Philip Townsend was an Irish gentleman. In 1756, he travelled to North America, where he fought against the French in the Seven Years War. His diary provides an insight into frontier warfare and the assault on Louisbourg.
In 1879, the British fought a war against the Zulu kingdom. The Zulus resisted bravely and were only defeated after a series of particularly bloody battles that have gone down in the annals of colonial warfare.
Sir Thomas Fairfax led his troops to victory over King Charles I at the Battle of Naseby on 14 June 1645. His triumph won the First English Civil War (1642-46) for Parliament and ensured that monarchs would never again be supreme in British politics.
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on 18 June 1815 between Napoleon’s French Army and a coalition led by the Duke of Wellington and Marshal Blücher. It was the decisive battle of its age.
This battle took place on 22-23 January 1879. A huge force of Zulus attacked a small British garrison, but was eventually repelled after more than 12 hours of bitter fighting.
The 1916 Somme offensive was one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War. But it provided the Army with a tough lesson in how to fight a large-scale modern war.
D-Day enabled the Allies to establish a foothold on the beaches of Normandy. But they still faced the task of breaking out, pushing the Germans back and liberating France.