Images

An 1860s purple silk dress. Such vibrant colours became popular in the Victorian era following the invention of synthetic dies. Victoria & Albert Museum, London.

A 19th-century crinoline cage worn by women to give their outer dress the desired voluminous silhouette. Steel frame covered in red linen and wool. The crinoline's maximum diameter is 2.35 metres (7.7 ft). Victoria & Albert Museum, London...

No Man's Land, illustration by Lucien Jonas, 1927. Lucien Jonas was a French artist appointed as an official military painter after being mobilized in 1914, becoming one of the most prolific and renowned wartime artists of the First World...

Burnside's Bridge at the Antietam Battlefield (also known as Sharpsburg Battlefield near Sharpsburg, Maryland). So-called because Union General Ambrose Burnside wasted countless numbers of Union soldiers' lives trying to cross it during the...

Bombardment of Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor: 12th & 13th of April, 1861, the attack that started the American Civil War, colored lithograph by Currier & Ives, 1861. Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.

The U.S.–Mexican War (1846–1848) marked a decisive moment in the territorial and political transformation of North America. The conflict was triggered by the U.S. annexation of Texas (1845) and a disputed southern boundary, claimed by the...

French Army troops operating a captured German Maxim MG 08 machine gun at Fort Douaumont at the Battle of Verdun (Feb-Dec 1916) during the First World War (1914-18). Imperial War Museums.

Aerial view of the fortress of Douaumont, part of the Verdun complex of fortresses fought over in the Battle of Verdun (Feb-Dec 1916) during the First World War (1914-18). Photographisches Bild- und Film-Amt

A pin badge of the French general Philippe Pétain (1856-1951), who became a national hero after the successful defence of Verdun in the Battle of Verdun (Feb-Dec 1916) during the First World War (1914-18). Imperial War Museums.

The Mississippi Rifles, under Colonel Jefferson Davis, stop a Mexican charge at the Battle of Buena Vista, watercolor by Samuel Chamberlain as published in his My Confession: The Recollections of a Rogue, c. 1860.