Why did I love this book?
This is one of the first ‘proper’ history books I read, having borrowed it from my local public library, and gave me a lasting interest in the wars and warriors of Central Europe.
First published in 1964, it recounts the life of an Irish exile who became a field marshal in the Austrian Habsburg army and died leading a bayonet charge against the Prussians. Browne’s career exemplifies how ‘German’ military history is far more diverse than it might first appear.
Christopher Duffy vividly brings the eighteenth century to life, and I warmly recommend his many other books on early modern warfare.
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Maximilian von Browne is counted among the finest soldiers of the old Imperial Austrian Army. As the present biography sets out to show, he was outstanding in his time for his vigorous conduct of war, and his extremely advanced idea of leadership and responsibility. Few commanders have taken so literally the phrase ‘to share the hardships of his men’.
A son of that generation of Irishmen who fled from a penal regime to take service in Catholic Europe, Browne rose in the Army of the Empress Maria Theresa. In 1746, he could take the greater part of the credit for…