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Writing Lilian Harrison into history
Article
In this article Matthew Brown and Pablo Scharagrodsky introduce us to the little-known story of Anglo-Argentinian swimmer Lilian Harrison, who in 1923 became the first person to swim the 42km from Uruguay to Argentina at the estuary of the Rio de la Plata. Her story shows how she had to battle against not only tides and...
Writing Lilian Harrison into history
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My Favourite History Place: Keswick
Historian feature
Adventure is a buzz word in the tourist trade and this old market town with under 5,000 residents advertises that it is the Lake District’s Adventure Capital. There is plenty to justify the title – the challenges of mountaineering on foot, bicycle or climbing-rope, swimming, canoeing, sailing, dragon-boat racing, hang-gliding and...
My Favourite History Place: Keswick
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A fit country for heroes?
Historian article
In this article Steve Illingworth explores the conditions for returning British servicemen at the end of the First World War in relation to the promise by Prime Minister Lloyd George about creating ‘a fit country for heroes’. In particular, it looks at the experiences of former soldiers in Salford, a...
A fit country for heroes?
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Out and About in Lyme Regis
Historian feature
Explore Lyme Regis’ past as John Davis guides you on a historical trail through the iconic seaside town...
Out and About in Lyme Regis
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Real Lives: Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial: Edward George Keeling
Historian feature
Trevor James introduces a victim of an earlier pandemic.
As we explore churchyards and appreciate the range of memorials that are revealed, they convey a variety of emotions and other messages. Sometimes they still contain quite unexpected surprises.
The single Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial in the relatively remote rural Staffordshire village...
Real Lives: Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial: Edward George Keeling
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Grave matters
Historian article
Diana Laffin considers what study of the styles, planning and planting of Brookwood cemetery reveals about nineteenth century mindsets.
Graves are serious sources for historians. There is nothing casual about the choices made at death: the size and design of the monument, the text on the stone, even the location...
Grave matters
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From Disraeli to Callaghan: Britain 1879 - 1979
Historian article
A previously unpublished survey of British history by A.J.P. Taylor. It is a characteristic piece, though marked by gloom about the then recent inflation. Introduced by Historical Association President Chris Wrigley.
From Disraeli to Callaghan: Britain 1879 - 1979
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Out and About in Haworth
Historian feature
Kimberley Braxton takes a tour of Brontë country, through Haworth and onto the iconic Yorkshire Moors that were central to Wuthering Heights.
Haworth is a place for walkers; even before you reach the breathtaking moors it is likely your legs will already be burning from climbing the steep Yorkshire terrain....
Out and About in Haworth
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Do historical anniversaries matter? Case study: Arnhem 1944
Historian feature
2019 has been quite a year for historical anniversaries – Peterloo 200, D-Day 75, Monte Cassino 75, Women MPs 100 years, Apollo Moon Landings 50 years and all following on the tail of four years of the First World War centenary – and that is not counting the anniversaries that...
Do historical anniversaries matter? Case study: Arnhem 1944
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A European dimension to local history
Historian article
Trevor James raises the prospect of broadening our approaches to local history to take a wider European perspective.
When Professor W. G. Hoskins published his The Making of the English Landscape in 1955, he taught us how to observe and understand the topography of our landscapes, urban and rural, and...
A European dimension to local history
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Terriers in India
Historian Article
Peter Stanley is working on the largely unexplored history of the thousands of British Territorial soldiers who served in India during the First World War using their letters and diaries. He is trying to discover what happened to these men when they returned to Britain. Did their service in India...
Terriers in India
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Lord Palmerston
Historian article
Lord Palmerston (1784-1865) has long interested (and confused) historians. A man of contradictions and paradoxes, he seemed both to embody modern Victorian Britain, and yet at the same time stand as a potent symbol of what had been lost.
Lord Palmerston
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'Spy Fever' in Britain, 1900 to 1914
Historian article
The decade and a half prior to the First World War saw Britain experience a virulent, some might say sordid phenomenon that has been referred to as ‘spy fever.’ This article traces the roots of spy fever, and examines its nature, before assessing its effects on Britain between 1900 and...
'Spy Fever' in Britain, 1900 to 1914
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70 years – 70 ‘things’ that tell our story
Historian article
As part of the Historical Association’s recognition of our patron the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, The Historical Association asked our members and followers to put together a collection of 70 ‘things’ that tell the story of the last 70 years: how the UK and the world have changed; how they have developed;...
70 years – 70 ‘things’ that tell our story
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Civilian expertise in war
Historian article
Philip Hamlyn Williams introduces us to the commercial and industrial background to modern-day warfare.
When I think of war, I immediately see men and women in one of three uniforms: Royal Navy, RAF and Army. My research over the past seven years into how the British army was supplied in two...
Civilian expertise in war
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Cinderella dreams: young love in post-war Britain
Historian article
In a lecture given to the Cambridge branch, Carol Dyhouse explains changing attitudes to marriage in the 1950s and 60s.
Women teachers in the 1950s and 1960s regularly complained about how hard it was to keep girls’ attention on their schoolwork. Educationist Kathleen Ollerenshaw pointed out that the prospects of marriage,...
Cinderella dreams: young love in post-war Britain
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Remembering Neville Chamberlain
Historian article
Brent Dyck is a Canadian teacher and a previous contributor to The Historian. In this short essay he offers us his objective interpretation of the achievements of Neville Chamberlain. For some what he says may seem surprising and for others it might even be controversial. However, editorially it seemed entirely proper...
Remembering Neville Chamberlain
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My Favourite History Place: Queen Square, Bath
Historian feature
Some years ago, on the shore of Loch Lomond, I met a Scotsman. As we started to converse he asked me where I was from. When I replied ‘Bath’, his response was ‘Ah, the most beautiful city in Britain,’ adding, out of patriotism or good judgement, ‘Edinburgh is second.’
The Roman...
My Favourite History Place: Queen Square, Bath
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My Favourite History Place: St James Church, Gerrards Cross
Historian feature
Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, is a well-to-do town in the Chilterns and a wealthy commuter dormitory for London. It also harbours what might be one of the most remarkable, under-appreciated churches of the mid-nineteenth century. St James, the parish church, was built for the ‘unruled and unruly’ agricultural labourers and traders who inhabited...
My Favourite History Place: St James Church, Gerrards Cross
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At home with Amanda Ira Aldridge
Historian article
Stephen Bourne examines the life of Amanda Ira Aldridge, the multi-talented singer, composer and voice teacher.
Amanda Ira Aldridge may have lived a quiet life but she was a trailblazer in the world of music. After a career as a concert singer, she became a composer in a male-dominated profession, for which she adopted a male pseudonym, Montague Ring. In her...
At home with Amanda Ira Aldridge
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My Favourite History Place: Gladstone’s Library at Hawarden
Historian feature
When I first visited Gladstone’s residential library in 1977 for a pre-university History degree reading week, I barely knew who Gladstone was. I had just come back from a holiday in Italy and the contrast between Florence and Hawarden, a Welsh border town, was startling. I came from the sunny remains...
My Favourite History Place: Gladstone’s Library at Hawarden
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Isaac Butt and Irish Nationality
Article
Alan O’Day reviews and reassesses the career of the major Irish Nationalist figure before Charles Stewart Parnell. Once the most respected man in Irish nationalist circles, Isaac Butt became merely a footnote in Anglo-Irish history after his death on 5 May 1879. Yet, from the mid-1860s until he died his...
Isaac Butt and Irish Nationality
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Nineteenth Century African chiefs in Nuneaton: A local mystery uncovered
Article
In Nuneaton’s St. Nicolas Churchyard lies a sizeable, though not elaborate, flat gravestone. It commemorates Canon Robert Savage, Vicar of the parish 1845-71, his wife Emma and many of their children. This tombstone, like so many in our graveyards, reveals a wide range of historical information, recording significant detail about...
Nineteenth Century African chiefs in Nuneaton: A local mystery uncovered
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My Favourite History Place: Mandala House
Historian feature
Many myths surround David Livingstone and in this part of the world more myths about the man abound than perhaps anywhere else. We can only speculate on whether he fought off lions with his bare hands, shamed slave-traders into letting their slaves go with just a few words from the scriptures...
My Favourite History Place: Mandala House
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A Zeppelin VC remembered
Historian article
Ronan Thomas introduces the bravery of Rex Warneford who was the first pilot successfully to bring down a Zeppelin in 1915.
Rex Warneford was one of Britain’s ‘bravest of the brave’. A Royal Navy fighter pilot during the First World War, he was awarded the Victoria Cross by King George...
A Zeppelin VC remembered
