Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
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Audiobook3 hours
The Longest Afternoon: The 400 Men Who Decided the Battle of Waterloo
Written by Brendan Simms
Narrated by Michael Page
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
In 1815, the deposed emperor Napoleon returned to France and threatened the already devastated and exhausted continent with yet another war. Near the small Belgian municipality of Waterloo, two large, hastily mobilized armies faced each other to decide the future of Europe-Napoleon's forces on one side, and the Duke of Wellington on the other.
With so much at stake, neither commander could have predicted that the battle would be decided by the Second Light Battalion, King's German Legion, which was given the deceptively simple task of defending the Haye Sainte farmhouse, a crucial crossroads on the way to Brussels. In The Longest Afternoon, Brendan Simms recounts how these four-hundred-odd riflemen beat back wave after wave of French infantry until they were finally forced to withdraw, but only after holding up Napoleon for so long that he lost the overall contest. Their actions alone decided the most influential battle in European history.
With so much at stake, neither commander could have predicted that the battle would be decided by the Second Light Battalion, King's German Legion, which was given the deceptively simple task of defending the Haye Sainte farmhouse, a crucial crossroads on the way to Brussels. In The Longest Afternoon, Brendan Simms recounts how these four-hundred-odd riflemen beat back wave after wave of French infantry until they were finally forced to withdraw, but only after holding up Napoleon for so long that he lost the overall contest. Their actions alone decided the most influential battle in European history.
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Reviews for The Longest Afternoon
Rating: 4.416666666666667 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
12 ratings1 review
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5An interesting history that no one taught me in school. Very, very interesting. One of those little bites of a big story that really held my interest.