England

The battle over the Middlesex Election of 1769, writes George Rude, raised the constitutional question of the voters’ right to return a member of their own choice to Parliament.

Essentially a plain man, neither a visionary nor a revolutionary, William Cobbett, rustic tribune of the people, was first and foremost a gifted writer 'who happened to write about politics'.

Englishmen, during the reign of George III, loved every form of festivity and show. In 1775, a courageous attempt was made to hold a magnificent London regatta. But, as F.H.W. Sheppard writes, there were the usual delays and misunderstandings; ladies fell into the Thames-side mud; and, naturally, the weather changed.

One of Nelson’s proteges, William Hoste, patrolled the Adriatic Sea at a time when its coasts were largely under Napoleon’s control, as P.C. McFarlan writes.

Stephen Usherwood describes the Oxford Movement, the revival of the Catholic faith in England, and the hostility that both aroused.

A.L. Rowse reviews a local history of Cornwall.

A millwright of Derbyshire, James Brindley was closely associated with the engineering of eighteenth-century waterways, writes Hugh Malet.

Impressment for Naval Service of seamen in British ports dates back to the reign of Edward I; Christopher Lloyd describes the practice and how it ceased in the mid-nineteenth century.

During an industrial conflict that lasted five weeks and brought the Port of London to a standstill, writes R.B. Oram, the “close fraternity of the docks” struck for better working conditions and more generous rates of pay.

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