Great Britain History

In this riveting account, renowned scholar Ronald Hutton explores the history of deity-like figures in Christian Europe. Drawing on anthropology, archaeology, literature, and history, Hutton shows how hags, witches, the fairy queen, and the Green Man all came to be, and how they changed over the centuries. Looking closely at four main figures—Mother Earth, the Fairy Queen, the Mistress of the Night, and the Old Woman of Gaelic tradition—Hutton challenges decades of debate around the female figures who have long been thought versions of pre-Christian goddesses.

Eagle Days transforms the Luftwaffe’s historical role during the RAF’s ‘Finest Hour’ from a cartoonish antagonist to a multidimensional, flawed-yet-formidable opponent. The narrative contains not just the voices of the air crews who conducted the fighting, but uniquely never-before-translated primary source material of other contemporary eyewitnesses, (Luftwaffe’s paratroopers, anti-aircraft gunners and air signalmen). Eagle Days will offer all fans of this period a refreshing, comprehensive and exciting account of the Luftwaffe’s real experiences during the Battle of Britain.

The Pastons were members of the English gentry, a group of roughly 1,000 households sandwiched between the ruling nobility and the peasants and a rough analog for the contemporary “middle class.” Their existence was fairly typical, except for the fact that it was recorded in an extraordinary collection of nearly 1,000 letters that have survived to this day. Through these letters, which cover the years from 1421 to 1484 and the lives of three generations of Pastons, historians Frances and Joseph Gies provide a rare window into the day-to-day life of this family.

The amazing experiences of the Queen Alexandra nurses in the World Wars is one of the greatest adventure stories of modern times, and - incredibly - remains largely untold. Thousands of middle-class girls, barely out of school, were plucked from sheltered backgrounds, subjected to training regimes unimaginably tough by today's standards, and sent forth to share the harsh conditions of the fighting services.

To understand what it is to be a Princess Royal, Helen Cathcart skillfully portrays the lives of the foremost royal daughters from the days when princesses were "ladyes" and the King's eldest son was styled Prince Royal, through to our present Princess Royal.

Grace O'Malley, daughter of a clan chief in the far west of Ireland, went from marriage at fifteen to piracy on the high seas. She soon had a fleet of galleys under her commander, but her three decades of plundering, kidnapping, murder and mayhem came to a close in 1586, when she was captured and sentenced to hang. Saved from the scaffold by none other than Queen Elizabeth herself—another powerful woman in a man's world—Grace's life took another extraordinary turn, when it was rumored she had become intelligencer for the queen's spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham.

Elizabeth was crowned at 25 after a tempestuous childhood as a bastard and an outcast, but it was only when she reached 50 and all hopes of a royal marriage were dashed that she began to wield real power in her own right. For 25 years she had struggled to assert her authority over advisers who pressed her to marry and settle the succession; now, she was determined not only to reign but also to rule.

Here is the behind-the-scenes story of how the United States forged its wartime alliance with Britain, told from the perspective of three key American players in London: Edward R. Murrow, Averell Harriman, and John Gilbert Winant. Drawing from a variety of primary sources, Olson skillfully depicts the dramatic personal journeys of these men who, determined to save Britain from Hitler, helped convince a cautious Franklin Roosevelt and a reluctant American public to support the British at a critical time.

Wentworth in Yorkshire was surrounded by 70 collieries employing tens of thousands of men. It is the finest and largest Georgian house in Britain and belonged to the Fitzwilliam family. England's forgotten palace, it belonged to Britain's richest aristocrats. Black Diamonds tells the story of its demise: family feuds, forbidden love, class war, and a tragic and violent death played their part. But coal, one of the most emotive issues in twentieth century British politics, lies at its heart.

The modern history of Africa was, until very recently, written on behalf of the indigenous races by the white man, who had forcefully entered the continent during a particularly hubristic and dynamic phase of European history. In 1884, Prince Otto von Bismark, the German chancellor, brought the plenipotentiaries of all major powers of Europe together, to deal with Africa's colonization in such a manner as to avoid provocation of war. This event - known as the Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 - galvanized a phenomenon that came to be known as the Scramble for Africa.

The sinking of the German battleship Bismarck - a masterpiece of engineering, well-armored with a main artillery of eight 15-inch guns - was one of the most dramatic events of World War II. She left the port of Gotenhafen for her first operation on the night of 18 May 1941, yet was almost immediately discovered by Norwegian resistance and Allied air reconnaissance. British battlecruiser Hood was quickly dispatched from Scapa Flow to intercept the Bismarck, together with new battleship Prince of Wales.

From poverty to pets, from medicine to magic, from slang to sex, from wallpaper to women's rights. A glorious portrait of life in London from 1660-1670 by the bestselling author of ELIZABETH'S LONDON.

The French and Indian War was the world's first truly global conflict. When the French lost to the British in 1763, they lost their North American empire along with most of their colonies in the Caribbean, India, and West Africa. In The French and Indian War and the Conquest of New France, the only comprehensive account from the French perspective, William R. Nester explains how and why the French were defeated.

London Labour and the London Poor is a rare and fascinating insight into the lives and struggles of the 19th-century poor. Written by journalist and reformer Henry Mayhew, a founder and editor of the satirical magazine Punch, it collects hundreds of testimonials from the lower strata of Victorian society. We encounter street entertainers, 'pure finders', cabinetmakers, gingerbread sellers, 'screeve-fakers', swindlers, and burglars. We hear accounts from toshers finding items in sewers, people attempting to train pigs to dance, and witness the sale of everything from gilt watches and chickweed to needles, dog collars, and eel soup.

Our capital city has always been a thriving and colorful place, full of diverse and determined individuals developing trade and finance, exchanging gossip and doing business. Abandoned by the Romans, rebuilt by the Saxons, occupied by the Vikings and reconstructed by the Normans, London would become the largest trade and financial center, dominating the world in later centuries. London has always been a brilliant, vibrant, and eclectic place.

“Famous Men of the Middle Ages” features attractive biographical sketches of thirty-five of the most prominent characters in the history of the Middle Ages, from the barbarian invasions to the invention of the printing press. Each story in this book by John Haaren is told in a clear, simple manner, and is well calculated to awaken and stimulate the youthful imagination.

India was the jewel in the crown of the British Empire. There were vast riches to be exploited and vast numbers of people to be subjugated. How better to achieve these aims than by building a rail network that facilitated the export of raw material and made it easier for troops to travel around the country to tackle uprisings? India joined the railway age late: the first line was not completed until 1853, but, by 1929, 41,000 miles of track served the country.

Who owns England? Behind this simple question lies this country’s oldest and best-kept secret. This is the history of how England’s elite came to own our land, and an inspiring manifesto for how to open up our countryside once more.

From the author of The Sisters, a chronicle of the most brutal, turbulent, and exuberant period of England's history. Bess Hardwick, the fifth daughter of an impoverished Derbyshire nobleman, did not have an auspicious start in life. Widowed at sixteen, she nonetheless outlived four monarchs, married three more times, built the great house at Chatsworth, and died one of the wealthiest and most powerful women in English history.

Tucked just beyond offices and a lecture hall in the heart of London lies a turquoise door. Intrigued, James Cheshire stepped through and was astonished by what he found inside: thousands of maps and atlases, spilling out of wooden drawers. It was a map library. Here, Jams transports us to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when the library’s maps were wielded for war and negotiated during peace; when its charts traced, for the first time, the icy peaks of the Himalayas.