How Can Man Die Better: The Secrets of Isandlwana Revealed

First, this book and Like Wolves On the Fold are two excellent companion pieces. One deals with Isandlwana, the other with the defense of Rorke's Drift. Col. Snook has spent time with the Zulu and is a retired British Army officer who understands infantry battle. His respect for the men on both sides of the battle shows through the book. Neither side is shortchanged. Col. Snook makes the battle entirely understandable and as clear as it can be. His account of the fight along the flank of the Isandlwana hill, and the attempt at the end to rally under Isandlwana along the road is unmatched. He also shows the reader how Durnford's NNC troops were set on in the south, retreated, and sparked alarm in the main camp, then how the impis that moved on to Rorke's Drift missed the main fight when they moved behind Isandlwana into the valley to envelop those who were retreating to Fugitives' Drift. Before the book is finished, you know where each company was located, how it maneuvered, and what happened to its men in detail. Five stars for this one, although this book, like Like Wolves On the Fold, is not for the casual reader, but for the person interested in specific and intricate detail.

This book is like The Perfect Storm: no one knows for sure what happened at the end because no one was there--at least no Europeans. (A better analogy might be the Mahler 10th symphony as completed by Cooke; sketches existed but they needed to organized and filled in.) So if you like your history backed up by solid evidence (with no accomodation for "what ifs" and "maybes") at every turn, this book is not for you.

Others have criticized Chelmsford's mistakes and those of other participants, but where Snook's book really fills a void is his analysis of the last stand of the companies of the 24th. I found his version of events completely plausible and compelling; he just has to be basically right. He does go a bit overboard, so that the story is told at the spear-jabbing, bayonet-thrusting level, but he turns out to be such a great action writer that he carries the reader along with him. Even if you keep asking yourself: how does he really know that?--it doesn't matter. The book is a masterpiece of reconstruction. If you know that going in, you will appreciate Snook's work as a long-overdue tribute to the 24th regiment and the men who died at Isandlwana.

This book attempts to revise popular perceptions of the battle of Islandlwana, in the 1870s in which over 1,200 British troops (over six times as many as died at the Little Bighorn) arrayed in battle formation with modern rifles and supported by cannon and rocket fire were overrun and slaughtered by Zulu forces armed primarily with short stabbing spears and clubs. The author makes the point that almost all accounts of the battle come from those Europeans who fled the scene ahead of the charging Zulu forces, as those who held their ground and fought on, were overwhelmed and killed and very little attempt was made to gather accounts from the Zulu participants. So, the popular accounts come from witnesses who actually did not see most of the battle. Those who have seen the movie "Zulu Dawn" will have a pretty fair idea of the traditional view. One of the heros of that view and the movie, Colonel Durnford, comes in for particularly harsh treatment in this book. Well written and well worth reading.

I have just finished the good Colonel's book. While I agree with the other reviewers for the most part, I have some issues. The devil is in the details. Yes, it is an exhaustive survey of the battle--a fair and resonable review of the battle with solid extrapolation where details are not available. But the overall narrative is constantly interrupted with details of who is stationed where, when, how equiped and why and etc. Snook crams in so much detail that it can get confusing to keep track of what is going on over all. We constantly fly from one location to another and must forever be "setting the table" before finally moving what happened on the battlefield forward a little bit. The basic structure is what is going on hour by hour pretty much on the British side, although there is a good bit from the Zulu prospective included. It is kind of like reading a book of footnotes in a way. It is an exciting story, and the author is obviously proud of the British military as fighting men. But the flow is not there. The prose is clean and the author's delivery is very even-handed, but the suspense is killed with the constant halts for details! It may be the best analysis factually of the battle we will get, and that is to the author's credit. I found the maps ok, but it is annoying to read about people and units in the text and not have them all identified on the maps. He also includes photos of the battle site with unit locations hand written over them--but many of the locations look the same to me and are labled with different units having fought there. Maybe it would have been better to spend one chapter on the individuals important to the story, one chapter on British equipment & weapons, one on tactics of the era, etc. and then let the story flow from beginning to end. At least that way, those who don't enjoy such details could skip to the main story and refer back if need be. I hate to be a "naysayer" but I have read much better flowing battle narratives.

I've been interested in this battle since I was a small child and saw Zulu on TV, sadly this author falls into the same trap as all the others I've read on this subject in that most of what he presents is fiction and not fact. The author takes too much time wasting the reader’s time in explaining the make-up of the 24th and in details that only someone keen on those details would appreciate. He never fully explains the politics behind the move for the British army to move on the Zulu. The author also never explains the reasoning for the British not sending in far greater fire power to crush any opposition. When he speaks of the British fighting man he uses too much flowery prose and tends to over exaggerate their fighting abilities. Much like at the Little Big Horn we may never know the full truth behind what happened but to embellish the fight as he did is a disservice.
Until a full archaeological excavation of the battle field is taken the full truth of the final moments will never be told and I’m shocked that no one has taken on this task, could it be that the full truth will tarnish the myth set forth by this author and others. I agree that the rifle used by the British regulars at that time was far better than anything the native had but the author greatly embellishes the superiority of this weapon. Recently on YouTube it was revealed that it was the cartridge and not the rifle that let the British down, the cartridges tended to jam when not placed into the breach with care. As someone who has experience with a jammed weapon while under fire in Iraq I can see how this could have allowed the Zulu to overwhelm the British.
In the end it was hubris that doomed the British on that day just as hubris doomed Custer a few years earlier.

I've been fascinated with this period of English military history ever since seeing the film "Zulu" as a teenager in the mid '60's. I searched out a couple of books on the period over the years and ended up with the typical standard historical overview that, while perhaps informative from a historians perspective, left me wanting more. I never felt that the main players motivations, character and human failings or heroism had been fully fleshed out and placed within the full context of the engagement. Mike Snook has fulfilled that desire to understand and comprehend this battle and it's participants more satisfactorily than any book of it's kind and I can not recommend it highly enough.

I just finished reading it for the second time in 8 months and found subtle character nuances and thrilling glimpses of the pace and flow of the battle that left me breathless. Snook is a natural born story teller and his approach to the tale transcends typical historical fare and places you on the ground in the midst of the motivations, mistakes and chaos of the battle. As a lifelong professional soldier and member of the regiment in question there may be some subtle bias on his part but he writes with such authority and clarity that I'm inclined to accept his conclusions. I've read a number of reviews that criticize his seeming absolution of Pulleine's oversights and shortcomings but he addresses these issues several times and then precedes to not dwell on the obvious and moves on from there with one of the most thrillingly told battle recreations I have ever read. I was reluctant at first to accept that Durnford was not necessarily the heroic figure as portrayed by Burt Lancaster in "Zulu Dawn" (cherished cinema heroes die hard sometimes...lol) but be that as it may, this is a book I will reread again and again.

This book tells the story of the greatest defeat of the British army in the late Victorian age - by an army of Zulu Africans. In the story, many of the misconceptions of this battle are corrected - including the most popular one that the soldiers in the firing line were not able to the get the bullets that they needed to fight the battle. This was probably given as the reason initially to provide a rationalization, an excuse some would call it, for why a British unit would be defeated by what they considered essentially to be savages.

The real story regarding why the British were defeated is a lot more interesting than the one above. Primarily they were defeated because the Zulus won - the Zulus defeated them. Also, the British defeated themselves by not following proper procedures while on campaign - similarily to what happened to Custer at the Little Big Horn. The officers were too cocky and consequently, the enlisted man paid for it with his life. The book lays out in some detail what the British officers could have done to better prepare for this battle.

However, the enlisted British soldier sold his life dearly to the Zulus resulting in a seriously bloody battle and the details are provided to give a sense of how bloody it was. This book is not for the squemish. If you like to read about the British colonial period and military history, then this book is for you.

In February 1968 at the beginning of the Tet Offensive, I experienced many of the moments described in this moving book. We all shook hands and said goodbye just before an launching an unsupported assault on a North Vietnamese regiment with predictable consequences. if we had bayonets, we fixed them too, a last-ditch effort to survive, as Snook explains. He account is about as fine a read on the gruesome details of the close fight as one will ever encounter.

Charles Krohn
Author, The Lost Battalion of Tet

This title I found well organized {topic headings} with helpful maps and photographs. There does abound here, interesting, though controversial, supposition. The work is worth a read keeping this in mind.

Lots of good detail and background combined with an obvious bias towards British imperial officers. Other books have covered it, but Durnford was made a scapegoat by the lying (proven and documented) Chelmsford and his secretary. Even the Duke at Horseguards was appaled at how they lied about his failures and attempted to pin them on the mere "colonial" officer Durnford. Snook continues that weasely tradition of protecting the British officer corps at all costs.