The Opium Wars
The wars of 1839-42 and 1856-60 are a perfect case study of the divergence of opinion that the British Empire continues to generate.
Victorian
Birth of Celia Fiennes
The pioneer of English travel writing was born on June 7th, 1662.
Death of Edward Gibbon Wakefield
The Antipodean reformer died on May 16th, 1862.
Lessons from Lord Rosebery
Britain's political elite are often criticised for having few achievements away from Whitehall. Richard Foreman contrasts their inexperience with the 19th-century statesman Lord Rosebery.
Birth of John Bright
The leading Victorian radical and Liberal politician John Bright was born on November 16th 1811.
Victorian Jokes: The best in 19th-century humour
Lee Jackson of Victorian London selects some of his favourite Victorian jokes.
When Britain Still Believed in God
The Victorian era was an age of faith – which is why it was also a golden period of progress, argues Tim Stanley.
Crystal Palace: Reflections of Empire
Glittering monument to Britain’s colonial achievement or fragile symbol of a fragmenting imperial dream? Jan Piggott charts the efforts to make Joseph Paxton’s Crystal Palace flourish as an ‘Acropolis of Empire’.
From Georgian to Victorian
Nicholas Dixon asks whether there was a radical transition between the two eras.