Worshipped by the Druids for its longevity, the Common Yew is typically found in churchyards, its soft wood used over ...

In January 1899 Barnum and Bailey’s ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ was a few weeks into its second winter season at London’s Olympia when something extraordinary happened. The performers in the so-called ...

On the 12th May 1820 Florence Nightingale was born. A young woman born into a rich family, Florence would go on to have an enormous impact as a nurse serving during the Crimean War. Famed as the “Lady ...

Important events of 1915, the second year of the First World War, including the first German Zeppelin raid on England, the Gallipoli Campaign and the Battle of Loos. 4 Feb The Germans declare a ...

“Executions are so much a part of British history that it is almost impossible for many excellent people to think of a future without them” – Viscount Templewood, In the Shadow of the Gallows (1951) ...

This restrictive and demure line is typical of the early Victorian period 1837 – 50. The lady wears a dress with a long, tight, pointed bodice and full skirt supported on many petticoats. The sleeves ...

Every nation has its own ‘Patron Saint’ who in times of great peril is called upon to help save the country from its enemies. St David is the patron saint of Wales, St Andrew of Scotland and St ...

King James I succeeded the last Tudor monarch, Elizabeth I, becoming the first Stuart king of England. He had already reigned as King James VI of Scotland for the last thirty-six years. Mary Queen of ...

Castles and fortified houses can be found all over Britain. Impressive, oppressive, dramatic, romantic: who built these castles, and why? Many fortified sites started off as Bronze or Iron Age forts, ...

To the writer and diarist John Evelyn, she was ‘the curse of the nation’. To the Bishop of Salisbury, she was ‘a woman of great beauty, enormously vivacious and ravenous; foolish but imperious’. To ...

Born around 1068, very little is known of Henry’s early life: as the youngest son of William the Conqueror he had never expected to be king. Inheriting the throne from his eldest brother William II, ...

Among many other events, July saw the Second Anglo-Dutch War (pictured above) ends with the peace of Breda. The Dutch acknowledge the loss of Delaware and New Jersey, New Amsterdam is renamed New York ...