Sunday 28 June 1914 was warm and sunny, and most Londoners were enjoying a day of rest. One exception was the resident clerk at the Foreign Office who was on duty to deal with any unexpected crisis that might occur. …
"In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies" - Churchill to Stalin at the Teheran Conference, November 1943
...established guard dog units in Hong Kong, Singapore and Cyprus. The Malayan Emergency saw the transport of tracker dogs by helicopter. Once on the ground, tracker dogs assisted the British...
...in 1918, OBOS printed 300,000 maps. Sixty seven Ordnance Survey staff were killed during the war and they are commemorated at a memorial in a peaceful garden besides the new...
The British Civil Wars has always interested me and International Women's Day prompted me to focus my blog post on a crucial, controversial, yet often overlooked, figure in British history, Henrietta Maria. I came across little, other than biographical histories, …
How the West was won 65 years ago today the North Atlantic Treaty was signed in the State Department auditorium in Washington. An organisation was born—NATO—that remains a cornerstone of Western defence up to the present day. In 1949 there …
Everyone likes the opportunity to travel in their job; especially if you are asked to go overseas, and sometimes you may choose to take your work home with you. This is a long established practice for many occupations. But the …
Clement Attlee bore little resemblance to the contemporary politician. He had no time for the things that are now the stock-in-trade of all serious aspirants for high office: image and public relations. Attlee was so apparently unconcerned with presentation that …
Speaking personally, I love it when BBC Parliament re-shows general election television coverage in order to mark general election anniversaries, and I know I'm not alone with my enthusiasm. You see the story of the election unfold, 'in real time' …
...Jeremy Heywood occupied a range of senior civil service roles, including as Principal Private Secretary to the Prime Minister (1999–2003). Prior to that, he had a variety of senior roles...