"Sharpe's Skirmish" is a historical short story by

Bernard Cornwell Bernard Cornwell (born 23 February 1944) is an English author of historical novels and a history of the Waterloo Campaign. He is best known for his long-running series of novels about Napoleonic Wars rifleman Richard Sharpe. He has also writ ...

in the Richard Sharpe series. "Sharpe's Skirmish" was first written in 1998. British bookseller W. H. Smith devised the idea of giving away a Sharpe short story with every copy of '' Sharpe's Fortress''. This irritated other publishers, and only a few thousand copies were printed. Much later, Cornwell revised the story, which was published by the Sharpe Appreciation Society.

Plot

This short story occurs after ''Sharpe's Sword'' in the summer of 1812. Sharpe and his men escort commissary Major Tubbs to an abandoned Spanish fort where a cache of thousands of muskets has been forgotten in the general French retreat in northern Spain. Unbeknownst to the British, French Major Ducos has authorised a surprise raid to threaten the Duke of Wellington's supply lines and hopefully delay the British pursuit long enough for the French to regroup. To accomplish this, the French first need to secure the fort, which guards a bridge across the Tormes River. However, Sharpe stands in the way, and for the first (but by no means last) time thwarts a scheme involving Ducos.

Characters in "Sharpe's Skirmish"

* Captain Richard Sharpe – rifle captain in the British army, commanding the Light Company of the South Essex Regiment * Teresa Moreno – Sharpe's wife, a Spanish partisan *Sergeant Patrick Harper – Sharpe's right-hand man and friend *Major Michael Hogan – an engineer and Wellington's head of intelligence *Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley – commander of the British army in Spain

Allusions to actual history, geography and current science

References are made to incidents during the

Peninsular War The Peninsular War (1808–1814) was fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Kingdom of Portugal, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French ...

and the Siege of Gawilghur. Lieutenant General Wellington was based on the real historical figure of the same name with limited dramatic licence taken.

Publication history

*1999, UK,

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is a British–American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five (publishers), Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group USA, Hachette, Macmi ...

Pub date 1 March 1999, Limited Edition Paperback *2002, UK
Sharpe Appreciation Society
, Pub date 2 September 2002, Revised Extended Paperback Edition

References

External links

Section from Bernard Cornwell's website on ''Sharpe's Skirmish''

Sharpe Appreciation Society

Read on-line
{{Bernard Cornwell 1999 short stories

Skirmish Skirmishers are light infantry or light cavalry soldiers deployed as a vanguard, flank guard or rearguard to Screening (tactical), screen a tactical position or a larger body of friendly troops from enemy advances. They may be deployed in a sk ...

Historical short stories Short stories by Bernard Cornwell HarperCollins books Short stories set in Spain Short stories set in the 1810s