Sharpe Books

Sharpe’s first story as an officer takes him to the daunting fort of Gawilghur. This is also the last of his Indian adventures. Sir Arthur Wellesley (the future Duke of Wellington) was never at his shining best when he had to lay siege to great fortresses, and few are greater than Gawilghur up on its vast cliff over the Deccan Plain. In the end the fortress fell to the extraordinary gallantry of some Scottish soldiers and I fear Sharpe muscles in on their achievement.

Sharpe, now a Sergeant, finds himself alongside Sir Arthur Wellesley at the terrifying Battle of Assaye. In later life Sir Arthur (who became, of course, the first Duke of Wellington), always reckoned Assaye was his finest achievement. During the battle he very nearly died, or certainly had his closest escape in a fight, and Sharpe, naturally, is there. The ‘villain’ in this book (apart from Hakeswill) is Anthony Pohlmann, a cheerful Hanoverian rogue who began life as a mercenary ranker and became one of India’s most successful generals.

The first of Richard Sharpe’s Indian adventures, pitting him against the sinister Tippoo Sultan in the siege of Seringapatam, 1799. Like most of the Sharpe novels this one is based on a real campaign, and almost all of the actions described in the book really did take place. Sharpe begins this novel as a private and his worst enemy is not the Tippoo, nor even the Tippoo’s professional strongmen who had interesting ways of putting prisoners to death, but Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill who will continue to harass Sharpe all through the Indian novels.

Richard Sharpe and the Battle of Fuentes de Onoro, May 1811

This, like Sharpe’s Rifles, was written at the request of the TV producers, though I can’t remember why they wanted this one. It tells the ghastly tale of the battle of Fuentes d’Onoro, a bloody struggle on the Portuguese frontier which deteriorated into a gutter fight in the narrow alleys of a small village. It was a French defeat, but they still chiselled it into the Arc de Triomphe as a victory – I guess they were short of victories so just added a few defeats to make up the numbers.

Sharpe, at last, meets Napoleon. I was worried about this, but it’s probably the best passage in the book (and right at the beginning, which is a bad thing). Sharpe then goes on to meet Lord Cochrane, the ‘sea devil’ who was the inspiration for C.S. Forester’s Hornblower and for Patrick O’Brien’s Jack Aubrey.