Gareth Glover is a 54 year old ex-Royal Navy Officer who has studied the Napoleonic wars for 40 years. He is now renowned as a Military Historian and particularly as the foremost expert on British memoirs and archival material from across the world of this fascinating period of history.
Over the last ten years, Gareth has brought together many hundreds of newly discovered eyewitness statements from the Battle of Waterloo in his acclaimed six volume series simply known as The Waterloo Archive.
Utilising all of this new material, the 'traditionally accepted version' of the Waterloo Campaign has been found to be wrong in many instances both strategically and tactically, this new evidence has now been published to great acclaim as Waterloo, Myth & Reality.
Gareth is able to explain how the five winners of Waterloo (British, Netherlands - Belgium and Holland together, Prussia, Brunswick and Royalist France) all produced their own versions of the campaign and claimed the lions share of the glory for winning it. This has led to acrimony for centuries and has meant that each nation has grown up with a distorted view of the campaign. This has been further complicated by the later deification of Napoleon and a whole industry set up to prove that it was not his fault that the French army lost.
Error, myths, misquoting and downright falsification of evidence has led to a very distorted story which frankly anyone actually there would really struggle to recognise. On the 200th Anniversary of the battle in 2015 it is high time that this is put right.
Gareth can lead you through this fascinating story, utilising the mass of eyewitness accounts he has uncovered to see the true story struggling beneath the mass of conflicting claims and counter claims.
Gareth is now working on a History of the Second Division at Waterloo entitled 'They Swept the Field Clear'. utilising the newly discovered Clinton papers.
I have known of, known and respected Mr Glover for many years now. He has an international reputation as an author, researcher, and historian. He is an enthusiast and stickler for accurate investigation, using primary source material. He is an accomplished speaker and most worthy of being on a panel of expert lecturers in matters of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.
This would place him in a particularly strong position to talk about personal, generic, strategic and tactical issues of these times. What will be found most engaging will be his ability to recount individual and unit stories, illustrating many contemporary events in the Peninsular campaigns and the events of the 15-19 June 1815, around Waterloo.
He has assisted me in several productions and he would be the first person I would approach to acquire further information on any disputed or unclear relevant historical issues.
MKH Crumplin FRCS (Eng and Ed) FHS FINS, Trustee to the Waterloo Association and Education Lead for Waterloo200
A dynamic and versatile speaker, Josh is able to draw upon his experience and expertise to give inf…