Sophia Nash, PhD student

Fighting from the saddle: Horsemanship and combat effectiveness in the British Army of the long eighteenth-century

Thursday 25 May 2023 at 4pm, in Room 203, 10 University Gardens

The focus of this research is to explore the equestrian nuance underpinning campaigns and engagements involving mounted troops, which is habitually overlooked by contemporaries and historians alike, if for differing reasons. The aim is to determine the degree to which performance was intrinsically linked to horsemanship.

The interrelation between welfare, management and riding in defining ‘horsemanship’ is crucial to understanding the cascade effect of poor horse management into tactical shortcomings; an assessment from this angle leads to a re-evaluation of notions of ‘success’ for mounted engagements, particularly in the attritional campaign warfare which came to characterise the British Army experience of the period. 

This seminar will seek to address some of the ‘unknown unknowns’ of this equestrian perspective, as well as the resulting missed opportunities for analysis, presented via case study engagements and contemporary literature.

Please note: this is a hybrid event, and anyone interested in the hybrid option should email Rachel.Chin@glasgow.ac.uk for the zoom details.

Military equitation or a method of breaking horses and teaching soldiers to ride. Designed for the use of the Army. Third edition, with plates. Revised and Corrected, with Additions By Henry Herbert comte de Pembroke · 1778 https://www.google.co.u

First published: 6 April 2023

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