Wives, Whores & Amazons - Women in Napoleonic era Armies

Well one of the blames is upon us German speakers, or German historians not interested in doing military history or social military history, it is almost up to amateurs alone to do some sort of research - at their own interest and expense. It is possibly too much to ask for a foreigner to do the work for us and even learning the language.

This leads unbalanced conclusion as like the French Army was unique in a specific topic, or the British.

Yes I agree language skills or lack of it - seemingly is becoming more and more a rare field in training historians.

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As someone with no musical ear, I shudder to speak. I only manage to produce an even passable French accent when I’m cold, wet tired and miserable! My spoken German is strictly limited to subjects such as beer, sandwiches, wurst and a smattering of Formula 1. My Dutch is limited to pleasantries, as I’ve always struggled to find someone who does not instantly switch into fluent English! However, no one should be daunted from what can be achieved with services such as Google translate or a few good dictionaries. Idioms and jokes/sarcasm can be a challenge, but it is surprising how much military and technical jargon can be picked up. What I find fascinating is when translations of quotes or passages arrive in anglophone works by different routes. Heaven forbid I’d ever tout myself as a translator, but following it back to the source allows one to read around the subject and get context. So the message should be ‘courage mon brave”, we have little to fear but much to gain!