Almark Publishing

The first Almark book I bought was Emir Bukhari 'French Napoleonic Line Infantry' published in 1973. I bought a copy from a giant pile of remaindered copies in W. H. Smith....

There is a history of Almark Publishing yet to be written - they produced innumerable books on uniforms some good some bad. They seem to be an interesting result of 70's typesetting methods more than anything else. I believe they started as publishers of decals for model aircraft - but I will have to get out my old Airfix mags to see.

Bukharis book is half decent. M. G. Head wrote some fairly dreadful (in hindsight) rehashes of  Rousselot. Some parts (e.g. the drawings of the Sapeurs du Genie fire pump) are based on a logical imagination but just plain wrong.

The oddest thing Almark published was 'Soldiers of the Napoleonic Wars' - a bi-monthly (?) part series which I remember being sold in W. H. Smiths in the magazine section. It was fairly wonderfully done - Fosten being exceptional at the British Army - but was doomed to failure after 7 (???) issues.

Most of the Almark books I have are the glossy finish paperbacks and are much the worse for their age - the perfect bindings are starting to fall apart which seems to happen to all of them however carefully they are stored :-(