Engines for empire : the Victorian army and its use of railways

The railway represented one of pivotal technological developments of the nineteenth century. This book reviews the way in which the British army exploited the potential of railways from the 'dawn of the railway age' to the outbreak of the First World War. It explores the use of railways when the army was acting in aid of the civil power, as a factor in the planning for home defence, and as an increasingly efficient means of supporting the army on active service. If the early Victorian army welcomed railways as an ancillary means of responding to domestic emergencies, it encountered similar challenges in fulfilling its role in home defence. Over nearly thirty years from the Crimean War to the intervention in Egypt, the Victorian army both experimented with railways and observed the employment of railways. The Sudan Military Railway was regarded as 'astounding in conception'. The book reveals that the army monitored the use of railways in foreign wars, experimented in the use of railways within rear areas, designed and built railways for strategic defence in India, and later exploited railways to transform the prospects of military success in the Sudan and South Africa. The Victorian army demonstrated a capacity to integrate the railway into its logistic planning, to grasp the imperative of operational management, and to envisage it as a key element in mobilisation and strategic planning. Engines For Empire Examines The Use Of The Railway By The British Army From The 1830s To 1914, A Period Of Domestic Political Strife And Unprecedented Imperial Expansion. The Book Uses A Wide Array Of Sources And Images To Demonstrate How The Victorian Army Embraced This New Technology, How It Monitored Foreign Wars, And How It Came To Use The Railway In Both Support And Operational Roles. The British Army's Innovation Is Also Revealed, Through Its Design And Use Of Armoured Trains, The Restructuring Of Hospital Trains, And In Its Capacity To Build And Repair Railway Track, Bridges, And Signals Under Field Conditions. This Volume Provides Insights On The Role Of Railways In Imperial Development, As A Focus Of Social Interaction Between Adversaries, And As A Means Of Projecting Imperial Power. It Will Make Fascinating Reading For Students, Academics And Enthusiasts In Military And Imperial History, Victorian Studies, Railway History And Colonial Warfare. Front matter Contents List of maps and illustrations Acknowledgements Public order: the army and railways Map Railways and home defence Railway experiments in mid-Victorian wars Operational railways Strategic railways in India The Sudan Military Railway Railways on the veld: the South African War, 1899–1902 Conclusion: Railways and the preparation for war, 1914 Appendix 1: Working methods on the Sudan railway, 1884–85 Appendix 2: Indian volunteer railway units, 1869–1901 Select bibliography Index This wide-ranging and extensively researched work reviews the way in which the British army exploited the potential of railways from the 'dawn of the railway age' to the outbreak of the First World War. -- .