History Today

The Russian Armada 1904-5

David Woodward recounts how, after a voyage from the Baltic of 11,000 miles, the Russian Second Pacific Fleet was dramatically destroyed off the coast of Korea by the Japanese.

Hitler & the Bomb-Plot Part III: In Paris

Only the infirmity of purpose displayed by the key-figure at the top, John Wheeler-Bennett writes, prevented the revolt against Hitler, which had failed in Berlin, from being continued successfully from Paris

The Testament of Sir Humphry Davy

R.J. White introduces Humphry Davy: the inventor of the safety-lamp and one of Britain's greatest chemists was by temperament a romantic poet and philosopher.

The Fall of Constantinople

Five hundred years ago Constantinople—long a bastion of the Western world—fell to the armies of the Grand Turk. G.R. Potter gives his account of how the last remnants of the Byzantine Empire finally disappeared.

Peru Before Pizarro

C.A. Burland describes the highly developed, sprawling and ancient Incan civilisation in the years preceding its conquest by the Spanish seaborne empire.

St. Andrews: The Haunted Town

The site of her oldest university and the home of one of her earliest missionary Saints, St. Andrews holds a special position in the history of Scotland, as Russell Kirk here explains.

Could Napoleon Have Won?

His refusal to learn by experience, C.S. Forester suggests, was largely responsible for Napoleon’s ultimate failure

Who were the first Crusaders?

Pope Urban II launched the First Crusade, which lasted from 1096 to 1099. Jonathan Phillips examines the origins and motives of the first Crusaders.