In addition to their introductory overview, the editors (professors of history at the U. of Montana and Kansas State U.) present five chapters documenting civilian experiences of war in Europe, sequentially covering the Thirty Years War of 1618-1648, Early Modern Europe of 1648-1789, the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars, and the Modern Europe of 1815-1900. The essays describe the effects of plundering and looting by armies, the creation of refugee populations, war-related hunger and disease, the unleashing of conscious terror by contending forces, conscription and its impacts, and even cultural consequences of war.