On the Irrawaddy

by G. A. Henty

First published 1897

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2.5(5)

After the death of his father, young Stanley Brooke remains in India with his uncle, trader Tom Pearson, and develops the language skills and practical knowledge that soon make him valuable when war breaks out between Britain and Burma in 1824. Stanley is drawn from commercial life into military service, where his ability to move between cultures carries him through imprisonment, escape and increasingly dangerous assignments along the Irrawaddy.

The campaign takes him into contact with Burmese commander Maha Bandula and through the difficult advance on Ava, where disease, river transport and unfamiliar terrain are as important as battlefield courage. Stanley’s adventures give the First Anglo-Burmese War a personal scale, following a young man whose usefulness depends as much on observation, disguise and negotiation as on fighting.