Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2018 i History Extra

“One hundred years ago this month, the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service were combined to form the Royal Air Force (RAF). Britain’s commemoration of the centenary will surely be coloured by its role in the Second World War, which many believe to be the RAF’s finest hour. In this month’s cover feature, on page 25, military historian Patrick Bishop revisits this period to argue that of all the three services, it was Britain’s air force that contributed the most to victory over the Axis. It’s a view that I’m sure many of you will respond to and we look forward to your letters and social media messages over the next few weeks. Another icon of Britain’s past making headlines this month is Isambard Kingdom Brunel, about whom…

The beginning of April 1814 found Napoleon Bonaparte in defiant mood. After a series of military reverses, his empire had crumbled and the troops of the Sixth Coalition (comprising Russia, Austria, Prussia, Britain and others) had occupied Paris. The emperor himself, with what remained of his army, was at Fontainebleau, south of the capital. Far from giving up, however, he was determined to fight on. At midday on 3 April, Napoleon told the Imperial Guard that they would shortly march on Paris and retake the city. “Vive l’empereur!” the men shouted. “A Paris! A Paris!” Unfortunately for Napoleon, his senior officers had different ideas. They had no desire to see more blood spilt to appease their master’s vanity. “Are we to sacrifice everything to one man?” asked the previously loyal…

“The Earl of Warwick (1428–71) was a decisive player in the late 15th-century conflict known as the Wars of the Roses (1455–87). Fuelled by unparalleled personal wealth and the influence it generated at home and abroad, Warwick used his power to raise and remove kings in a medieval game of thrones that had far-reaching effects on the social and economic stability of England. An adept politician, Warwick knew how to manipulate popular discontent to his advantage and that of the kings he served. But when he found himself marginalised and at odds with Edward IV, his volte-face in championing Henry VI’s hopeless cause set him and his Lancastrian conspirators on a collision course with disaster. Warwick’s ambitious plan to make his daughter queen by virtue of a hasty marriage to…

An early Briton had dark skin DNA extracted from a 10,000-year-old skeleton known as Cheddar Man has revealed that he had dark brown or black skin and blue eyes – a combination common in western Europe at that time. The results also suggest that Cheddar Man was unable to drink milk as an adult. Footprints shed light on ancient childhoods Footprints found at the ancient site of Melka Kunture in Ethiopia indicate that children as young as one accompanied adults on hunting trips. The c700,000-year-old footprints, preserved by volcanic ash, were found with stone tools and the butchered remains of a hippo. Tunnel may pose risk to Ice Age site Archaeologist David Jacques, of the University of Buckingham, has warned that building a tunnel past Stonehenge could damage nearby Mesolithic…

Your article on Georgiana was interesting and she was in many ways a remarkable woman (History Explorer, February). However, she had the opportunity to be so because of almost unlimited wealth. That wealth was derived from the sweat of lead miners, coal miners and farm labourers who earned a subsistence wage and struggled to feed their children. The contrast between her life and that of the thousands of workers who were needed to support it is quite stark. Too often when we look back at the lives of the rich and famous we forget that their achievements were only possible because of those that supported them. The Duke of Wellington is said to have claimed Waterloo was won “on the playing fields of Eton”. In truth it was won because…

In the 12th century, the Yorkshire monk and writer St Ælred of Rievaulx chastised his readers for not being more active when visualising Christ’s suffering. He told them to imagine that they were licking the sweat from Christ’s dusty feet, and kissing his wounds one by one until their lips became stained red with blood, like a scarlet ribbon. Mystics such as Margery Kempe, Julian of Norwich, Catherine of Siena, Marie d’Oignies and Angela of Foligno followed this advice, recording visions of the crucifixion, which helped catapult them into mystical states. St Ælred’s words capture perfectly the essence of Passion Meditation, a devotional craze that swept the Christian world in the Middle Ages. The idea was that, if you wanted to deepen your faith, you needed to do more than…

Vicki Crawford is director of the Martin Luther King Jr Collection at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, United States Clive Webb is professor of modern American history at the University of Sussex Peter Ling is professor of American studies at the University of Nottingham Britta Waldschmidt -Nelson is professor of transatlantic history and culture at the University of Augsburg Zoe Colley is lecturer in history at the University of Dundee. She specialises in civil rights and the American South…

During the pandemic’s first 25 weeks, some 25 million people died Pandemic 1918: The Story of the Deadliest Influenza in History by Catharine Arnold Michael O’Mara Books, 368 pages, £20 When Anthony Burgess – author of A Clockwork Orange – was a baby, his father arrived home from the First World War to find him chuckling in his cot while his mother and sister lay dead beside him in the same room. The timing was crucial: by then, the kind neighbour who fed him had also succumbed to the deadly influenza virus that claimed more lives than the guns and gases of the battlefields. Mortality figures probably underestimate the total toll, but it seems likely that during the pandemic’s first 25 weeks, 25 million people died. The numbers spiralled upwards,…

Hidden in streets across the country is the story of Britain’s history. Such is the central idea behind Britain’s Most Historic Towns (Channel 4, March). The series finds Professor Alice Roberts telling the stories of historic towns during transformative moments in British history. So, for example, we learn about the Regency period via the metamorphosis of Cheltenham into a fashionable spa resort. Over on Radio 4, In Our Time (continuing from Thursday 22 March) tackles a host of historical subjects as Melvyn Bragg corrals academics together to discuss Alexis De Tocqueville’s book on government in the New World, Democracy in America; George Eliot’s Middlemarch; the Roman slave trade; and father and son railway pioneers George and Robert Stephenson. Meanwhile, in Chinese Characters (Radio 4, Monday 9 April), Rana Mitter explores…

Under the radar EXHIBITION Special Forces: In the Shadows National Army Museum, London 17 March–18 November - 020 7730 0717 • nam.ac.uk The secret world of special forces comes under the spotlight at the National Army Museum this month, in its first major exhibition since the museum reopened in March 2017. The exhibition will examine 70 years of Britain’s special forces, exploring the roles played by these elite regiments since their foundation in the Second World War, outlining the training and skills required, and describing operations around the world. The men and women of special forces have to undergo a rigorous recruitment regime. One part of the exhibition examines this process, looking at six examples of those that have made it through. This will include interviews with former soldiers as…

1. BENTLEY PRIORY MUSEUM Join us in commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Royal Air Force with our new temporary exhibition exploring 100 years of Air Defence, open between 30th March – 10th November 2018. bentleypriorymuseum.org.uk | 020 8950 5526 2. BAMBURGH CASTLE A stunning coastal fortress at the heart of an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Explore fourteen rooms, The Aviation Artefacts Museum, archaeology, cafeteria, grounds and battlements. Discover an amazing eclectic collection of 3500 items. bamburghcastle.com | 01668 214515 3. NATIONAL TRUST CALKE ABBEY Plenty of stories are waiting to be told at Calke Abbey – the country house in decline. Discover the people who lived and worked on the estate, and meet their modern-day equivalents who help keep Calke alive today. nationaltrust.org.uk/calke-abbey 4. ANAESTHESIA HERITAGE CENTRE A unique medical…

Rab cake Hailing from the sun-drenched Adriatic island of Rab, this soft, squishy almond cake was reportedly first served to Pope Alexander III in 1177, and quickly became a favourite with the island's monks and nuns. It's now a classic dish wheeled out at weddings, baptisms and other special occasions. I've chosen to make my Rab Cake in a traditional spiral shape, but all sorts of designs are now popular. INGREDIENTS For the pastry: 250g flour 25g butter 1 tsp sugar 1 egg 1 tbsp water pinch of salt For the filling: 500g ground almonds 450g sugar 3 tbsp Maraschino (or cherry brandy) 3 eggs zest of 1 orange zest of 1 lemon icing sugar (for dusting) METHOD Make the pastry by kneeding together the flour, butter, sugar, egg, salt…

Rana Mitter I’ve been travelling through China finding the places where some of the most important Chinese lives of the past two millennia have been lived: from the cosmopolitan conqueror Kublai Khan to feminist and radical activist Ding Ling. • Rana profiles six influential Chinese lives on page 32 Patrick Bishop In Air Force Blue , my new book describing the achievements and ethos of the wartime RAF, I argue that the air force was critical not only to Britain’s survival in the early years of the conflict, but also to its ultimate victory. • Patrick describes the RAF’s war-winning effort from 1939–45 on page 25 Hetta Howes In the Middle Ages, women’s bodies were seen as imperfect and leaky. However, the ecstatic practices of medieval mystics show how women…

What new information has come to light during the re-examination of the Viking graves? We now believe that the mass grave at the site, which contained the bones of at least 264 people as well as artefacts and coins dating to the mid-870s, was associated with the Great Viking Army, which, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, arrived in England in 865. Radiocarbon dating, performed in the 1990s, dated the bones to a mixture of dates between the seventh and ninth centuries. Our investigations, though, have revealed that the bones were all consistent with people who died in the late ninth century, at the same time as the Great Viking Army’s invasion. The bones were mostly of men aged 18–45, but 20 per cent of the remains were women’s. What do…

“ The politics of gay rights encouraged the binary thinking (gay or straight) that went with prejudice against homosexuality” HARRY COCKS According to the OED, the word ‘transgenderism’ was coined in the journal Sexual Hygiene and Pathology in 1965 to distinguish questions of sexuality from reversals of gender such as transvestism. Sexuality, it was argued, was not a major factor in transvestism. It was not until the mid-1990s that transgender assumed its current meaning. It now refers to someone rejecting conventional notions of gender, seeing themselves as in between genders – without necessarily wanting to reassign their gender surgically (though it can also include that). Why have transgender issues come to such prominence in Britain, North America and elsewhere? The short answer is to be found in the transformation of…

Should the suffragettes be pardoned for their crimes? Tori Simpson Kurz They did much more for society than just get the right to vote. I say pardon them. They ignited change and a movement with benefits for not just women but all of society. There are cultures in this day and age that still keep women on this level… Ginette Hardwick The suffragettes only resorted to lawbreaking after years of not getting anywhere by using peaceful means. It wasn’t until they did the things for which they were arrested that the establishment took any notice Barbara Ayres I think not. Surely leaving history as it is shows just how difficult it was, and is there to learn from @DufferRoy No. At the time, what many women were doing to further…

In her memoirs, Margery Kempe recalled a monk telling her that he wished she was locked up in a house of stone. Pilgrims and archbishops were also, it seems, irritated by the 15th-century English mystic, declaring their desire that she go elsewhere to practise her devotion. But why? The answer appears to lie in the sheer fervour of that devotion. When travelling with her fellow pilgrims, Margery chastised them for talking about frivolous things instead of God. In response, they made her sit alone on a small stool at the end of the table – and later, they tried to ditch her entirely. She insisted on wearing white, a custom usually reserved for virgins, even though she had given birth to 14 children. Above all, Margery’s visions of Christ were…

1511 English auxiliaries help the Dutch against the neighbouring Duke of Guelders 1512-14 In Henry’s first war with France, a failed attack on Gascony is followed by a campaign that results in the capture of Thérouanne and Tournai 1513 James IV of Scots, invading England in support of his French allies, is killed at Flodden (as shown in an 1882 painting) 1520 A small army sent to expand English control in Ireland achieves little 1522-25 A second war with France sees more naval raids and land campaigns, including one in 1523 that crosses the Somme to threaten Paris 1527-29 An ineffectual war against the Low Countries fails to make its Habsburg rulers accept Henry’s divorce 1532-34 An inconclusive war of border raids is fought against the Scots 1534 The largest…

Cnut: The North Sea King by Ryan Lavelle Allen Lane, 128 pages, £12.99 Cnut is one of the most fascinating figures in medieval history: a Viking invader who became a successful king of Anglo-Saxon England, he was ruler of an empire that reached across the North Sea. Yet, as Ryan Lavelle comments in his engaging short account of Cnut’s life, this mighty king “has been relegated to a bit-part in the popular perception of medieval history”. Perhaps inevitably, the book begins with the famous story of Cnut commanding the tide to obey him – but as Lavelle goes on to show, there is much more to Cnut than colourful legend. Cnut was the son of the Danish king Svein Forkbeard, who briefly seized the throne of England in 1014 after…

Hadrian’s Wall: Rome and the Limits of Empire by Adrian Goldsworthy Head of Zeus, 224 pages, £18.99 Even in its denuded and ruinous state, Hadrian’s Wall is an awe-inspiring monument. Designed to stand around seven metres in height, it originally comprised an estimated million cubic metres of hand-carved stone and ran for a distance of 73 miles, from Newcastle to Bowness-on-Solway. Constructed in the second century AD, and taking perhaps seven years to complete, it represents the single greatest building project ever initiated in Europe. Curious, then, that it barely appears in accounts surviving from antiquity, the only reference being in the fourth-century Scriptores Historiae Augustae, which rather perfunctorily notes that it was designed simply “to separate the Romans and barbarians”. The wall was far more than just a barrier,…

The Black Dahlia James Ellroy (1987) Elizabeth Short was an aspiring actress in Hollywood who acquired the nickname ‘The Black Dahlia’ after being brutally killed and mutilated in 1947. Short’s unsolved murder remains one of the most famous criminal cases in Los Angeles history. This powerful novel, the first in Ellroy’s ‘LA Quartet’, blends fact and fiction as it explores the circumstances surrounding Short’s death and the ensuing police investigation. Dust and Shadow Lyndsay Faye (2009) Although Lyndsay Faye is best known for a trio of novels about a pioneering policeman on the streets of 1840s New York, her first novel Dust and Shadow brought together two legendary figures, one historical and one fictional. Sherlock Holmes needs all his unparalleled skills as a detective when he pits his wits against those…

Looking north across the waterfront from Liverpool’s Albert Dock makes for a dramatic view. On the banks of the Mersey, topped by two wide-winged Liver birds, symbols of the city, stand the Three Graces. Majestic and iconic, these three imposing buildings are a grand reminder of the city’s former dominance in shipping and trade, and the prosperity it once reaped from these industries. However, looking out from a window in the International Slavery Museum (ISM), I’m given a different perspective on this impressive landscape. A small, unobtrusive black plaque informs me that the Three Graces stand on the site of the former George’s Dock. It was here that ships bound for Africa were loaded with produce to trade for slaves. George’s Dock has long since disappeared, and the city’s waterfront…

“There is something essentially prosaic and unpretentious about the Dutch city” Before visiting Amsterdam for the first time, some 20 years ago, I purchased a guidebook and was briefly taken in by the banal tourist description of the city as ‘the Venice of the North’. Both destinations are indeed waterborne. Both were built on bog and marshland reclaimed from the sea. But there, as any visitor will quickly discover, the comparison ends. The novelist Henry James saw Venice as “perfect poetry” and Amsterdam as “perfect prose”, a description that still applies to present-day Amsterdam. For there is something essentially prosaic and unpretentious about the Dutch city, and these are qualities that stem in large part from its history. Amsterdam had its origins, about 1,000 years ago, at the junction of…

Q When and how did King John get the name ‘Lackland’? Elaine Pottie, by email A As well as having a terrible reputation both for tyranny and extortion, King John ‘Lackland’ (reigned 1199–1216) has been denounced for military ineptitude: during his reign John lost Normandy to King Philip of France. But the nickname ‘Lackland’ was not attached to John because of the lands he lost as king, but dated from his boyhood, and came from his closest family. The 12th-century chronicler William of Newburgh tells us that when John’s father, King Henry II (reigned 1154–89), made his older sons, Geoffrey and Richard, dukes of Brittany and Aquitaine, he commented that his youngest son John would have to stay as Johannes sine terra, or ‘John lack-land’. Henry later tried to improve…

“The world needed cheering up after the First World War. His Little Tramp brought so much joy to so many people – you’d have to be made of stone not to laugh at Chaplin” Charlie Chaplin was a comedian and film-maker whose ‘Little Tramp’ persona helped make him silent cinema’s biggest star. He grew up in London in poverty, began performing in music halls as a boy, and at 18 or 19 joined the Fred Karno troupe, ending up in Hollywood. He was later accused of communist sympathies and forced out of the US, settling in Switzerland, where he died aged 88. When did you first hear about Charlie Chaplin? Through my coal miner dad, John, who took me at the age of five or six to the local cinema…

When Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, awoke on 14 April 1471, it was to a landscape obscured by thick fog. The day before, the richest and most powerful magnate in England had arrayed his army along a ridge north of Barnet, ready for battle. The stakes could not have been higher, but Warwick was a hardened gambler. He had been in his mid-20s when the dynastic feuding known as the Wars of the Roses had broken out in earnest. At the start of the wars he had been a Yorkist, instrumental in placing the young Edward IV on the throne. But after the two fell out, Warwick had switched sides. Now his men fought for the House of Lancaster. Dawn had not yet broken when the fighting began, and the…

THE FRANKLIN INSTITUTE The director of the Shaanxi Cultural Heritage Promotion Centre has condemned the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia for being “careless” with the 10 Terracotta Warrior statues currently on loan there. The comment relates to an incident in December when the thumb of one of the warriors (similar to the one shown below) was snapped off and stolen. The centre is planning to claim compensation.…

“ When our daughters were little we took them to Paris and did all the usual things: a boat ride on the Seine, the Eiffel Tower, a trip to Disneyland. But we also took them to the Louvre. We walked to the Mona Lisa down a huge gallery covered with 15th-century Renaissance paintings: Adam and Eve ashamed by their nakedness; holy virgins in ecstasy; and then tortured saints and martyrs – crucifixions, flagellations, beheadings – angels and long-haired, bearded men floating beatifically in the sky above. Our younger daughter, who was seven at the time, was shocked. But she was also confused: “What is this all about?” she asked. “What’s in their heads?” It’s the question all historians must ask: a reminder, as if we needed one, that even in…

“With our backs to the wall and believing in the justice of our cause each one of us must fight on to the end” Sir Douglas Haig Haig was commander of the BEF on the western front. With the German Spring Offensive – a desperate attempt to win the war before the Americans could arrive – posing a tremendous threat to British lines, Haig famously attempted to rally his troops. The Allies were stretched to such an extent that General Ferdinand Foch was appointed supreme commander on the western front, responsible for pulling together the efforts of the French, British, American and Italian armies, a move that Haig supported. It was agreed to entrust to Foch “the strategical direction of military operations. The commander in chief of British, French and…

What shaped Martin Luther King’s world view? Did he experience racism as a child? Vicki Crawford: Although the King family were relatively economically privileged, this did not fully shield him from the experience of racial prejudice when he was young – he was, after all, born in 1929, during an era of legal segregation. A pivotal experience occurred in 1944 as he returned to Atlanta from an oratorical contest in Dublin, Georgia. He and his teacher were forced to stand on an overcrowded bus so whites could have the available seats. This left an indelible imprint on the young King, who had just delivered perhaps his first important public speech, on ‘The Negro and the Constitution’. Clive Webb: King’s home city of Atlanta was racially progressive by the standards of…

The book is grimly determined to rescue MI5 from its detractors Enemies Within by Richard Davenport-Hines William Collins, 672 pages, £25 Richard Davenport-Hines is a fine writer and a prodigious researcher. His latest book is very fat (672 pages) and exhaustively footnoted, well written, sometimes humorous and, as far as I can tell, reliable in terms of fact. But Enemies Within also has a purpose. It is grimly determined to rescue the security service from its detractors. While billed as a book about the Cambridge spy ring, it offers a broader history of spying in Britain, with a good deal on Russian espionage too. The first chapter, dealing with spying from the days of Elizabeth I and Ivan the Terrible, is engrossing. But the heart of the book is a…

“Romans like Julius Caesar and Tacitus saw wine as a form of reason or control” An actor’s life Sunday Feature: Exit Burbage – the Man Who Made Hamlet RADIO Radio 3 Scheduled for Sunday 15 April It may be the words of William Shakespeare that have endured, but it was one of his associates, Richard Burbage, who first brought many of the Bard’s greatest roles, including Hamlet and Lear, to life. A founding member of the Lord Chamberlain’s Men, Burbage’s was the name that drew in the punters and thus set Shakespeare’s work on the way to immortality. This one-off documentary finds Andrew Dickson charting Burbage’s life. (Look out for Dickson’s feature on Richard Burbage in our next issue.) Religious rights The Turban Bus Dispute RADIO Radio 4 Scheduled for…

1 M Shed BRISTOL A major slaving port Bristol has been grappling with its slaving history recently – in 2017, concert venue Colston Hall announced it would change its name to escape connections to slaver Edward Colston. In its accessible and engaging galleries, the M Shed museum addresses some of the tangled issues connected to the city’s shadowy past. bristolmuseums.org.uk 2 Wilberforce House HULL Birthplace of a famous abolitionist William Wilberforce, one of the most celebrated advocates of the anti-slavery movement, was born at this red-brick house in Hull in 1759. Several of Wilberforce’s personal items are on display, along with a small exhibition on slavery, abolition and life in west Africa. www.hull.gov.uk 3 Museum of London, Docklands EAST LONDON Where slave produce was stored Housed in a warehouse once…

BEST TIME TO GO April and May are especially good months in which to see the city and visit the nearby famous bulb and tulip fields. GETTING THERE Eurostar has recently introduced a twice-daily train direct from London to Amsterdam, taking just 3 hours 41 minutes. There are also direct flights to Amsterdam from a variety of UK airports. WHAT TO PACK Russell Shorto’s book Amsterdam (2013) presents a fascinating argument for the view that Amsterdam is the world’s most liberal city. Donna Tartt’s challenging novel about a Dutch painting, The Goldfinch (2013), is partially set in Amsterdam. WHAT TO BRING BACK A copy of The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank, which can be purchased from the Anne Frank House on Prinsengracht. Since its publication in 1947…

1. What was Queen Anne’s Bounty? 2. What did Carthaginian general Hannibal, Hussite leader Jan Ziska, Napoleonic marshal Andre Massena and British admiral Horatio Nelson have in common? 3. What was a Vespasienne and why was it so named? 4. What did Wiltshire barrister Sir Cecil Chubb (left) buy at auction for £6,600 in September 1915? 5. The world’s first international cricket match was staged in 1844. Who were the contestants? 6. What happened at the church below on 17 May 1649? QUIZ ANSWERS 1. A subsidy paid to boost the incomes of poorer Church of England clergymen. 2. They were all blind in one eye. 3. A French public urinal, named after the emperor Vespasian who is said to have put a tax on urine. 4. Stonehenge. 5. Canada…