The West India Regiments were an anomalous presence in the British Army. Raised in the late eighteenth-century Caribbean in an act of military desperation, their rank-and-file were overwhelmingly men of African descent, initially enslaved. As such, the regiments held a unique but ambiguous place in the British Army and British Empire until their disbandment in 1927. Soldiers of Uncertain Rank brings together the approaches of cultural, imperial and military history in new and illuminating ways to show how the image of these regiments really mattered. This image shaped perceptions in the Caribbean societies in which they were raised and impacted on how they were deployed there and in Africa. By examining the visual and textual representation of these soldiers, this book uncovers a complex, under-explored and illuminating figure that sat at the intersection of nineteenth-century debates about slavery and freedom; racial difference; Britishness; savagery and civilisation; military service and heroism.

Short-listed, 2025 Templer Prize, The Society for Army Historical Research

‘In Soldiers of Uncertain Rank, David Lambert has given us a book that will be a reference point for years and decades to come, particularly for anyone interested in how the British Empire assembled and managed regiments that were mostly a direct result of their own expansive colonial policies. This is, without a doubt, the most comprehensive and thoroughly researched study to date on the key role played by the West India Regiments throughout the Age of Revolution’s Atlantic World.’

Manuel Barcia - University of Leeds

'David Lambert brilliantly analyses the uneasy place of the West Indian regiments in imperial cultural from the 1790s to their representation in contemporary exhibitions. He deftly uses visual images as well as texts to explore the vexed British attempt at constructing a black martial masculinity that appears always under control.'

Kay Dian Kriz - Brown University

'In this fascinating account of a neglected arm of British global power, Lambert shows how Black West Indian soldiers were an intrinsic yet marginalised part of the British Army. These were men who enforced enslavement yet were feared by slave-owners; who were honoured and at the same time humiliated for extending the Empire in Africa, and who are still the object of cultural and political contestation. Told with verve and conceptual flair, this story illuminates the ambivalence of Britain’s violent colonial past like no other.'

Alan Lester - University of Sussex

'Soldiers of Uncertain Rank is an incisive and timely study. Tracing discussions of the West India Regiments from the ‘wars of representation’ over slavery to the ‘culture wars’ of our own time, David Lambert’s excellent book is required reading for anyone interested in the history of the Caribbean and legacies of the British Empire.'

Christer Petley - University of Southampton

'An impressive achievement by a leading Caribbean Studies scholar. Lambert’s examination of the visual and textual imagery of the West India Regiments is attentive to the nuances and particularities of representation and print culture. An important contribution to an under-explored area of British visual culture which acknowledges and interrogates the power of imagery within the imperial imaginary.'

Sarah Thomas - Birkbeck, University of London