I didn't really care for this very biased (pro-English) military history of the Hundred Years War. The author focuses on the military aspects of the conflict, going into great detail about troop movements and battlefield maneuvers, and failing to address the social and cultural fallout of the war. Moreover, the author is decidedly pro-English (to his credit, he admits this in the introduction) and manages to brush aside the plunder and slaughter the English armies performed on French soil (while also praising the soldiers as professionals) and ends the book by voicing a degree of regret that the English had not been able to retain their territories in France. Overall, I felt the bias got in the way of a good story and left me feeling a lot of sympathy for the French. ( )

Proudly Biased

What was wrong with the French? Why didn’t they just let the English take over their lands? Why did they have to keep fighting? Why did they want to push the English back across the Channel? These are the puzzling questions that led English kings to keep crossing the Channel for over a century to try to get the French to let them rule. All they wanted was everything. Three million Brits wanted control over 16 million French. King after king led sorties and sieges - that succeeded. But the English never consolidated their victories by occupying and administering (until about 90 years into it). They swept through the land, destroying anything that was not sufficiently defended, and moved on, returning control to the natives who were left. Then they came back and laid it waste again. And again. This is the essence of the Hundred Years’ War.

It was made a little more difficult because of the Scots who had a treaty with France to come to their aid in the case of an English invasion. The Scots fulfilled their commitment by gleefully attacking northern England, and running away when the English came after them. Even the capture of their king didn’t stop them. It was a labor of love. And it kept English troops in the north, when they were needed on the continent. Eventually, the Scots fought alongside the French in France, such was their love of England.

The English had an advanced military strategy. They had banks of archers who did nothing but shoot arrows into the air – six per minute each. This resulted in a rain of tens of thousands of arrows that not only killed and maimed, but frightened the horses into rearing and fleeing. The English liked to set up where it was advantageous, dig holes and trenches to slow the enemy, and wait to be attacked. It was a requirement that they be attacked. Sometimes they had to taunt the French into attacking. If it wasn’t so bloody, it would seem humorous.

Corrigan is a Sandhurst man, and wallows enthusiastically in the actual battles, which he relates in fine detail. The chronology is treated more summarily, with a lot of begatting and intrigue worthy of any opera, which defined the warring internal politics of England. So much effort went into rearranging the chess pieces that society itself was all but neglected, except for constant taxation (and revolts).

He’s also an Anglophile of the first rank, belittling the French at every opportunity, and singing the praises of Kings Edward III and Henry V, his all time favorite. Anything the French accomplished, particularly the advances with Joan of Arc, Corrigan attributes to dumb luck, while everything the English accomplished was due to professional soldiers, able administrators, strategic diplomats and loyal archers from an unending stream of extraordinary, quality people at the king’s service. This despite protection rackets run by garrisons, pillaging, looting, backstabbing, plots, betrayals, murder and mayhem. Finally, in the epilogue, Corrigan comes clean: “France as a nation has never liked us. The feeling is mutual.” And he ends by claiming the Hundred Years’ War to subjugate France was “a great and righteous cause”.

David Wineberg ( )