I was mostly going to write a book review as I finished reading 'The Gun, by C.S. Forester'
It was a hard cover edition with a different but also interesting cover from that one. It's set in the Napoleonic wars in spain, (always a safe bet for me). I also like it as the main character is really 'the gun' it's self, an ornamental 18 pounder siege gun. It kind of has to be the main character as anyone else that stands up for the roll gets killed.
As with most of Europe's forces the Spainish regular army got slaughtered by Napoleon and on their desprite retreat into the relative saftey of the mountains of western spain from french who weren't following. The last of their siege guns tipped over on the battered road. The feable team of horses and the starving gun crew couldn't pull the thirteen foot, three ton canon any further. They gave up and walked on.
Days later the gun was found by locals of the hills, slowly moved deeper into the mountains and hidden from french eyes. Then they were pressed into service in a last attempt by the army to repell the invaders, and wiped out.
Two years later the french have control of the spainish plains and outposts and fortresses guarding the river crossing in the bulk of spain. The spainish guerrillas controll the hills unable to attack french fortifications. Then a guerrilla leader hears of a gun that has been hidden away. He marches his men to uncover it. It's carriage has rotted away so he drafts local craftsmen to build a new one and begins the struggle to get the gun back out of the mountains. Mile by mile and some times inch by inch. More men are drafted or join and they near the plains, a feeble collection of livestock and untrustworthy men, and then the leader comes into a village and sees a man on a tall horse, a mountain of an animal, and he loses a duel over it.
The man with the horse and his brother have an advantage, they have a letter giving them any help the british military can offer. The brother takes a small boat out to a royal navy ship off the coast and frightenly seasick, with out a word of common language gets ammunition for the gun. 450 rounds (4 tons) of iron ball, grape and canister, 2,700 pounds of black powder. On the backs of mules it heads inland to find the gun and a french fort guarding bridge.
The forts commander doesn't see a problem defending against some group of guerrillas, he has before, until the first ball blasts threw the wall, and the second ball next to it. The wall falls and the fort is taken but not before the brother is mortaly wounded. The man on the tall horse moves on to a town and after the town is taken the guerrillas have a new leader.
He takes the ten thousand men he now leads up the great road and lays siege to a fortified city. Digs the gun in a fires at a single spot in the unyielding wall, round after round, chips, pebbles, stones, blocks give way. Part way threw he pauses to wipe out a thousand french soldiers with napoleon's own 'wiff of grape' barrels full of canister shot.
The city strikes back with tactics vs. the guerrillas man power and desire, and land a shot on the gun, breaking the carriage. As the spainish look on they land another smashing the barrel. They see their hope of taking the city disappear and they wander back into the hills.
