The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Britain, Volume 1: 1700-1870 by Roderick Floud, Jane Humphries and Paul Johnson (editors) (Cambridge University Press), 2014 495pp., £29.99 paper, ISBN 978-1-107-63143-4 The Cambridge Economic History of Modern Britain, Volume 2: 1700-1870 (Cambridge University Press), 2014586pp., £29.99 paper, ISBN 978-1-107-68673-1 These two volumes are...

The Cambridge History of South Africa: Volume 1, From Early Times to 1885 by Carolyn Hamilton, Bernard K. Mbenga and Robert Ross (eds.)(Cambridge University Press), 2010 466pp., £80 hard, ISBN 0-978-521-51794-2I am writing this review an hour before England's first match of the World Cup in the ‘Rainbow Nation'.  For...

The Cambridge History of the Second World War: Volume 1, Fighting the War by John Ferris and Evan Mawdsley (eds.)(Cambridge University Press), 2015 804pp., £ 99.99, hard, ISBN 978-1-107-03892-9Richard J. B. Bosworth and Joseph A. Maiolo, (eds.),The Cambridge History of the Second World War: Volume 1I, Politics and Ideology (Cambridge...

The Cambridge World History of Slavery, Volume 3: AD 1420-AD 1804 by David Eltis and Stanley L. Engerman (editors) (Cambridge University Press), 2011 762pp., £110 hard, ISBN 978-0-521-84068-2 This is the second of the four volume in The Cambridge World History of Slavery to be published and will attract a considerable...

The Catholic Church and the Campaign for Catholic Emancipation in Ireland and England by Ambrose Macaulay (Four Courts Press, 2016) 416pp., £ 26.74, hard, ISBN 978-1-84682-600-9 Rather like the debate on the European Union…in many respects it was the Brexit of its day…the campaign for Catholic Emancipation divided society into...

The Chamberlains: Joseph, Austen and Neville 1936-1940, Roger Ward, Fonthill, 176p, £20-00. ISBN 978-1-78155-447-0 This book reflects Roger Ward’s extensive researches in to the local political history of Birmingham but it offers a much wider analysis as it explores the national contribution and role of the three Chamberlains. He makes...

Tom Scott - The City-State in Europe, 1000-1600: Hinterland, Territory, Region(Oxford University Press), 2012382pp., £45, hard, ISBN 978-0-19-927460-4There has been no detailed comparison of the development of the city-state in medieval Europe over the last century. There has been a considerable research on medieval urbanisation but it has concentrated on...

The Code-Breaker's Secret Diaries: The Perilous Expedition through plague ridden Egypt to uncover the Ancient Mysteries of the Hieroglyphs, J. F. Champollion (Gibson Square Books, 2009) 208pp., paperback, £8.99, ISBN 978 1 903933 83 1.This book is the result of the labours of several people - Dr. Joyce Tyldesley provides...

The Comet Sweeper. Caroline Herschel’s Astronomical Ambition, Claire Brock, Icon Books, 2017, paperback, 292 pp., £8.99, ISBN 9781785781667 Caroline Herschel - sister of the royal astronomer William Herschel - qualifies to be regarded as no less a figure than ‘Britain’s first female professional scientist’, maintains Claire Brock in this lively account of...

The Common Story: A history of Tooting Common, [ed] Katy Layton-Jones, Wandsworth Council’s Tooting Common Heritage Project, 2019, 132p, £10-00 from the Tooting History Group [or downloadable free via link on the Tooting History Group page]. A few miles from the Historical Association office, a substantial and easily accessible open...

The Complete Pompeii - Joanne Berry(Thames & Hudson), 2013  256 pp., £14.95 pp., ISBN 978-0-500-290927Originally published in 2007, this paperback edition of Joanna Berry's authoritative and lucid account of the rise and fall of Pompeii has been published to coincide with the British Museum exhibition, Life and death: Pompeii and...

The Constitutional Origins of the American Revolution by Jack P. Greene(Cambridge University Press), 2010 198pp., £15.99, paper, ISBN 978-0-521-13230-5Jack P. Greene has written a succinct study arguing that the establishment of overseas settlements in America created a problem of constitutional organisation. Central to this issue was how far conflicting understandings...

The Crusades: The War for the Holy Land, Thomas Asbridge, (Pocket Books, London, Sydney, New York, Toronto, first published by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd., 2010) xvi, 767pp., paperback, £9.99, ISBN 978 1 41652 608 7This edition is by Pocket Books but this substantial volume will scarcely fit into anyone's...

The Devil’s Bridge: The German Victory at Arnhem, 1944, Anthony Tucker-Jones, Osprey Publishing, 2020, 304p, £20-00. ISBN 978-1-4728-3986-2 The British view the events surrounding the bridge across the River Rhine at Arnhem in 1944 as an heroic attempt to accelerate the defeat of Nazi Germany, a view exaggerated in popular...

The Dignity of Chartism: Essays by Dorothy ThompsonStephen Roberts (ed.) (Verso), 2015 xxx, 206pp, £14.99 paper, ISBN 978-1-78188-849-6The historian Dorothy Thompson, who died aged 87 in 2011, was best known for her writing on the social and cultural aspects of the nineteenth-century Chartist movement. The documents she edited in The...

The Disappearance of Emile Zola: Love, Literature and the Dreyfus Case, Michael Rosen, 2017, Faber and Faber, 302p, £16-99. ISBN 978-0-571-31201-6 Emile Zola occupies a pivotal position in the world of personal integrity and courage. His intervention over the scandalous treatment of the Jewish French army officer, Captain Dreyfus, who...

The Empire of Death: A Cultural History of Ossuaries and Charnel Houses, Paul Koudounaris, (Thames and Hudson, London) 224pp., hardback, £29.95, ISBN 978 0 500 25178 2 This is the first book to focus on the world's most important charnel rites, normally inaccessible to the general public.  Paul Koudounaris, who...

The End of Byzantium - Jonathan Harris (Yale University Press), 2010 298pp., £25, hard, IDBN 978-0-300-11786-8That the modern world begins with the fall of Constantinople in 1453 as the Muslim hordes battled their way into Europe was a widely accepted position when I was in school.  In fact, the Ottoman...

The English Civil War: An Atlas and Concise History of the Wars of the Three Kingdoms 1639-51, Nick Lipscombe, Osprey, 2020, 389p, £50-00.                   ISBN 9781472829726. This is an extraordinarily thorough book. Simultaneously it manages both to provide a clear commentary on military experiences within the Three Kingdoms whilst also providing...

The Ever Open Door: 150 years of the Together Trust, Andrew Simpson, The Together Trust, 2020, 140p, £14-99. ISBN 978-1-5272-5671-2  From its earliest beginnings in Manchester 1870 as a ‘Night Refuge for Homeless Boys’, through being transformed into the ‘Manchester and Salford Boys and Girls Refuges and Homes’ and then...