«They are simply marvellous. Wheeler was a naïve writer of real power - a natural story-teller, a provider of portraits, someone whose gift was to bring everything he wrote about to life»

TES

«In a later age he would have become a successful war correspondent ... We have no more human account of the Peninsular War from a participant in all its battles. Vivid images - of people, landscapes, events - flows from his pen ... One of military history's great originals»

John Keegan, DAILY TELEGRAPH

«These letters have already become a minor classic ... deftly edited, they are clear and telling in the accounts they give of a soldier's day-to-day life, a mixture of danger, boredom, discomfort and occasional delight»

GOOD BOOK GUIDE