History Today

King Henry of Haiti

Amid the instability of post-revolutionary Haiti, torn between Britain and France, Henry Christophe rose from lowly roots to become its ruler. Paul Clammer remembers his vital role in shaping a new kingdom.

The Strange Tale of the Kibbo Kift Kindred

The Boy Scout movement produced a little-known offshoot of ‘intellectual Barbarians’, whose charismatic leader had dreams of overcoming the existential crises of the 20th century.

The Science of the Supernatural

Many assumptions and values separate us from the Victorians, but belief in the supernatural is not one of them, argues Simone Natale. 

A Question of Interpretation

The public expects historians to deliver authoritative accounts of the past, yet different conclusions can be drawn from the same sources.

'Curing' Homosexuality

During the 1950s and 1960s, debates over the legality and morality of homosexuality drove gay men and doctors to desperate and dangerous measures in their search for a ‘cure’, writes John-Pierre Joyce.

The Champion of Moderation

As politics in Britain, Europe and the US descends into fragmentation and bitter division, Frank Prochaska commends the civilising voice of Walter Bagehot.

Learning Lessons in the Middle East

The history of Britain’s foreign policy in the Middle East is largely a litany of failure, of self-inflicted wounds that are still felt today. Peter Mangold considers what British diplomats and politicians have failed to learn.