Century of Service
The History of the South Alberta Light Horse
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Publisher: Robin Brass Studio, Toronto, ON May 2005 ISBN 1-896941-43-5 Suggested Retail Price (may vary): Canada $69.95 / U.S.A. $59.95 Details: Hardcover, 488 pages, 8.5 x 11 inches, More than 550 photos, illustrations and maps, Appendices, endnotes, bibliography, index, scale drawings of vehicles and weapons, organizational charts. |
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Century of Service is the story of Alberta's senior militia regiment which celebrated its centennial in July 2005. Although it was officially authorized in 1905, the South Alberta Light Horse can actually trace its origins back to early days of the Province in 1885 when units of irregular cavalry were raised in Western Canada during the Northwest Rebellion. The fascinating story of this proud regiment takes "Her Majesty's Cowboys" from the 1880s to the 21st Century. It describes how the predecessors of the modern Light Horse fought for their nation in times of war and struggled to stay alive in cheese-paring times of peace. The reader will accompany the Light Horse as they fight in the Rebellion of 1885, South Africa in 1899-1901, the Western Front in 1915-1918 and Northwest Europe in 1944-1945. Theirs is a chronicle of gallantry, sacrifice, patriotism and endurance (and not a little humour) during which they carve out a magnificent fighting record at the Somme in 1916, Vimy Ridge in 1917, the Normandy beaches in 1944, the Rhineland in 1945 -- and many places in between. Century of Service is also a history of the Province of Alberta from the time of aboriginal peoples to the modern day. As we follow the fortunes of Alberta's senior militia regiment, we also follow the fortunes of the province itself over a period of more than a century -- warriors and buffalo, cattle and cowboys, dust bowls and depressions, booms and busts. In doing so, we learn that many of the traits of the Light Horse -- independence, individuality, ruggedness, enthusiasm and self-reliance -- result from their Albertan background. Lavishly illustrated with more than 550 photographs, drawings, cartoons and paintings including fifteen pages of colour and specially-commissioned artwork, Century of Service will have interest for a broad audience. Appendices contain details of the Regiment's Battle Honours, awards and decorations, fatal casualties, commanding officers, predecessor units and a glossary of military terms, acronyms and abbreviations. Written in plain language for the general reader, Century of Service will appeal to those interested in the history of Canada and Alberta, military history, and the meaning of military duty.
Some sample extracts
from Century of Service
Title
page – Frontispiece
What Reviewers say
about
[This book] is accompanied by an extensive collection
of phootographs, maps and diagrams, bringing the development of the
regiment to life in the eyes of the reader. The numerous photographs,
including many present day ones, are certainly among the highlights
of Century of Service. Donald Graves once again, has given tangible evidence that he is
a master craftsman when dealing with military history. This book is
written in the same lively style for which he has become known --
it really is a good read -- and here and there we find totally apt
insertions of barrack room humour and reminders that peacetime soldiering
(at least) is generally great fun. But underlying all this is meticulous
research, serious study and a professional historian's insistence
on evidence to justify his analyses. ...... this is an excellent book
work, and it belongs on the shelf of everyone who has an interest
in Canadian military history.
Century of Service, is not merely a stroy of military formations, maneuvers, machines and machinations. Rather it is a story of people, Alberta people, almost all of them, drawn from civilian life in a call to defend their homes in wars fought on foreign soil to prevent those wars from reaching their own soil. Graves opens his story with the skirmishes on the prairie between "Her Majesty's Cowboays," the Rocky Mountain Rangers, one of the many ancestors of the SALH .... from there he tracks the First World War history of the 31st Battalion, known as the "Alberta Battalion" ...... Graves does not minimize the hideous cost of trench warfare which the 31st endured fro more than three years. But he does something few First World War historians manage. As well as the horror, he details the technology of the trenches --how they worked and how men lived in them. It takes him nearly a full chapter and makes fascinating reading. ...... The SALH embraces in its ancestry 35 predecessor armoured,
artillery and infantry units. Graves had to cover them all, yet somehow
unite them into the unified story of the single modern regiment through
which their history is being preserved. Plainly, this book could have
become an incomprehensible hodge-podge of names, numbers, and unconnected
anecdotes. What Graves has turned out is nothing of the sort. He masterfully
weaves this confusion into a coherent and unified story which emerges
as far more than a military account. It's the story of a province
and a contribution it made to the preservation of a way of life many
thousands of men felt were worth dying for.
***** (5-star) Amazon.com reviews Donald Graves' s history of the South Alberta Regiment in World War Two is acclaimed as one of the best WW II regimental histories yet written. This book, the history of the South Alberta Light Horse, is just as good, and offers a substantially wider view, looking in detail at the SALH from inception to the present, 1905 to 2005 (hence the title). …… Graves does not just start his story in 1905, however, and traces the history of the Militia in Alberta back to its starting points. Despite covering all this ground, the book is laid out in several distinct chapters, broken up with interesting sub-paragraph headings and always written so the reader knows exactly which unit is being discussed. The prose is lucid, meeting the tenets of good historical reporting using period terminology (yet avoiding abbreviations that would confuse the layman) and remaining conversational and even light in tone. To that end, despite the richness of detail and abundance of academic footnotes, Graves has very much made this book - like the South Alberta history - storylike in tone, making maximum use of personal anecdotes to illustrate points. And those points are well covered - Graves discusses many themes in detail - for the combat units, he sketches out methods of employment, conditions for the average soldier and the officers in charge of them, and places their battles into the overall larger context demanded. He does the same thing with peacetime history, providing the political context of how and why the Militia evolved, what its purpose was, and how the SALH and predecessors went about meeting its objectives. …… The book can't be praised highly enough for being a comprehensive look at not just one regiment, but the histories of many militia regiments and how they reflected on the Canadian Army as a whole. Colour photos and plates by the superb Ron Volstad bring the subject matter to life, though they are unfortunately few in number. The mass of black and white photos are unpublished and extremely well captioned, each caption being more of a sidebar to the main text than simple explanatory piece of the picture itself. The photos have been carefully selected to maximize the understanding of the reader and make him relate to the story being told. Additionally, Chris Johnston's line drawings are here in abundance, a very welcome treat, including such rarities as the loading layout for LCTs of the the 13th Field Regiment (self propelled) on D-Day, and a look at the rare ammunition sledges they towed into action on 6 June. There is much in this book for not just devotees of regimental history, but wargamers, general interest historians, armour buffs and more. This book will give the general interest reader a deep understanding of what it was like to be in a cavalry or infantry unit in the First World War, in the Militia in the mid and post war eras, in an armoured or artillery regiment in Normandy and NW Europe, and paints a vivid picture of life in the Militia today. …… This book can not be bettered by any regimental history
in the foreseeable future.
This sweeping narrative …… is so many things - a historical
academic work, a yarn of thrilling military exploits, and a coffee
table book that can be picked up and its hypnotic pages leafed through
time after time whenever one has five or ten minutes to spare. …… There are fabulous characters such as Maj._Gen. Frank Worthington, variously known as "Fearless Frank" or "Fighting Frank," and recruits who fought bullets and bombs in a valiant effort to do their jobs and perhaps just stay alive until the next day. Where, one ponders, did we find such individuals? Could we ever find thousands of men with such stamina today? …… The author stresses [that] Century of Service is not only a military history, it is also a history of Alberta …… [and] …… believes the independence, individuality, self-reliance and ruggedness of the Alberta spirit explains in many ways the character of the regiment itself. Crammed with more than 500 photographs of men and machines,
maps and even cartoons, this book should not only be in everyone's
library, it should be in every classroom in every school in our nation.
A Century of Service -- The History of the South
Alberta Light Horse, is a highly readable account from the distinguished
Canadian military writer Donald E. Graves. An awesome compilation,
not the least of his accomplishments was piecing together the regimental
family tree. It is, however, the personal stories -- and the many
never-before-published pictures -- which hold the reader. The citizen
soldier is a Canadian tradition predating Confederation. Century
of Service is an inspiring record of southern Alberta's contribution.
Graves, and the regimental committee that helped with the work, have
done it justice.
Historian Donald E. Graves lead the pack of modern writers who have transformed regimental histories into valuable works of military history. His two books on the history of the South Alberta Regiment and the South Alberta Light Horse are among the best examples of this valuable new genre and in may ways, have served to inspire the authors of most newly-commissioned unit histories to not only imitate their approach but also to copy their very attractive physical format. [Century of Service is] lavishly illustrated and well-written and detailed ...... contains hundreds of fascinating photographs, well-executed original maps and accurate and detailed scale vehicle drawings. ...... the reader will learn what iw as like to serve in the trenches of the Western Front; how an artillery regiment operated in Normandy and how a Commonwealth armoured regiment was commanded and fought in the Second World War...... If you enjoy stirring but human accounts of soldiering
in peace and war, combat, the technical aspects of combat and the
military history of the violent 20th century, then ... Century
of Service should be on your shelf. |
