History Today

James A. Boutilier profiles Dr Alfred Percival Maudslay, a world-wide traveller who inaugurated the study of Mayan civilization in Central America.

During troubled times over Hawaii, Oregon and the West Indies, Melville maintained a sympathetic attitude to Britain - not least to the Chartists, writes Charlotte Lindgren.

David Woodward describes how, throughout the First World War, the King remained on the narrow strip of Belgium between Ypres and the sea which remained in Allied hands.

In 1897 The Gadfly was published in English by Ethel Lilian Voynich - ‘E.L.V.’ to her friends. Anne Fremantle introduces this revolutionary novel, set in nineteenth-century Italy, which has sold 5 million copies in Russia.

Christopher Hibbert describes how, against the Queen’s wishes, the Prince successfully toured the British Indian Empire at the age of thirty-four.

C.M. Yonge shows how, during the nineteenth century, the British public began to take a keen interest in the wonders of their native beaches.

John Terraine describes how, in the months before Trafalgar, the French Fleet from Toulon was ordered to the West Indies, but Nelson was convinced that their real aim was Egypt.

Stephen Clissold explains how, after twenty years of life as a nun, St Teresa began to experience visions and ecstasies which led her to found a reformed Carmelite convent in Avila.

In 1871 Parisians watched the burning of one of their most ancient palaces; and, Philip Mansel writes, twelve years later, its ruins were sold and demolished.

M. Foster Farley describes the battle of the Cowpens, of January 17th, 1781, whereby an experienced old soldier, Daniel Morgan, routed the force led by Banastre Tarleton, a ‘ruthless and ambitious’ young adventurer.