Spain’s royal champion don Juan of Austria was commander of the Christian fleet at the Battle of Lepanto (1571). This was a battle of galleys, luxuriously illustrated by…
Category: French History
The Campaign in Normandy, June & August, 1944
This was the real turning point in the Second World War, although it came much later than it should have done, due mainly to inappropriate weather conditions for…
The Occupation of the Rhur
The valley of the Rhur, which would become famous enough for a major film to be made of the bombing of its dams during the Second War, was…
Colonization
These days the word strikes a sour note, arousing images of rough settlements, starving ‘piccaninies’, whips, shackles, thoughtless government from a distance of thousdands of miles etc. If…
The Revolt of Portugal II
This Atlantic, south-western European country is on the western side of the Iberian Peninsula, bounded to north and east by Spain and to the west and south by…
War in the air Part II: Per Ardua Ad Astra
The Blizkrieg from Nazi Germany that opened the Second War in 1939 showed that apart from tank power, air power was a vital component of…
The Inquisition
This was a Catholic tribunal founded on a temporary basis in France and Germany. Its purpose was to seek out heresy, prosecute and punish it. In the thirteenth…
The Métis & the Red River Rebellion
Among the first Canadians were the oddly named Métis – having a mixture of pure Native American blood with white, mostly French and Scottish. It was a robust…
The French Republican Calendar
During the French Revolution (q.v.) the National Convention decided on a sublimely Gallic act to herald the start of a new epoch for France, and, if popular,…
Two failed plots: Babeuf and Cato Street
Plotters and plots have been recurrent throughout history. They became famous because of the good fortune that attended them, or the bad luck which dogged them….