All articles in History
8th May, 2017 in History, Society & Culture
Buffalo Bill’s British Wild West
Britain was full of expectation during the early months of 1887. Her Majesty Victoria, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India had been on the throne for half a century – most of that time spent out of the public spotlight in mourning for her husband and consort,…
3rd May, 2017 in History, Society & Culture
The Festival of Britain 1951
In 1951 towns and cities across Britain still bore the devastating scars of the Second World War which had ended only six years earlier. After more than a decade of rationing, austerity and making-do, gloomy post-war Britain needed a lift. The government’s antidote was ‘The…
1st May, 2017 in History, Society & Culture
Evil May Day: When Tudor London rioted against foreigners
The first day of May is commonly associated with dances around the Maypole and marches for worker’s rights. However, London in 1517 saw an entirely different turn of events, ones which would come to be known as ‘Evil May Day’, or ‘Ill May Day’. In the early 1500s London was a bus…
27th April, 2017 in History, Sport
London’s first Olympics, 1908
The 1908 Olympic Games were originally awarded to Rome. Rome had been chosen in the belief that its fame and accessibility would encourage competitors to attend from all over the world, particularly as attendance at the last Olympics, St. Louis in 1904, had been disappointing. Ho…
21st April, 2017 in History, Trivia & Gift
From Boxgrove Man to Stonehenge: England’s prehistory explored
Contrary to what your schoolbooks and National Trust tea towels might have told you, English history didn’t begin with William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy. English history began, not with a Norman, but with a Roger. Roger was a pretty average individual: he sto…
18th April, 2017 in Fiction, History
Resurrecting the dead: Or the delicate art of writing biographical fiction
Biographical fiction is the art of bringing historical figures back to life. It turns a name in the history books into a person so vivid, complex, and yet comprehensible that history itself becomes more understandable. Good biographical fiction provides insight into the psycholog…
18th April, 2017 in Biography & Memoir, History
King Arthur in history and legend
The name King Arthur conjures up fantastical tales of magic, romance, and Knights of the Round Table. But how do we separate the fiction from historical fact, when much of what remains is legend? Author Bronwen Hosie unravels the mysterious real life of Britain’s most famous king…
13th April, 2017 in History, Military
The Battle of Culloden 1746
Culloden Battlefield is located five miles east of Inverness in the Scottish Highlands. The Battle of Culloden, the culmination of the Jacobite Rising of 1745, was fought on 16 April 1746 and is the last full-scale pitch battle fought on the British Isles. Even if the eighteenth…
13th April, 2017 in Biography & Memoir, History, Society & Culture
Who was Abraham Lincoln?
Abraham Lincoln qualifies as a historical ‘giant’ not because of the ways his image and the stories about him have drawn so many to him, but quite simply because he was at the centre of events that shaped the modern world. His election to the presidency of the United States in 18…
11th April, 2017 in History
Richard III, the missing princes, and bones discovered in the Tower
Many books, both non-fiction and fiction, have speculated on the ‘Mystery of the Princes in the Tower’. And many people have called for re-examination of the bones that were found in the Tower of London in 1674 and assumed to be theirs. Calls to look again at those bones have inc…
2nd April, 2017 in History, True Crime, Women in History
The mysterious Princess Caraboo
On the evening of Maundy Thursday in 1817, a young woman wearing colourful Eastern dress was seen wandering through the sleepy village of Almondsbury, Gloucestershire 8 miles north of Bristol. She was wearing a black stuff gown with a muslin frill at the neck, a red and black sha…
31st March, 2017 in History, Society & Culture, Trivia & Gift
Six things you might not know about April Fools’ Day
April 1st – an annual festival of practical jokery, hoaxes and pranks under the guise of ‘April Fools’ Day’ or ‘All Fools’ Day’. Still popular today, it has been celebrated for centuries across different cultures although its exact origins remain a mystery. Here are six…