The Spanish Ulcer: A History of the Peninsular War

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  J. Draper said,

  This is the first history of the Peninsular War that I’ve read, so on the one hand I can’t compare it to other works on the subject as some other reviewers have done. On the other hand, I perhaps view the book differently since I am outside of that context.

  I found the book to be a useful precis of the military campaigns. I was disappointed that more attention wasn’t paid to political and economic forces and repercussions, or to the geurillas. I found the book to be useful for listing what happened, but very light on explaining why. I understand that is, perhaps, too much to ask for in 1 volume. I was also disappointed at what I found to be a dry presentation of the sequence of events.

  I found the writing style to be easy to read once I got past some annoying eccentricities. Gates’ use of semicolons; seemed odd, at least to an American reader. It seems that ‘Army of XYZ’ need not be put in single quotation marks (and why single?) every time it is mentioned (I know, picky-picky). In the early chapters, Gates’ switches between references to individuals by their names (e.g., “Marshal Soult”) and their Imperial titles (e.g., “Duke of Dalmatia”), which was at first confusing to someone who was not already familiar with the personages so referenced.

  The number of maps and figures is grossly inflated and they do not support the text well, partly because of their poor quality. I noticed that the same map of Badajoz is reproduced at least 4 times. As another reviewer notes, the randomly rotating compass rose is annoying. A set of two maps which purports to show troop positions on the first day of a battle (in the first map) and on the second day (in the second map) are, in fact, identical except for a small typo. Elsewhere, one encounters a map of a battle that is mentioned in the text but not described. Campaign-level maps do not often show terrain features or road networks; battle-level maps never attempt to illustrate troop movements or stages of the fighting. Several of the figures are reproductions of paintings of events, and are of such poor quality as to be worthless (oddly, except for two paintings by Goya, no attribution to artists is made–perhaps Gates was the painter). The publisher mentions that more than 100 maps and figures occur in the volume–which means that the book could have been at least 75 pages shorter (or could have included 75 more pages of analysis and interpretation).

  In summary, I found this an educational outline of the military campaigns of the Peninsular War. The work is damaged by very poor production values. I found it a useful read, but not a very entertaining one–and sometimes a frustrating one.
  Rating: 3 / 5

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  William S. Grass said,

  Gates’ Spanish Ulcer is a one-volume history of the Peninsular War waged by France in Spain from 1808-1814. It covers all operations in this complicated conflict and contains a map every three or four pages. There is plenty here for the academic doing research, the professional military person learning the origins of guerilla, or 4th generation warfare, or the war gamer who wants to know the terrain and order of battle for a particular engagement. For the casual reader such as myself, however, the narrative is too dense and the descriptions of operations too detailed. I would have personally preferred an account that either focuses biographically on Wellington or the French marshals, or gives a smoother narrative of developments. Such was not Gates’ goal, so I won’t subtract any stars just because I chose the wrong book on the Peninsular War for myself. The Spanish Ulcer certainly deserves five stars for hitting the mark for those more specialized purposes.
  Rating: 5 / 5

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  R. Miller said,

  In reading the Richard Sharpe series by Cornwell, one is left with an incomplete understanding of just how complex, difficult and messy the Peninsular War really was. Richard goes here – problem solved. Richard goes there – problem solved. This excellent book places all of the players in chronological and historical perspective giving the full picture of the military actions in this war. It gives scant attention to the political machinations of the adversaries; but does tie in the ebb and flow of Napoleon’s commitment to this open wound on his southern flank. Well written and researched this book is well worth it.
  Rating: 5 / 5

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  D. S. Thurlow said,

  David Gates’ “The Spanish Ulcer” provides one of the very few single volume histories of the Peninsular War that attempts to address the entire conflict and not focus on, for example, the exploits of the Anglo-Portuguese Army. Gates addresses the actions of the Imperial French, the struggles of the Spanish politicians, armies and guerillas, and the fiasco of Portugal prior to the British intervention. That Gates manages to do in one volume what Charles Oman required seven volumes to cover is, however, both a strength and a weakness. On the one hand, students of the era now have a single reasonably comprehensive summary of the Peninsular War phase. On the other hand, of necessity, much of the detail of a very complex conflict is compressed, while the narrative tends to jump from place to place. Some advance knowledge of the conflict is almost required to make sense of the many moving parts. Unfortunately, the maps provided in the text are not well designed and more confusing than helpful. Readers are advised to track the action on their own large map of the Iberian Peninsula. This book is strongly recommended to those with an interest in the Peninsular War but not the time or energy to work through the longer studies.
  Rating: 4 / 5

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  C. Falzone said,

  Text, narrative, facts and readability all rate very high, 5 star level actually, but, and I just refuse to understand how, after pouring himself into researching and writing an excellent piece on a topic that is not, lets say, especially overwhelmed with offerings, he can allow the third grade drawings he includes to be foisted off as maps.
  Rating: 4 / 5

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