GAUDI, Friedrich Wilhelm von.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Instructions for Officers of Infantry, First edition of this translation, in a handsome contemporary binding. "The book describes in great detail everything an engineer officer needed to know about the principles of defence... [and] was extremely popular with British officers" (Fletcher). Gaudi (1725-1788), a Prussian officer of Scottish extraction, served in the Seven Years War and was present at several of Frederick the Great's major battles. His important treatise on fieldworks was first published in 1767 at Wesel, where he was governor of the citadel, under the title Versuch einer Anweisung für Officiers von der Infanterie ("Attempt at instructions for infantry officers"). An English translation published by a Colonel Pleydell in 1768 was used as the basis for this version.The translator, General de Malortie, an officer in the Bourbon army, later published his own works on fortification. Here he describes Gaudi's work as "universally considered as one of the best that was ever published on the subject" (p. i). Malortie included notes throughout and added six additional chapters: "definitions", "basic maxims", entrenchments, on the glacis and covert-ways, and the attack and defence of fieldworks; and six new plates of his own.The list of 249 subscribers, arranged by regiment, is headed by the dedicatee, the Duke of York, and includes several Waterloo officers, including Sir William Ponsonby, Sir Colin Halkett, and Baron Ompteda.Provenance: Charles William Vane, third Marq

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