Lady De Lancey at Waterloo, A Story of Duty and Devotion; David Miller

This book tells the tragic story of William De Lancey, who became one of the first professional staff officers in the British Army, worked for Wellington throughout the Penisular War, and was his chief-of-staff at the Battle of Waterloo. His wife Magdelene Hall led a sheltered life until, having been married barely a month, she accompanied her husband to Brussels, was parted from him by the Waterloo campaign, found him afterwards wounded, and then nursed him for ten days until he died. Out of the tragedy of his death came a widow's moving tribute to her dead husband, the poignancy of which has not diminished with time.

This Fascinating account of duty and devotion, which soon became the talk of Georgian Britain and which Charles Dickens later described as 'astonishing and tremendous', had been lost to time until found in a dusty trunk in 1999. David Miller's incisive study features reproduction of the authentic text of the abridged version of Lady De Lancey's narrative - the story in the words of the lady herself - and includes an analysis and historiography of this important source from the Napoleonic period.