The Broadneck Library will be closed Monday, April 1 - Tuesday, April 16 for branch improvements. Please plan to pickup your holds at another location

The Riviera Beach Library is currently closed. For more information on the new location, please visit the Riviera Beach Library

Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War

Book Cover
Average Rating
Publisher:
Varies, see individual formats and editions
Pub. Date:
2013
Language:
English
Description

From the acclaimed military historian, a history of the outbreak of World War I: the dramatic stretch from the breakdown of diplomacy to the battles—the Marne, Ypres, Tannenberg—that marked the frenzied first year before the war bogged down in the trenches.
In Catastrophe 1914, Max Hastings gives us a conflict different from the familiar one of barbed wire, mud and futility. He traces the path to war, making clear why Germany and Austria-Hungary were primarily to blame, and describes the gripping first clashes in the West, where the French army marched into action in uniforms of red and blue with flags flying and bands playing. In August, four days after the French suffered 27,000 men dead in a single day, the British fought an extraordinary holding action against oncoming Germans, one of the last of its kind in history. In October, at terrible cost the British held the allied line against massive German assaults in the first battle of Ypres. Hastings also re-creates the lesser-known battles on the Eastern Front, brutal struggles in Serbia, East Prussia and Galicia, where the Germans, Austrians, Russians and Serbs inflicted three million casualties upon one another by Christmas. 
As he has done in his celebrated, award-winning works on World War II, Hastings gives us frank assessments of generals and political leaders and masterly analyses of the political currents that led the continent to war. He argues passionately against the contention that the war was not worth the cost, maintaining that Germany’s defeat was vital to the freedom of Europe. Throughout we encounter statesmen, generals, peasants, housewives and private soldiers of seven nations in Hastings’s accustomed blend of top-down and bottom-up accounts: generals dismounting to lead troops in bayonet charges over 1,500 feet of open ground; farmers who at first decried the requisition of their horses; infantry men engaged in a haggard retreat, sleeping four hours a night in their haste. This is a vivid new portrait of how a continent became embroiled in war and what befell millions of men and women in a conflict that would change everything.

Also in This Series
More Like This
More Details
ISBN:
9780385351225
9781483073590
Staff View

Grouping Information

Grouped Work ID9aa136d3-79fb-0a1d-2278-b8c23791c645
Grouping Titlecatastrophe 1914 europe goes to war
Grouping Authormax hastings
Grouping Categorybook
Grouping LanguageEnglish (eng)
Last Grouping Update2024-03-29 04:05:49AM
Last Indexed2024-03-29 04:22:12AM

Solr Fields

accelerated_reader_point_value
0
accelerated_reader_reading_level
0
author
Hastings, Max
author_display
Hastings, Max
detailed_location_aacpl
Online OverDrive Collection
display_description

From the acclaimed military historian, a history of the outbreak of World War I: the dramatic stretch from the breakdown of diplomacy to the battles—the Marne, Ypres, Tannenberg—that marked the frenzied first year before the war bogged down in the trenches.
In Catastrophe 1914, Max Hastings gives us a conflict different from the familiar one of barbed wire, mud and futility. He traces the path to war, making clear why Germany and Austria-Hungary were primarily to blame, and describes the gripping first clashes in the West, where the French army marched into action in uniforms of red and blue with flags flying and bands playing. In August, four days after the French suffered 27,000 men dead in a single day, the British fought an extraordinary holding action against oncoming Germans, one of the last of its kind in history. In October, at terrible cost the British held the allied line against massive German assaults in the first battle of Ypres. Hastings also re-creates the lesser-known battles on the Eastern Front, brutal struggles in Serbia, East Prussia and Galicia, where the Germans, Austrians, Russians and Serbs inflicted three million casualties upon one another by Christmas. 
As he has done in his celebrated, award-winning works on World War II, Hastings gives us frank assessments of generals and political leaders and masterly analyses of the political currents that led the continent to war. He argues passionately against the contention that the war was not worth the cost, maintaining that Germany’s defeat was vital to the freedom of Europe. Throughout we encounter statesmen, generals, peasants, housewives and private soldiers of seven nations in Hastings’s accustomed blend of top-down and bottom-up accounts: generals dismounting to lead troops in bayonet charges over 1,500 feet of open ground; farmers who at first decried the requisition of their horses; infantry men engaged in a haggard retreat, sleeping four hours a night in their haste. This is a vivid new portrait of how a continent became embroiled in war and what befell millions of men and women in a conflict that would change everything.

format_aacpl
eAudiobook
eBook
format_category_aacpl
Audio Books
eBook
id
9aa136d3-79fb-0a1d-2278-b8c23791c645
isbn
9780385351225
9781483073590
last_indexed
2024-03-29T08:22:12.006Z
lexile_score
-1
literary_form
Non Fiction
literary_form_full
Non Fiction
local_callnumber_aacpl
Online OverDrive
owning_library_aacpl
Anne Arundel County Public Library Online
owning_location_aacpl
Online OverDrive Collection
primary_isbn
9780385351225
publishDate
2013
publisher
Blackstone Publishing
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
recordtype
grouped_work
title_display
Catastrophe 1914 Europe Goes to War
title_full
Catastrophe 1914 Europe Goes to War
title_short
Catastrophe 1914
title_sub
Europe Goes to War
topic_facet
History
Military
Nonfiction
Politics

Solr Details Tables

item_details

Bib IdItem IdShelf LocCall NumFormatFormat CategoryNum CopiesIs Order ItemIs eContenteContent SourceeContent URLDetailed StatusLast CheckinLocation
overdrive:7b572e08-8505-4772-a455-7ae3cacb0f511Online OverDrive CollectionOnline OverDriveeBookeBook0falsetrueOverDriveChecked Out
overdrive:7b572e08-8505-4772-a455-7ae3cacb0f51-1Online OverDrive CollectionOnline OverDriveeBookeBook2falsetrueOverDriveChecked Out
overdrive:de1b6d82-e8e5-4c7e-947f-3767a836c94a1Online OverDrive CollectionOnline OverDriveeAudiobookAudio Books0falsetrueOverDriveChecked Out
overdrive:de1b6d82-e8e5-4c7e-947f-3767a836c94a-1Online OverDrive CollectionOnline OverDriveeAudiobookAudio Books2falsetrueOverDriveChecked Out

record_details

Bib IdFormatFormat CategoryEditionLanguagePublisherPublication DatePhysical DescriptionAbridged
overdrive:7b572e08-8505-4772-a455-7ae3cacb0f51eBookeBookEnglishKnopf Doubleday Publishing Group2013
overdrive:de1b6d82-e8e5-4c7e-947f-3767a836c94aeAudiobookAudio BooksEnglishBlackstone Publishing2013

scoping_details_aacpl

Bib IdItem IdGrouped StatusStatusLocally OwnedAvailableHoldableBookableIn Library Use OnlyLibrary OwnedHoldable PTypesBookable PTypesLocal Url
overdrive:7b572e08-8505-4772-a455-7ae3cacb0f511Checked OutChecked Outfalsefalsetruefalsefalsetrue
overdrive:7b572e08-8505-4772-a455-7ae3cacb0f51-1Checked OutChecked Outfalsefalsetruefalsefalsefalse
overdrive:de1b6d82-e8e5-4c7e-947f-3767a836c94a1Checked OutChecked Outfalsefalsetruefalsefalsetrue
overdrive:de1b6d82-e8e5-4c7e-947f-3767a836c94a-1Checked OutChecked Outfalsefalsetruefalsefalsefalse