Annual Booklist 2020 : Thomas Greenshields
Tom Greenshields retired from the Civil Service in 2008 in order to devote himself to his twin interests of military historical research and living history. He has a degree in geography from the University of Oxford and a PhD in the same from Durham, on the settlement of Armenian refugees in Syria and Lebanon after the First World War. After completing his doctorate, Tom spent the bulk of his career involved in mapping and geographic support to the Armed Forces within the Military Survey organisation. In his last eight years, he worked in MOD HQ, working on support to developing capability. In addition, from 1980 he spent eight years in the Territorial Army (Royal Engineers), and retired as a captain in 1988. He took early retirement from MOD at the end of March 2008. After years of research in the records of the IWM, the Liddle Collection and the various regimental archives, his first book, Those Bloody Kilts: The Highland Soldier in the Great War, was published by Helion in 2019 and was a prizewinner in that year’s SAHR Templer Best First Book awards.
He continues to pursue his interest in both the Highland soldier and the Great War. Currently he is pursuing research into the arguments for and against the kilt, and its significance, from the formation of the Highland regiments to its final triumph as the national dress of Scotland with the formation of the Royal Regiment of Scotland in 2006. With regard to the Great War, he has a keen interest in the experience and effectiveness of the NCO, much less studied or understood than that of the officer, and in developing a satisfactory model of the way in which morale operated on the individual soldier, which may have wider application.
My first suggestion is Diana Henderson’s book Highland Soldier 1820-1920, which I found quite inspirational for its examination of the social mores and composition of the Highland regiments. The scope of the book is perhaps rather too wide, covering a long time span in which there was considerable change in both the composition and social background of the regiments; and furthermore, embracing the Great War, in which there were a large variety of battalion types for which she uses only a few original sources. But when published in 1989 this was pioneering work, drawing attention to new lines of study, and is still a useful source for the 19th Century background.
My second choice, which tackles similar issues as well as potentially more controversial ground of courage, nerves, discipline and morale, but for the British soldier overall and the Great War in particular, is Richard Holmes’ Tommy. What I particularly like about Tommy is its analytical approach to the experience of the individual British soldier, again suggesting lines of investigation for my own study.
The many works of Lyn Macdonald, 1914, 1915, Somme etc, have also been inspirational in demonstrating the use of written and verbal accounts of British soldiers to establish and illustrate their story. How much those of us who come later owe to the likes of Lyn Macdonald and Peter Liddle for their work in collecting and capturing these recollections! Max Arthur’s Forgotten Voices of the Great War also helped to draw attention to the great trove of soldiers’ recollections available for study. It was really the potential richness of the material demonstrated in these sources, combined with the analytical approaches of Henderson and Holmes, which led me to believe that a study of the Highland soldier in the Great War, based essentially on their own written and recorded experiences, was viable. This was more than borne out by the wealth of material available in both the IWM and the Liddle Collection, but also in the unexpectedly large reserves of material (much less worked over) in the various regimental archives.
Finally, a word for Battles of the Boer War by W. Baring Pemberton, published as long ago as 1964. This may not be a great classic, but I recently revisited it to read his accounts of the battles of Modder River and Magersfontein, both significant battles for the Highland regiments in South Africa. While there are still questions for me to investigate, especially regarding the role of barbed wire at Magersfontein, I was impressed by the clarity and objectivity of his accounts. But I really draw attention to this book as it was one of the Batsford British Battles Series, most of which were available to me as a teenager on the shelves of our library at Nottingham High School. It was this series, with books on Corunna, Waterloo and so on, probably by now mostly dated and superseded, which did most at an impressionable age to spur on my love of military history, so I remember them with affection. I bought many of them when they came out as Pan paperbacks, and, I think, for six bob, Pemberton’s book was one of the best purchases I have ever made!
The book I would most like to see is one on the experience of the Infantry NCO in the Great War. Although much has been written about the life of the officers during the Great War, much less has been written about the NCOs. The book would examine the social background of the NCO, and their roles and effectiveness in battle, in training and behind the lines. It would particularly consider the role of the NCOs in maintaining discipline, maintaining morale and providing support both upwards and downwards. It would consider the relationship between NCOs and their officers and men, and between themselves at the same and different levels. The research would be based on the recorded experiences of the soldiers themselves; principally correspondence, diaries, recordings and eye-witness accounts in the IWM, the Liddle Collection, regimental archives and other collections. The potential source material is vast, so this would be a work of love, conducted over several years. I’d be willing to take it on myself, using a similar approach to that taken in my book on the Highland soldier, but is there anyone out there willing to publish?