War I, and into the 1930's. It was not until the catastrophic fall of France in 1940 that caused the U.S. Army to fundamentally change their intellectual framework. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Fall Semester 2008. / August 6, 2008. / United States Army, French Military Thought / Includes bibliographical references. / Frederick R. Davis, Professor Directing Dissertation; J. Anthony Stallins, Outside Committee Member; James P. Jones, Committee Member; Jonathan Grant, Committee Member; Darrin M. McMahon, Committee Member.

The way in which Napoleon used cavalry to shape the battlefield and to support his infantry attacks made cavalry operations play a unique role in Napoleonic warfare. Studying the cavalry operations during the decline of the Empire from 1813 through 1815 enabled an analysis not only of the capabilities of the soldiers and leadership of the French cavalry, but also a better understanding of the changes that occurred in Napoleon's operational and strategic art of warfare. This study required an analysis of cavalry operations in all of the major campaigns in the period. The operations of General François-Ètienne Kellermann from 1813 through 1815 provided an excellent case study of cavalry operations to analyze the changes in Napoleonic warfare. This detailed analysis presented different conclusions than many historians and questions much of the traditional interpretation of the capabilities and operations of Napoleon and his armies. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2006. / April 7, 2006. / French History, Napoleon, Kellermann / Includes bibliographical references. / Donald D. Horward, Professor Directing Thesis; Jim Jones, Committee Member; Jonathan Grant, Committee Member.

"How the Common Grunt and Prostitute Changed Military Policy" argues that the promiscuity of the American servicemen and the women they encountered, forced the military to abandon its policy of endorsing abstinence during the Second World War. Out of fear of weakening the combat strength of the military, the government initially used punishments as a deterrent to contracting venereal disease. Since the men in arms actively sought venues for pre-marital sex regardless of the consequences, such penalties proved unsuccessful. As the war progressed, the War Department and Surgeon General's Office reacted and began to implement methods of venereal disease education, prevention, and treatment. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. / Spring Semester, 2004. / April 1, 2004. / Prostitution, Sexual Behavoir, American Servicemen, World War II / Includes bibliographical references. / Jonathan Grant, Professor Directing Thesis; Peter Garretson, Committee Member; William O. Oldson, Committee Member.

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