Zulu War 1879 ─ Twilight of a Warrior Nation

Osprey's Campaign title for the Zulu War (1879). In the late 1870s the British Imperial administration in the Cape colony in southern Africa began to view the Zulu kingdom as a challenge to their authority.To contain this perceived threat, they engineered a war. The early campaigns went terribly wrong, with the decisive Zulu victory at Isandlwana. Ultimately however, the British won the war. The Zulus, primarily reliant on their skill with the stabbing spear, had no real defence or retaliation against the massed firepower of professional British soldiers. Ian Castle examines the British-Zulu war and its two key battles, Isandlwana and Khambula, with excellent black and white photographs accompanying the clear and detailed text.

Ian Knight was born in 1956. He was a freelance writer on military history for ten years before studying Afro-Caribbean History at the University of Kent. He has written widely on Zulu history and travelled extensively in Zululand. Ian was the editor of the Victorian Military Society journal for many years, and has written several books for Osprey. Ian Castle is a founder member of the Napoleonic Association, and is still very involved in their activities both in Britain and mainland Europe. Ian began writing over ten years ago and besides having numerous articles published in military magazines and journals, he has written or co-written eight books, four of which for the Osprey Campaign series.