From two veteran historians comes an intelligent and spirited history of Charles II’s dissolute life and surprising legacy.
To refer to the private life of Charles II is to abuse the adjective. His personal life was anything but private. His amorous liaisons were largely conducted in royal palaces surrounded by friends, courtiers, and literally hundreds of servants and soldiers. Gossip radiated throughout the kingdom.
Charles spent most of his wealth and his intellect on gaining and keeping the company of women, from the lowest of society such as the actress Nell Gwyn to the aristocratic Louise de Kérouaille. Some of Charles’ women played their part in the affairs of state, coloring the way the nation was run.
The authors take us inside Charles’ palace, where we will meet court favorites, amusing confidants, advisors jockeying for political power, mistresses past and present, as well as key figures in Charles’ inner circle, including his “pimpmasters” and his personal pox doctor.
The astonishing personal life of Charles II reveals much about the man he was and why he lived and ruled as he did. The King’s Bed tells the compelling story of a king ruled by his passion.
“An entertaining history of the antics of the libidinous King Charles II and his licentious court. Tells you everything you need to know about seventeenth-century sex.”—Tatler
White Cargo is the forgotten story of the thousands of Britons who lived and died in bondage in Britain's American colonies.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide "breeders" for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock.
Drawing on letters crying for help, diaries, and court and government archives, Don Jordan and Michael Walsh demonstrate that the brutalities usually associated with black slavery alone were perpetrated on whites throughout British rule. The trade ended with American independence, but the British still tried to sell convicts in their former colonies, which prompted one of the most audacious plots in Anglo-American history.
This is a saga of exploration and cruelty spanning 170 years that has been submerged under the overwhelming memory of black slavery. White Cargo brings the brutal, uncomfortable story to the surface.
