Woodham-Smith C. The Reason Why

New York: McGraw-Hill, 1953. — 287 p.The Reason Why is a study of the Charge of the Light Brigade, a military disaster during the Crimean War and one of the defining events of the Victorian age. It became Woodham-Smith's most popular book, and afterwards she explained to a television audience how she wrote the Charge itself: working at a gallop through thirty-six hours non-stop without food or other break until the last gun was fired, when she poured a stiff drink and slept for two days. Though the work was critically acclaimed, it came to the conclusion that the allies had lost the Crimean War, which most historians conclude is not true.