History Today

Among Johnson’s principal aims, he wrote, was to produce a volume, ‘for the use of such as aspire to exactness of criticism or elegance of style’. H.P. Collins assesses whether he succeeded.

R.B. Oram recounts an episode in the history of British shipping.

Stephen Usherwood describes how the crisis of 1926, which silenced the British Press, was a challenge to the broadcasting authorities.

John Raymond offers a light-hearted survey of an important era in British social and political history, when the Prime Minister set an example of optimism that, despite setbacks at home and abroad, many of his most distinguished countrymen followed.

The result of the Seven Weeks’ War in 1866 subordinated the Austrian Empire to Prussian ambitions. Brian Bond describes the last lightning victory in the Napoleonic manner, until Hitler’s blitzkrieg of 1940.

Christopher Weaver describes how one of the creators of modern Soviet Russia met a hideous death in Mexico.

Maurice Bond analyses the changing landscape of primary source historical research in Britain.

Sudie Duncan Sides explores plantation life in the Southern states before the American Civil War.

Bernard Pool introduces Secretary to James, Duke of York, 1660-7, and a Commissioner for the Navy.

A.W. Palmer describes how the troubled politics of Serbia played a large part in precipitating the first World War. By a policy of violence and assassination, a group of army conspirators, known as the “Black Hand,” laid a fuse to the Balkan powder-keg.