-
Virtual Branch Recording: Rebellion and Resistance of the Enslaved in the Atlantic World
Article
This talk explored the struggle for liberation from the perspective of the enslaved, wherever possible in their own words. Dr Sudhir Hazareesingh shines a light on the lives of revolutionaries like Toussaint Louverture, José Antonio Aponte, Nat Turner, and the pregnant rebel Solitude; touching on the stories of the freed...
Virtual Branch Recording: Rebellion and Resistance of the Enslaved in the Atlantic World
-
Schools of Vice: how a medical scandal led to the dismantling of Britain’s last prison hulks
Historian article
Hulks – former naval ships used as prisons for those convicted of serious crime and sentenced to transportation – were intended to be a temporary solution to a penal crisis caused by the American Revolutionary Wars. These ‘schools of vice’, or ‘floating hells’ lasted 80 years, casting a shadow over...
Schools of Vice: how a medical scandal led to the dismantling of Britain’s last prison hulks
-
Finding Bad Bridget: the lives and crimes of Irish immigrant women in America
Historian article
From the early nineteenth century until the First World War, millions of Irish women emigrated to North America in search of better lives. Elaine Farrell and Leanne McCormick, co-leads for the AHRC-funded Bad Bridget research project, tell us how poverty, discrimination, isolation from family as well as greed and opportunism...
Finding Bad Bridget: the lives and crimes of Irish immigrant women in America
-
Imperial spaces of a ‘miniature world’: the case of Rugby School, c.1828–1850
Historian article
English public schools in the nineteenth century were training grounds not just for society’s elites but also for careers in Britain’s imperial service. In this article, Holly Hiscox explores the ways in which schools such as Rugby provided pupils with a miniature world of domestic and professional life which prepared...
Imperial spaces of a ‘miniature world’: the case of Rugby School, c.1828–1850
-
Real Lives: A German captain’s perspective on the end of WWI
Historian feature
Our series ‘Real Lives’ seeks to put the story of the ordinary person into our great historical narrative. We are all part of the rich fabric of the communities in which we live and we are affected sto greater and lesser degrees by the big events that happen on a daily...
Real Lives: A German captain’s perspective on the end of WWI
-
Doing history: Contemporary narratives and the legacy of the Dagenham Ford Factory Strike of 1968
Historian feature
In this article, Zubin Burley looks at how a visit to the local archive can transform our understanding of an important event in British social history...
Doing history: Contemporary narratives and the legacy of the Dagenham Ford Factory Strike of 1968
-
The End of Colonial Rule in West Africa
Classic Pamphlet
The dissolution of colonial empires since the Second World War is a major theme of contemporary history, and one which will challenge historians for many years to come. There are still sharp disagreements as to how this change should be described. European scholars tend to use the term ‘decolonization' (at...
The End of Colonial Rule in West Africa
-
From strategic routes to economic lifelines: the historical and contemporary importance of La Pintada
Article
In his work on the local history of his hometown in Panama, Miguel Elias Escobar Cornejo highlights the importance of understanding the geography of the historical sites we study. Here, he explains how a defensive route from the coast to the rugged mountain interior developed into one of the most important...
From strategic routes to economic lifelines: the historical and contemporary importance of La Pintada
-
Doing history: The Old Poor Law in a Regency York Parish 1795–1847
Historian feature
In this regular feature called Doing History, history enthusiasts describe a piece of research they have undertaken and how it sheds light on aspects of local and national history. Here Steve Barrett shows how his exploration of archives in York provided interesting insights into the controversial issue of poor relief, with a focus...
Doing history: The Old Poor Law in a Regency York Parish 1795–1847
-
Roald Dahl and the Lost Campaign
Historian article
Following the successful filming of his book ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’, Roald Dahl has an international reputation as a children’s writer. There is, however, a macabre dimension to his writing underlined by his successful TV series ‘Tales of the Unexpected’. Dark episodes in Dahl’s highly successful career touched his...
Roald Dahl and the Lost Campaign
-
The Olympics - politics, impact and legacy - its not just about the sport
Article
2024 is an Olympic Games year. Held every four years (with the exception of during the World Wars and Covid-19 restrictions), the modern Olympics is the largest international sporting event in the world. However, historically it has not always been just the sports that are played and the athletes’ performances...
The Olympics - politics, impact and legacy - its not just about the sport
-
Who only history know? Cricket, society, and the historical oversight of sport
Historian article
The early 2020s have seen various investigations and reports about discrimination in English cricket. As well as finding many examples of racial and gender prejudice, these investigations have unearthed a long history of social elitism in the sport. In this article, Duncan Stone explores some of the historical background to...
Who only history know? Cricket, society, and the historical oversight of sport
-
The Importance of Truth, Quality and Objectivity in the BBC German Service from 1938 to 1945
Historian article
Throughout the Second World War the BBC produced and transmitted regular broadcasts in German to Germany and other European countries occupied by the Germans. In this article Hattie Simpson evaluates the style and success of the BBC German Service. The article is based on her winning entry in the senior...
The Importance of Truth, Quality and Objectivity in the BBC German Service from 1938 to 1945
-
The circle of Ulster literary male friendships of author Forrest Reid
Historian article
Eminent Ulster novelist Forrest Reid was a complex character, reflecting a variety of attitudes in both his writing and his private life. In this article Michael Kelly examines how Reid and his circle of friends aimed to navigate their way through the changes of the early twentieth century, in both...
The circle of Ulster literary male friendships of author Forrest Reid
-
The Legacy of the Z Special Unit in World War II
Historian article
The Spirit of Normandy Trust Essay Competition is aimed at young historians and organised by the Historical Association (as part of the annual Young Historian Awards). The 2023 winner in the Key Stage 3 (lower secondary school) category is Ayan Sinha, a pupil at Queen Elizabeth Grammar School in Wakefield. In this abridged...
The Legacy of the Z Special Unit in World War II
-
The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
Historian article
The Nazis came to power in 1933 with an openly racist and antisemitic set of policies. In the years leading up to the start of the Second World War, those policies were carried out through legislation and governmental actions, with the support of many members of German society. Once the war started,...
The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
-
Women and the French Revolution: the start of the modern feminist movement
Historian article
Luke Rimmo Loyi Lego explores the role of women in the French Revolution, and how their challenges to traditional gender roles laid the foundations for the modern feminist movement.
The study of the French Revolution is often restricted to its impact on the Enlightenment ideas of influential men such as Rousseau,...
Women and the French Revolution: the start of the modern feminist movement
-
1914: The Coming of the First World War
Classic Pamphlet
This pamphlet argues that the outbreak of the First World War represented not so much the culmination of a long process started by Bismarck and his successors, as the relatively sudden breakdown of a system that had in fact preserved the peace and contained the dangerous Eastern Question for over...
1914: The Coming of the First World War
-
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the consequences of the industrial revolution
Teaching History feature
The British industrial revolution stands out as a pivotal moment in human history. Its timing, causes and consequences have all been major topics of historical enquiry for well over one hundred years. Many of the great Victorian commentators – Engels, Dickens, Blake to name a few – who lived through...
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the consequences of the industrial revolution
-
Gladstone and the London May Day Demonstrators, 1890
Historian article
One hundred and twenty years ago the advent of the first red May Days caused major concern across Europe. To general surprise, in 1890 and the next few years some of the largest rallies occurred in London. In Britain the main demonstration on the nearest Sunday to May Day passed...
Gladstone and the London May Day Demonstrators, 1890
-
Film: “The Talk Should Not Be Broadcast”: Homosexuality and the BBC before 1967
Virtual Branch
In the centenary year of the BBC, this Virtual Branch talk from Marcus Collins relates the strange tale of how the BBC did and did not broadcast about homosexuality in the 1950s and 1960s and what it tells us about sexuality, broadcasting and the origins of permissiveness in mid-twentieth century Britain.
Marcus Collins...
Film: “The Talk Should Not Be Broadcast”: Homosexuality and the BBC before 1967
-
The Evolution of the British Electoral System 1832-1987
Classic Pamphlet
During the last 20 years our perspective on the great Victorian question of parliamentary reform has noticeably changed. We have acquired a comprehensive picture of the organisation and political socialisation of those who won the vote; and some interesting debates have developed about the social characteristics of the electors and...
The Evolution of the British Electoral System 1832-1987
-
The Great Spa Towns of Europe: a UNESCO World Heritage Site
Historian article
Catherine Lloyd introduces us to an international heritage initiative to celebrate ‘spa’ culture.
From ancient times, people believed that gods and spirits brought the means of natural healing. Step back in time to imagine an eerie wilderness, a glade in a wood, or a pool by a river, where the snow...
The Great Spa Towns of Europe: a UNESCO World Heritage Site
-
Film: The Quest for the Lost of the First World War
The Searchers
Historian Robert Sackville-West joined the HA Virtual Branch in November 2021 to talk about the topic of his book The Searchers: The Quest for the Lost of the First World War. By the end of the First World War, the whereabouts of more than half a million British soldiers were unknown. Most were presumed...
Film: The Quest for the Lost of the First World War
-
Vichy France and the Jews
Article
Dr Julian Jackson examines the position and treatment of Jews in Occupied France. When in 1945 France came to try those who had ‘collaborated’ during the war, the fate of the Jews was not central. It was even possible for Xavier Vallat, Vichy’s Commissioner for Jewish Affairs, to defend himself...
Vichy France and the Jews
