Victorian

K. Theodore Hoppen describes how the victory of the ultramontanes in 1870 meant that for a considerable time the largest Church in Christendom adopted an attitude hostile to the modern world.

The Battle of Majuba Hill during the First Boer War, had immense political and military significance to British arms—and not only in South Africa. Its chief cause, writes Brian Bond, was a gross underestimation of the Boer’s tactical aptitude and courage.

Robert Blake traces the career of Edward Geoffrey Stanley, a low-profile leader who nevertheless became British Prime Minister three times: firstly in 1852; then from 1858-59; and lastly from 1866-68.

On November 17th, 1874, when Henry Morton Stanley marched away from Bagamoyo on what was to be his greatest exploring achievement, he was retracing his own steps of 1871 along the well-worn caravan route used by Burton and Speke in 1857; by Speke and Grant in 1860, and, writes C.E. Hamshere, many Arab traders before them.

A gifted utilitarian, and sometime Member of Parliament, Douglas Hurd writes that John Bowring spent ten tumultuous years in China where he believed in supporting the cause of progress with British gunboats.

Educationalist. Co-operator. Capitalist. Utopian. W.H. Oliver describes how Robert Owen was doomed to foster ideas and programmes which caused him considerable distress.

T.J. Brady introduces an early photographer at a Victorian front.

Alexander Burnes met his death on November 2nd, 1841, at the hands of a furious Afghan mob. James Lunt introduces one of the most adventurous travellers of his generation.

A century ago, writes Patrick Renshaw, Karl Marx and his colleagues founded in London the first International Workingmen's Association, a body from which many varieties of socialism and communism have since developed.

From 1848 until 1867, writes E.R.R. Green, the romantic nationalists of Ireland, with strong backing from the Irish-Americans, conspired in vain to make their country an “Independent Democratic Republic.”