A Charles Sturt University (CSU) lecturer has received a major Australian award for his book about the history of Australian Army chaplains.

Dr Michael Gladwin is a history lecturer at St Mark's National Theological Centre, a partner in the CSU School of Theology in Canberra. His book, Captains of the Soul: A History of Australian Army Chaplains, has been named the 2015 SparkLit Australian Christian Book of the Year.

Captains of the Soul was published in 2014 and is the first comprehensive historical account of Australian Army chaplains in wars, conflicts, peacekeeping missions, and in barracks and among service families.

The book was one of nine shortlisted for the annual prize and was judged to be 'a history of national importance and an insight into the Australian character. While increasingly unfashionable in some spheres of society, chaplains continue to be valued in proportion to the proximity of battle.'

Dr Gladwin said he was honoured to receive the award.

"I am encouraged and honoured to have received the award, especially given the calibre and strength of the shortlisted books by writers and scholars like John Dickson, Michael Bird, Rhys Bezzant and Richard Shumack.

"This year's awards are, I think, a testament to the depth and breadth of contemporary Australian Christian writing and thinking," he said.

Dr Gladwin is a graduate of the Australian National University and the University of Cambridge, and has been lecturing at St Mark's since 2009.

He has written widely on the religious and cultural history of Australia in the context of the British world, as well as the relationship between religion and war in Australian history.

Dr Gladwin is also the editor of St Mark's Review, one of Australia's longest-running journals of Christian thought and opinion, and the author of Anglican Clergy in Australia, 1788-1850: building a British World (2015).

His current research projects include the intellectual history of mission and colonialism in the nineteenth century; religious aspects of Australian war commemoration and experience of the Second World War; and the history of preaching and religious discourse in Australian cultural life.

The award was presented to Dr Gladwin at a celebration dinner in Melbourne on Thursday 13 August.

Captains of the Soul: A History of Australian Army Chaplains is published by Big Sky Publishing and can be purchased for $34.99. Read more about the book here.