Volume 56 Issue 10 October 2006

‘Black Shame’

In the Iraq war a radical Muslim group claimed that they prefer to attack black American soldiers, because ‘To have Negroes occupying us is a particular humiliation. Sometimes we aborted a mission because there were no Negroes’*. As Dick van Galen Last shows here, such prejudices were also common in the 20th century when an occupation by black soldiers was considered an exceptional humiliation: in the years after the Great War the German people called it the Black Shame.

The Ghosts of Calcutta

Hugh Purcell finds stirring memories of the British Raj in this thriving city, a far cry from its dreadful reputation of a generation ago.

Where Archives Belong

Deborah Hayter argues why family and local history archives should be prevented from being sold abroad and, whenever possible, remain accessible in the region where they were created.

History on TV

Craig Thompson, Executive Producer, World Congress of History Producers announces this year’s Congress produced in association with History Today.

Remembrance of Things Past

The coincidence, or otherwise, of memory and history has been a fruitful field for study for several years now, and one that has proved to be fraught with controversy and alarm.