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The Reason Why: The Story of the Fatal Charge of the Light Brigade Paperback – Illustrated, July 1, 1991

4.5 out of 5 stars 108 ratings

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This history is a war story of astonishing courage and honor, of stupidity, of blood, death, agony -- and waste.

Nothing in British campaign history has ever equaled the tragic farce that was the charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War's Battle of Balaclava on October 25, 1854. In this fascinating study, Cecil Woodham-Smith shows that responsibility for the fatal mismanagement of the affair rested with the Earls of Cardigan and Lucan, brothers-in-law and sworn enemies for more than thirty years.

In revealing the combination of pride and obstinacy that was to prove so fatal, Woodham-Smith gives us a picture of a vanished world, in which heroism and military glory guaranteed an immortality impossible in a more cynical age.
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Cecil Blanche Woodman-Smith was a British historian and author of popular history books on the Victorian era, including The Great Hunger, Queen Victoria, The Reason Why, and Thin Men of Hadda. She was appointed CBE in 1960, and received honorary doctorates from the National University of Ireland and the University of St. Andrews. She died in 1977.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ 0140012788
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Group
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ July 1, 1991
  • Edition ‏ : ‎ Reprint
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 288 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9780140012781
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0140012781
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 8.9 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.06 x 0.65 x 7.75 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.5 out of 5 stars 108 ratings

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Customer reviews

4.5 out of 5 stars
108 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book engaging, with one noting it reads like a suspense novel. The writing style receives positive feedback, with one customer describing it as a wonderful work of historical writing. They appreciate the storyline, with one mentioning it covers all the back story. The pacing receives mixed reactions, with one customer finding it boring.

17 customers mention "Readability"17 positive0 negative

Customers find the book highly readable, describing it as fascinating and very enjoyable, with one customer noting it reads like a suspense novel.

"...It’s a deep read, a long read, and a good read." Read more

"Many a historian rate this as a must read book. Written in the early 1900's it is still being published and read to this day...." Read more

"...It is an outstanding review of what led to the "Charge of the Light Brigade." This, along with the Custer debacle and the story of &#..." Read more

"...Let me be clear first of all - I think this is a good book, I recommend it, but with the following provisios. 1...." Read more

17 customers mention "Writing style"17 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the writing style of the book, describing it as well-crafted and detailed, with one customer noting it provides a thorough account of the English Military.

"...Still, it's well written, detailed and does indeed give you the reason why, even if that reason is mostly petty vanity." Read more

"...probably have written something like "good effort, well written lots of hard work, but you need to stick to the point and draw clear..." Read more

"...of those most responsible for it, and, a rather detailed account of the English Military at the time...." Read more

"Interesting overview of this famous event. A real bit of insight into mid-nineteenth century British society...." Read more

3 customers mention "Storyline"3 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the storyline of the book, with one mentioning it covers all the back story and another noting it is based on true events.

"This is a fasinating book. It covers all the back story of the charge of the light brigade and why is was such a slaughter...." Read more

"Interesting overview of this famous event. A real bit of insight into mid-nineteenth century British society...." Read more

"...Only in this case the story is true and told with good accuracy...." Read more

3 customers mention "Pacing"0 positive3 negative

Customers find the pacing of the book negative, with one describing it as boring and another noting the author's spectacularly inept tactical portrayal.

"...Yet Raglan had never led troops in the field, and proved a spectacularly inept tactician. "..." Read more

"...it, and you're left with a sense that they were indeed unthinking, uncaring and incredibly narrow...." Read more

"Truly one of the most boring books about such an interesting tragic mistake due to the (well-know and overly-reported) foils of British classism" Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on August 26, 2012
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Cecil Woodham-Smith's The Reason Why recounts the infamous Charge of the Light Brigade with unparalleled style. Not a truly objective history, Woodham-Smith's book is an eloquent, sweeping condemnation of the Victorian class system. Using two officers - Lords Cardigan and Lucan - as a prism on British society, she shows the combination of arrogance, bad judgment and miscommunication that led to the sacrifice of the "Noble 600."

    James Brudenell, 7th Earl of Cardigan proves singularly representative of aristocratic shortcomings. The only son in a family of daughters, he grew spoiled by parental dotage, generating an egotism mixed with dreams of military glory. By adulthood Cardigan was an almost caricature nobleman: handsome and gallant, but arrogant, snobbish and short-tempered. Woodham-Smith's claim that Cardigan's "glorious golden head had nothing in it" (15) is unfair; biographer Saul David shows that Cardigan was both intelligent and a good student. However, Cardigan certainly lacked in other areas: common sense, tact and especially temperance.

    Commanding first the 15th, and later the 11th Hussars, Cardigan proved harshly exacting. His stringent standards made the 11th Hussars England's premiere cavalry regiment, but they also engendered the loathing of his officers and men. He certainly kept England's press abuzz with sundry scandals. Minor breaches of etiquette sent him into apoplexy: he scandalized the Army by blackballing John Reynolds, a young captain who dared serve Moselle at a champagne dinner (the famous "black bottle" affair), and flogging a soldier on Easter Sunday. Cardigan himself violated societal mores through repeated duels and scandalous love affairs. He was publicly booed at theaters and public gatherings, becoming a perennial headache for his superiors. An exasperated Duke of Wellington proclaimed "he had never known the time of the staff... to be taken up in so useless a manner" (100).

    Profiled in parallel is George Bingham, 3rd Earl of Lucan. Lucan easily bested Cardigan in sheer bloody-minded nastiness. He gained infamy for cruelly managing his Mayo estates during the Irish potato famine. Consolidating land holdings and evicting tenants en mass, he caused untold suffering among his subjects and intense hatred: "it is doubtful if he considered the Irish as human beings at all" (113). Like Cardigan, he was also a martinet of the worst sort, a brutal taskmaster "perpetually entangled in trifles" (33) in commanding his troops and often contemptuous of superiors. Lucan found increasingly petty and bizarre ways of exerting authority: at one point, he ordered his cavalry drilled in antiquated Napoleonic tactics against Raglan's express orders.

    Not surprisingly, these men loathed each other. Lucan married Cardigan's sister and by all accounts mistreated her, igniting a personal feud. Naturally, when the Crimean War broke out Cardigan (heading the Light Brigade) found himself serving under division commander Lucan. Commanding general Lord Raglan exacerbated things by separating Cardigan from Lucan's main body, thus undermining Lucan's authority. Even in the field, the two men never missed an opportunity to spite or undermine each other, with disastrous results.

    Woodham-Smith forcefully attacks the British military that spawned them. The purchase system, by which officers could literally buy a higher rank, had its benefits. It forestalled the establishment of a powerful, Prussian-style military class, and forced officers to take personal responsibility for their regiment's upkeep. In practice however, it populated the Army with dilettantes and adventurers, seeing military service as a stepping stone to easy prestige. Nominally officers could advance by merit; in practice men without experience or qualification leapfrogged over seasoned career soldiers. Lord Palmerston proclaimed that "it was very desirable to connect the higher classes of Society with the Army" (30), whether or not they were fit to lead.

    The lack of a major war since 1815 ensured an antiquated senior staff. Commanding the Allied armies was Fitzroy Somerset, Baron Raglan. Wellington's longtime secretary, Raglan's bravery (he had lost an arm at Waterloo), amiability and organizational skills were unquestioned. His greatest achievement was ensuring smooth relations with his French and Turkish allies. Yet Raglan had never led troops in the field, and proved a spectacularly inept tactician. "Without the military trappings... one would never have guessed him to be a soldier," Woodham-Smith says (161). He proved frustratingly absent-minded, constantly confusing his French allies with the Russian enemy. An exasperated junior officer complained that "everything [is] old at the top. This makes everything sluggish."

    The Crimean disaster becomes tragically predictable. Horses crowded into transport ships died en route to the Crimea. Raglan botched the Allied attack at the Alma, forcing British troops to take and retake the same ground repeatedly. Over-caution and mis-communicaton prevented a complete victory when Raglan refuses Lucan's request to launch a follow-up attack. Raglan ill-advisedly shifted the Allied supply base to Balaclava, a tiny village ill-suited for supplying two massive armies. Finally, administrative muddle ensures inadequate supplies and medical treatment, causing thousands of troops to die of disease and exposure.

    In fairness, most officers shared many misfortunes with their men. Both Raglan and his French counterpart Marshall St. Arnaud ultimately succumbed to dysentery. Lucan was wounded at Balaclava and even his detractors granted him personal bravery. Cardigan however spent evenings on his yacht in Calamita Bay, entertaining civilian friends and distancing himself from his brigade's hardships. Lest this seem unduly extravagant, military buffs may remember American General George McClellan lunching while the Battle of Malvern Hill raged, Boer War commander Charles Warren stopping his division's advance for a bath, or Charles Townshend dining on plum duff at Kut while his troops starved. This mixture of sang froid and self-indulgence seems unfortunately prevalent.

    Woodham-Smith hits her rhetorical stride with Balaclava. She recounts the stirring stand of Colin Campbell's "Thin Red Line," and the gallant Charge of the Heavy Brigade, where 300 cavalrymen under James Scarlett defeated 2,000 Cossacks in a wild uphill charge. Woodham-Smith captures the excitement and fleeting glory of these skirmishes. Against all odds, the British seemed poised to win a spectacular victory. Yet Cardigan stood by, using a discretionary order from Lucan as an excuse not to attack the routed Cossacks. Had Cardigan followed up on Scarlett's success, the third phase of the battle might never have occurred.

    Instead, a classic example of mismanagement follows. Raglan dictates an unclear order to quartermaster Richard Airey, instructing Lucan to attack Russian troops taking capture guns away from the Causeway Heights. Captain Louis Nolan, Raglan's impulsive aide, delivers the message to an agitated Lucan, emphatically pointing at the nearest guns. Neither man recognizes Nolan's fatal mistake: that Lucan cannot see the Heights from his position. Nolan instead gestures towards a mass of Russians supported by artillery in the valley ahead. Stung by accusations of "looking on" in earlier engagements, Lucan does not ask Nolan to clarify his order, and Cardigan protests halfheartedly. Before anyone realizes it, the Light Brigade initiates its fateful charge.

    Historians still dissect the Charge in hope of assigning blame, following the footsteps of Cardigan and Lucan's vicious postwar press feud. Woodham-Smith dodges the issue of individual guilt, viewing Balaclava instead as the logical conclusion of an entire system. For all their gallantry, the British cavalry could not achieve the impossible, and find themselves decimated by well-placed cannon and overwhelming numbers. With so many egotists and incompetents staffing the Army, the Light Brigade's fate seems inevitable. If the British Army was gradually reformed after Crimea, it came at great cost and only grudgingly. The purchase system was not abolished until the Cardwell reforms of 1868-1874, largely at the impetus of Crimean veteran Garnet Wolseley.

    If The Reason Why isn't definitive, it's because of its limited portrayal of the Crimea (the book mostly ends at Balaclava) and its editorial tone. More recent works (Terry Brighton's Hell Riders, Saul David's The Homicidal Earl) eschew Woodham-Smith's polemical approach for more balanced analysis. Still, Woodham-Smith's passionate anger and vivid prose make it the most readable account of the Light Brigade's sorry fate, and a classic account of military incompetence.
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  • Reviewed in the United States on September 11, 2023
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    As a history major who often gets fixated on a particular historical event, I got hooked on The Charge of the Light Brigade and bought this book after reading multiple reviews online. The author takes their time walking through the lives and careers of the two principals - almost to the point where you wonder where it’s all going - until the climatic battle where the reader finally understands the many layers of context undergirding the decisions that day. It’s a deep read, a long read, and a good read.
  • Reviewed in the United States on January 25, 2021
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    I bought this book after rewatching one of my favorite movies, 'Charge of the Light Brigade,' (1968). The relationship between Lord Lucan and Lord Cardigan is astounding. Two congenital aristocrats with differing strengths and weaknesses who won't let a war get in the way of their dislike for each other. It really is fodder for black comedy. The only drawback to the enjoyment of all this insane Peacocking, is the realization that human life was at stake. You see Lucan during the potato famine (although the author does go out of her way to describe the multi-layered complexity of the situation) as a cartoon evil landlord dispersing starving Irish on horseback, only it's no cartoon. While it's fun to marvel at the outlandishness of these characters, their callous cruelty to anyone born beneath them spoils it, and you're left with a sense that they were indeed unthinking, uncaring and incredibly narrow. Still, it's well written, detailed and does indeed give you the reason why, even if that reason is mostly petty vanity.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on November 19, 2013
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Many a historian rate this as a must read book. Written in the early 1900's it is still being published and read to this day. It is the story of the Charge of the Light Birgade. If you are into British History this is a must read. I read the book over 30 years ago when a college friend recommended it. I ordered it on Amazon a year ago to re-read it, then gave it to a friend lived in Scotland and who is into history. He in turn sent it to his son who makes a living playing bagpipes in Colorado. The book gets into the British psychic, and how command was purchased not always deserved. The battles of the Crimean War have amazed scholars and casual readers alike. The book deals with how the British Office thought and carried out orders as well as details on the battles themselves.
    7 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on February 22, 2017
    I just ordered this book from Amazon to replace a copy I gave away a few years ago -- gave it to a young high schooler who has a deep love for history. I purchased this book about 1970 with the Doubleday Bargain Book Club, and read it several times. It is an outstanding review of what led to the "Charge of the Light Brigade." This, along with the Custer debacle and the story of "The Lady Be Good" are stories that have long fascinated me. I was so glad to find all the answers in this book. And the answers really show what problems existed with the British system of purchasing officer ranks with no real understanding of military tactics.
    2 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • phil
    5.0 out of 5 stars Highly readable yet thoroughly detailed account of one of Britains most well known military blunders.
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 16, 2014
    The study of this book was a mandatory part of my Eng. Lit. GCSE course almost 50 years ago. I promised myself one day that I would read it again perhaps when it would mean more to me having had some life experience etc. I was not disappointed - this isn't just a study of that ill fated charge but also a very insightful study of those times. The power structures and hierarchies of a time when the aristocracy still pretty much ruled the roost. Lord Cardigan (who led the charge) himself was perhaps the most enigmatic of all. He was pretty much a bully, martinet and very much a pedant when it suited him. Yet despite his many failings he was possessed of a genuine remarkable courage. I say this because if the story written here is to be believed he led the charge knowing full well it was reckless in the extreme and indeed did not personally expect to survive it. The superior officer who gave the order was a long time rival if not enemy of Lord Cardigan and he had thought little of disobeying or ignoring orders from him in the past - so I can only speculate why suddenly he was so obedient. My theory is that the other orders had more to do with the day to day running of the camp or were more administrative in nature and therefore it is possible that Lord Cardigan did not attach as much importance to such orders as those concerning direct military action. This is the only part of the story that I wish had been examined in more detail and indeed it is quite possible that other books about Lord Cardigan and\or the ill fated charge have shed more light on this apparent contradiction. All in all though I thought it a remarkable book obviously well researched and gives the modern reader a window into a world (for better or worse) now long gone forever.
  • alan H
    5.0 out of 5 stars No nonsense narrative style with relevant incidental information giving a ...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 19, 2014
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    No nonsense narrative style with relevant incidental information giving a feel for the period. Although no definitive solution in this 'blame-game', such is life, it nonetheless gives the reader enough satisfaction while still leaving the door open for other writers to 'keep digging'.
    Her other book on the eponymous 'Florence Nightingale' , although not going into so much detail as Prof.Lynn McDonald, is also a most readable primer on the subject. Mrs. Cecil has left a worthy legacy.
  • Simnut
    4.0 out of 5 stars Good read though
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 7, 2014
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Very interesting insight into the army, the politics and society in general in the 19th century.
    Although with 21st century hindsight, if the descriptions of the author are to be considered accurate, it's difficult to comprehend how such a bunch of mal-adjusted bunglers built an Empire. As described, the characters involved could not be trusted to organise the proverbial gathering at the local beer manufacturer.
    I found the book both entertaining and informative, with a cliff-hanging climax leading to the well-known disaster. However it left me with a desire for further research. I can't help but think that the author over-egged the pudding in her descriptions of the main protagonists as over-privileged hooray henrys.
    Good read though, and recommended.
  • Mrs Marlene Cooper
    5.0 out of 5 stars An absorbing and detailed account of the Charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 22, 2014
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    This book gives a detailed and historic account of the family rivalry and dislike which existed between Lords Lucan and Cardigan which influenced events leading to the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade.
    Cecil Woodham-Smith's book is an absorbing and compelling read giving insight into how Army appointments were made in the nineteenth century and in particular how misunderstanding and misdirection combined with the bitter antipathy of Lucan and Cardigan resulted in the tragic loss of men and horses.
  • Mrs. Alexandra K. Macevoy
    5.0 out of 5 stars The Reason Why....
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 26, 2013
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    The subject is all in the title of the book. It was brought to my attention by a note in "Flashman" by Gorden MacDonald Fraser referring to this book. The book is a very easy book to read and is extremly informative about the characters who were involved in the Charge of the Light Brigade and their influence on the outcome.

    Almost in the style of "Flashman" Cecil Woodham Smith explains the whole of the story of the charge and how it fits into the outcome of the Crimean War. She relates how two brothers-in- law (Lord Cardigan and Lord Lucan) personal enmity came to be an enormous infulence on how the charge came about.