Rate My Professor Kevin Linch

Kevin Linch is Professor of British History in the School of History at the University of Leeds, a position he has held since 2004. He joined the University of Leeds in 1993 as an undergraduate, graduating with a BA (Hons) in History in 1996. His undergraduate dissertation on the response of East Sussex to the invasion crisis of 1803–1805 won the Le Patourel prize for the best piece of original research. He continued his studies at Leeds with an MA by Research on the part-time military forces in the West Riding of Yorkshire between 1793 and 1814, followed by an AHRC-funded PhD in History on the recruitment of the British Army during the Peninsular War period. Prior to his professorship, Linch held various teaching posts within and outside the School of History. His research focuses on war, society, and culture in Britain from 1688 to 1840, Britain's armed forces, conflicts involving Britain in the eighteenth century—especially the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars—and the experiences of soldiers and officers in the British Army from 1750 to 1815. He has served as principal investigator on AHRC-funded projects including 'Soldiers and Soldiering in Britain, c.1750 to 1815', 'Re-archiving the Individual: British Army Officers, 1790-1820', and 'Data in the Archive'. Linch advocates for the importance of archives in society, culture, and heritage, and integrates research-led teaching into modules on the changing nature of warfare in Europe from 1740 to 1840 and Britain during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.

Key publications include his first book, Britain and Wellington's Army: Recruitment, Society and Tradition, 1807-15 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), which explores how Britain met the manpower demands of the Napoleonic Wars without conscription. His latest book, A History of the British Army, 1783-1815 (Pen & Sword, 2024), received the Templer Medal for the best book on British Military History from the Society for Army Historical Research in 2024. Other significant works are the edited volume Britain's Soldiers: Rethinking War and Society, 1715-1815 (Liverpool University Press, 2014), and articles such as 'Defining Soldiers: Britain’s Military, c. 1740–1815' (War in History, 2013) and 'Desertion from the British Army during the Napoleonic Wars' (Journal of Social History, 2016). Linch is series editor for Boydell & Brewer's 'Britain's Soldiers' series, councillor for the Army Records Society, Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. He has engaged the public through appearances on the Napoleonic Wars Podcast and workshops on archival data and AI transcription.