"How many military history books do you own?" Topic

I was rearranging my books as part of my staycation and at the end of the shuffling I decided to count what I have. This doesn't include any Osperey's, wargames rules, fiction, or non-military history books.

WW2: 83
Modern (Arab-Israeli through Afghanistan): 18
Franco-Prussian War: 31
Other European 19th Century: 11
Colonial: 44
Old West: 16
Pirates: 7
Vietnam: 12
Napoleonic: 62
ACW: 19
WW1/RCW: 23
18th Century: 17
Ancients: 57
ECW: 5
Grand Total: 405

How many do they make?

Many more than my wife wants me to.

Four or five hundred would be my guess. Though I'm counting a Osprey book as one.

3 minivan loads, boxed. And that's after I sold dozens at the last Cold Wars. Need to downsize, but still buying :-)

Hardbacks? Several hundred in my library and about another couple of hundred Ospreys and uniform references in my painting room. I know I have every Osprey in print, and most ever printed, on the Napoleonic Wars…

(I don't mean to sound braggish, BTW, I live in Australia where large houses are pretty standard!)

I would have to guess the high hundreds, counting Ospreys, though I think it'd still be high hundreds even if I didn't (and I have about 100 of those…).

Without physically going to count, I have about 500-600. I got rid of my Official Records and the Supplement to the Official Records a few years ago. That was 228 books so it gave me a little room on my 8 large book shelves.

Many more than rule books, and far too many to even consider counting.

The University of Michigan library has thousands, so why do I need to own any :-)

Retirees get full library privileges. Anyway I still have a few hundred that I like to keep close to me.

Hundreds. At least 300 Osprey & like books then hundreds of hardbacks.

Don't have enough time to count them all!

I never stopped to count them, but even after selling a box-ful, I still must have hundreds.

6 large bookcases full. With more stacked on top and stuck in between the books on the shelf and the top of the shelf. A moving nightmare. The local library is waiting for me to die so they can open a new branch! I love my books!!

No idea … other than the history/military history takes all 24 shelves currently available. I'm reorganising and want to bind and archive the more important periodicals, rules and games – Slingshot, Arquebusier, Nugget etc. – which are currently in stacks and boxes but have discovered I will need to put in additional shelving as well as source binders and files.

Difficult to do the reorganisation, though as it is easy to keep stopping to read …

Phil

Two bedrooms worth on wall to wall to near ceiling shelves including the Osprey collections at present. Total volume number unknown. Except for about 45-ish recent titles in Osprey series; Battle Order, Campaign, MAA, Vanguard and New Vanguard, Elite, Warrior, and Fortress series I have them all. Count 10 six shelf bookcases in one room from my view at computer desk. I collected history and uniform books in youth to present day (since 1971), long before I started the miniature collections. Then there is the wargame magazine collection filed away by publisher.

The library is all inventoried on .xls spreadsheets on computer and mobile phone files to avoid duplications when searching 2nd hand book stores.

Do you want quantity or linear feet?

Too many, yet still not enough.

My library says I have 773, but that includes rules and some sold books (which I keep cataloged so I don't accidentally buy them again…).

If you're not already using it, consider creating your own personal library in libib.com. It's free, pretty easy to set up, and if you use the phone app, will let you use the phone camera to scan the ISBN barcode and fill out some or all of the information for you. My GF set this up for me last year, and it was by far one of the best birthday presents I have ever received.

I take a "backup" of my libib library every once in a while by exporting to a .csv file (which can be opened in a spreadsheet).

- Ix

Probably around 300. I drastically pared down my collection last year during a whole house renovation, selling, giving away or donating hundreds of books. I'm curious now to know just how many I have but I think I'll flock figures instead of counting books.

I did a rough count last week and it came to just under 600.

A lot.

Several hundred.

Eric

Not as many as Ken Bunger,

Around 1,100 or so.

Approximately 2500.

I gave several pick up truck loads of boxes to the local library before moving. Does that count?

1300 – 1500

Plenty.

Many

(Groan!)I don't want to think about it…

No clue… lots and lots…

After my cross-country move, my military history books amount to around 50 or less. Of course, I have books on other subjects (bible commentaries, for example).

I had a respectable collection of Osprey books and other references before downsizing, but I realized that for most of my painting, I can now reference the Internet for the information I need. I only kept three Blandford books (Waterloo, AWI, ACW), my two volume Funcken set, the Napoleonic Source Book, and 'Uniforms of the Seven Years War' as far as reference books are concerned.

Close to 1,000, all hardcovers and does not include my Ospreys. Currently I am purging the ones relating to WW1 and WW 2.

At least hundreds. Maybe thousands. Have them scattered throughout 3 different buildings.

Well over 2000.

4 3' x 8' bookcases full in my study. Some, plus the Ospreys,are in my bunker-game room.

Quite a few…

Plenty, as in several hundreds. But counting and categorizing takes away from reading and painting time.

I would guess about 500.

Hey!
I just dug up Washington's Crossing!
I wondered where that was.

About 20 shelves worth, and these days I keep an awful lot electronically as Pdf or E books too. I reserve my precious shelves for books I need to read physically (usually those with decent maps).

4-5000. yes, thousands. But it's a professional working, teaching and research library.

Hundreds and hundreds – a shelf once collapsed under the weight and 75 books fell on me (I counted them as I put them back) but that's not even the tip of the iceberg I have at least 200 just under the bed with nowhere else to go and am hoping to take a couple of crates full to my parents tonight…

1,000 plus

6 groaning bookshelves full.

About 12,000 as PDFs and around 500 real books solely on the Napoleonic period.

Since my open heart surgery a few years ago, I began to reduce my collection which had reach over a 1,000 books (not counting store stock books or Osprey).
For example, I had all of the WRG ancients (Heath) series and 19th century books. I am now selling those along with most of my other research books. I did not want my family to have to dispose of them in a hurried and erratic way.

Not too sure on exact numbers,but have stuff on ACW,WW1,Napoleonic era,and other eras.

Last time this came up (some years back), I had counted 1000, not counting titles that were general histories that covered as much politics/culture as military, so the actual number is a bit vague. I've been collecting such books (and foolishly selling some off many years back) since I was about 10, and some are true antiques published at least as far back as the 1880's.

I've largely cut back on my collecting in the last few years--God only knows what will become of all these when I'm gone--and adding more with so little time to read any more seems irresponsible.

One of these days, there's gonna be a helluva sale for some discriminating collector….

TVAG

More than I care to count and continuing to grow.