Peter Cottrell is currently a serving army officer in the British army. He has recently completed an MA thesis on the Royal Irish Constabulary and is hoping to read a PhD on policing during the Anglo-Irish War. He lives in Wiltshire, UK.

Professor Robert O'Neill, AO D.Phil. (Oxon), Hon D. Litt. (ANU), FASSA, FR Hist S, is the Series Editor of the Essential Histories. He has held a number of eminent positions in history circles, including the Chichele Professorship of the History of War at All Souls College, University of Oxford, 1987-2001, the Chairmanship of the Board of the Imperial War Museum and the Council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, London. He is now based in Australia.

The Anglo-Irish War has often been referred to as the war 'the English have struggled to forget and the Irish cannot help but remember'. Before 1919, the issue of Irish Home Rule lurked beneath the surface of Anglo-Irish relations for many years, but after the Great War, tensions rose up and boiled over. Irish Nationalists in the shape of Sinn Féin and the IRA took political power in 1919 with a manifesto to claim Ireland back from an English 'foreign' government by whatever means necessary. This book explores the conflict and the years that preceded it, examining such historic events as the Easter Rising and the infamous Bloody Sunday.