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Fairfax Of Virginia

Fairfax Of Virginia

Sir Robert Fairfax's descendants were intertwined with American history.
Hugh Fairfax

The Fairfax family occupies a unique and largely forgotten place in the story of America, as the only members of the House of Lords - the Peerage - to have been long-time residents of the United States for over 150 years. First as colonialists and then as citizens of...

Historical Heroes: Bill Slim

Historical Heroes: Bill Slim

Some talk of Wellington and Marlborough as Britain’s greatest general, but Field Marshal William Slim is a name that is often overlooked.

Even the most sketchily educated Briton today will nevertheless recognise in the murky depths of their consciousness the name of that great British general of World War Two, Montgomery of Alamein. To an older generation perhaps another name resonates equally and...

Blithe and Spirited

Blithe and Spirited

See Noel Coward's classic, haunting comedy.

Blithe and Spirited The run is as short as Labour's honeymoon period so head over to Ealing's The Questors Theatre to catch their production of Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit as soon as you can. In one sense the play is a ghost story, but one which is played for laughs...

Roy Farran: Rogue Hero

Roy Farran: Rogue Hero

Bill and David Stirling, Jock Lewes and Paddy Mayne were all remarkable SAS officers, but there was one more, Roy Farran who had an extraordinary career.

Roy Farran: Rogue Hero Roy Farran was one of the outstanding British soldiers of the Second World War. He was awarded a Distinguished Service Order and three Military Crosses while serving with the Royal Armoured Corps and the Special Air Service but he never rose...

The House of Windsor in the Modern World

The House of Windsor in the Modern World

The bestselling historian and author paints a picture of the monarchy today that is very different to the one in 1953.

The House of Windsor in the Modern World It transpires that prior to her death, our late Queen had been ill for some time. Bone marrow cancer by all accounts. The end is rarely easy irrespective of privilege and position; even divine right and executive religious...

The Decline of the British Army Between the Wars

The Decline of the British Army Between the Wars

In November 1918 the British Army had achieved victories to rank along any of its predecessors. Just over twenty years later it had been humiliated by the Blitzkrieg of the Wehrmacht.

The British Army was catastrophically unprepared for war in 1939. But it wasn’t just the Army that was unprepared. Despite a last-minute rush to re-arm, so too was the whole country. In Britain a deep-seated passivity had set in following the end the Great War. This...

Kilmartin Glen: Where Scotland Was Born

Kilmartin Glen: Where Scotland Was Born

The author of The Chronicles of Iona looks to one part of the British Isles that was at the forefront of progress in the period.

Kilmartin Glen: Where Scotland was born After an ambitious redevelopment project, the award-winning Kilmartin House Museum is set to reopen this summer, promising exciting new insights into the internationally-important archaeological landscape of Kilmartin Glen....

Lincoln’s Gettysburg; Comer’s Ridgewell

Lincoln’s Gettysburg; Comer’s Ridgewell

381st Bomb Group was part of the US Air Force’s wider bombing of Germany that cost many lives.

“I wanted to regain for a few moments the experiences that could be relived only by those men who flew from this field in that long ago time of war,” wrote 62-year-old Texan, John Comer, on his return to his former air base in England in 1972. “We were such ordinary...

The Model Bond: Wilfred ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale

The Model Bond: Wilfred ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale

Wilfred Dunderdale was more Bond than Smiley.
Tim Spicer

1920 Odessa Ukraine. The Russian Civil War is at its height, a young British man working for Naval Intelligence picks up a report from one of his agents. The crew of the Russian submarine OUTKA are going to mutiny and throw their officers overboard. He leads a party...

Battle of Meiktila

Battle of Meiktila

Armour and the Burma Campaign.
Jack Bowsher

The battle of the tennis court is one of the most famous actions in the war against Japan. The vicious siege of Kohima in the spring and early summer of 1944 saw the embattled British and Indian garrison of that tiny village in the mountains of Assam (now Nagaland),...