Writing the Great War: Sir James Edmonds and the Official Histories, 1915-1948 (Military History and Policy)

Begun within months of the war's outbreak, and not completed for a further 33 years, the writing of the Official Histories of World War I was a venture of unprecedented scale and complexity.Who, then, was responsible for producing such an enterprise? Did it aim to inform or did it have darker political motivations? Did the authors, who alone had access to records that were to remain classified for decades to come, seek to lay the facts and lessons of the war truthfully before the public? A number of critics have claimed that, on the contrary, the Official Histories were highly partial accounts written to protect reputations and cover up the true scale of British military incompetence.Andrew Green directly challenges these views, examining the progress by which official history was written, the motives and influences of its paymasters, and the literary integrity of its historians. The book focuses on four offical volumes covering arguably the most contentious battles of the war: Gallipoli, the Somme, Third Ypres (Passchendaele) and March 1918. What emerges from this is both a story of these great campaigns and an insight into the political intrigues and conflicting constraints that influenced the official writing of the Great War.

Britain's Official Military Histories of the Great War, finished in 1948, have been accused by later historians of attempting to whitewash events, ignoring important historical lessons, and of being wooden and bland in prose. Based on the author's doctoral dissertation in military history (completed at Leeds U., UK), this work disputes most of these criticisms. The process of writing the official histories is explored and the influence they had on later historical works is assessed. Also, the varied motivations of the critics are discussed. Distributed in the US by ISBS. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Contrary to expectation the official histories of World War One were relatively free from interference from the War Office and other British government agencies. This volume reveals that Sir James Edmonds took his work seriously as director of the official series and retained remarkable literary integrity. In this volume, Andrew Green examines the progress by which the Official Histories of World War I was written, the motives and influences of its paymasters, and the literary integrity of its historians.