What the English language owes to Shakespeare
One of the very authentic painting of Shakespeare / biografiasyvidas.com English owes more than you know to William Shakespeare. Yes, that playwright from four hundred years ago now considered so unimportant by British [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Nuffield
Morris, who became Lord Nuffield / bbc.co.uk William Richard Morris Nuffield started off well, but ended as the man who almost singlehandedly destroyed the British car industry. I don’t suppose this was [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Huey Long
Huey Long receives an honorary doctorate / inkwell.com Huey Pierce Long was born in 1893, almost instantly recognised as being energetic, intelligent and with an assured future. For example, he took on a [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Leopold II of the Belgians
King Leopold II of the Belgians Leopold was born in 1835 and was King of the Belgians from 1865 – 1909. We are told that he was lively and energetic practically [...]
Humour: tall tales
Madame Charles de Gaulle Paul Johnson tells us that when General de Gaulle at last decided to retire to his small chateau at Colombey-les-deux-Églises, he and his wife threw a small party [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Edward VIII
The Duke of Windsor (ex-Edward VIII) and the woman he loved / onlinepublishingco.info Edward (born 1894) was the oldest son of George V and Mary of Teck. He should have become [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: John Calvin Coolidge
The thirtieth President of the United States was born in 1872. No-one knew much about him, except his reputation for long silences broken by periods of terseness, until he became Governor of Massachusetts. He intervened [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Count Ciano – not really his fault
Ciano, Mussolini’s son-in-law / globalsecurity.org Galeazzo Ciano was born in 1903, the son of an admiral in the Italian navy. After a privileged education he entered the foreign service of his country in [...]
Disasters waiting to happen: Charles X of France
Charles X / historywarsweapons.com Charles was born in 1757 and was King of France for barely six years. He was a younger brother of Louis XVI, guillotined during the French Revolution, and also [...]
Gibraltar in the news again
President of the Spanish Government Mariano Rajoy spoke to the United Nations recently. He explained the country’s economic situation, which is disastrous, though no fault of his own, and clarified what his government is [...]
What was the Freikorps?
Freikorps troops /phoenixinvestmentarms.com Literally translated from the German, the word means ‘Free Corps’, though this term does not really express the intention behind the nomenklature. Freikorps were para-military formations formed throughout Germany [...]
‘Emancipation’ of the Catholics
The Christian Church first came into Britain through the north of Ireland and Scotland, probably with St. Augustine. The Roman Catholic Church was soon established throughout Ireland, Scotland and England, ruled inexorably from Rome [...]
Great War Commanders: General Allenby
Allenby’s chief claim to fame, though he would not have liked my reminding him of it, was that for a time he was Laurence of Arabia’s commanding officer. This was not easy for anyone, and [...]
Arturo eyes Andalucía
Arturo Pérez-Reverte is one of the very best writers of modern Castilian prose, but then he is also more than capable of writing in the purest seventeenth century Castilian prose, as can easily be seen [...]
Rich in history: the Rothschilds
Nathan Rothschild, who ‘organised’ the purchase of those Suez Canal shares / texemarrs.com Whole books have been published about this world-famous banking family. Some of the authors have indulged in hagiography, others have [...]
Chief Khans of the Mongol Empire
While Europe was littered with principalities and petty kingdoms headed by princes and kings with ambitions beyond their resources; while both American sub-continents were spacious open homes for native tribes (also for ever warring against [...]
Great War Commanders: Hans von Seeckt: who?
Hans von Seekt / zh.wikipedia.org I am not being frivolous. If you were to ask even German or Austrian nationals of below a certain age, say seventy, who Hans von Seeckt was, you [...]
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