The past is never dead, it isn’t even past
The Fight for Parry’s Jerusalem On March 11, 1916, Sir Hubert Parry handed a manuscript that would transform how the English saw themselves to his friend, Henry Walford Davies, with the rather casual words: “Here’s a tune for you, old chap. Do what you like with it.”...
Have you ever wondered about the history of a building or a place as you rush past, busy with life, and have never had the opportunity to stop and investigate it further? Millions of people walking through the U.K.’s towns, cities and landscapes every single day of...
Just over a decade ago, I started working on a two-volume series on the North American Aviation Mustang, chiefly aimed at modellers and warbird enthusiasts. The two volumes were respectively to cover the Allison-engined and Packard Merlin-engined versions of the...
The Bitter Legacy of Partition In 2008 I was commanding British and allied troops in South-East Iraq. We had been withdrawn from Basrah city the previous summer and were now based at the airport in insufficient numbers to do much more than protect ourselves. None of...
The Buckingham History Festival, which takes place in the celebrated market town over the weekend of 15-17 September, is one that subscribers to Aspects of History will relish. There’s a particular emphasis this year on the Early Modern period – which is no surprise...
Summer Reads from Sharpe BooksAlan Bardos Author of The Dardanelles ConspiracyThe Unseen Enemy by Tom Walker, is a perfect summer read invoking Sunday afternoons watching a black and white war film. Tom Walker effortlessly brings to life an RAF squadron in World War...
Having joined The Royal Marines as a musician to play in the band, when the Argentines invaded The Falkland Island in 1982, I was surprised to find myself being sent as part of the task force to retake the islands. Having few military skills like the Royal Marines...
The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising In all my novels, there are a number of plot lines which converge at the end of the book, but in my new book, Agent in Peril the core plot is based around the Battle of the Ruhr in 1943, the RAF’s bombing campaign from March-July that year...
Operation Codicil, is the first instalment of The Manner of Men series – which is to be a three-part series based on the Parachute Regiment in the Second World War. The series will follow a group of elite pathfinders from D-Day until war’s end, where they see action...
"The atomic clock ticked faster and faster. We may anticipate a state of affairs in which two great powers will each be in a position to put an end to the civilisation and life of the other, though not without risking its own. We may be likened to two scorpions in a...
