Comments: Hardcover, 528 pages, black-and-white photos, appendices of “Armoured Trains in Art and Propaganda” (including 16 pages of color images) and “Selected Original Factory Drawings of Armoured Trains and Trolleys.”
ISBN: 978-1-84832-262-2
Price: $62.35
Publisher: Seaforth Publishing
From the publisher:
The military was quick to see the advantages of railways in warfare, whether for the rapid deployment of men or the movement of heavy artillery, making the train a potent weapon in its own right — a mobile fort or a battleship on rails. Armed and armored, they became the first practical self-propelled war machines — and by the time of the American Civil War were able to make a significant contribution in combat.
Thereafter, almost every military power had a railway system that made some use of armored rolling stock, ranging from low-intensity colonial policing to the massive employment of armored trains during the Russian Civil War. Though their mobility was soon eclipsed by tanks and other armored fighting vehicles, armored trains retained a role as late as the civil wars in the former Yugoslavia.
This encyclopedic work covers, country by country, a huge range of railway fighting equipment spanning nearly two centuries. While outlining armored trains in the evolution of warfare, it provides details of their design through photographs and the author’s drawings. Originally published in French in 1989; revised and expanded for this English edition.
FSM says:
If ever there were a railway equivalent of Jane’s Armour and Artillery, this coffee-table tome would be it.