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Colin Brown is author of the acclaimed history Whitehall: The Street That Shaped a Nation. Formerly political editor of the Sunday Telegraph and Independent on Sunday, deputy political editor of the Independent, and correspondent for the Guardian, he covered breaking news in Downing Street and Westminster for over 30 years. He lives in London.
10 defining events in British History, we take them for granted – the Suffrage movement, Abolition, the Armada and Waterloo but what do we really know about them? Is the version we have the true one or is it a polished and buffed-up misty-eyed looking back on past glory? Well, according to Colin Brown it’s a mix of the two, his delving in the archives reveals some surprising views on these key events, that the text-book version is not always right. Due to his use of archive material, reports and personal records from the time, Colin Brown has written an insightful and well-rounded view of 10 key events.Like for Like ReadingThe Interesting Bits: The History you might have missed, Justin PollardHow England Made the English, Harry Mount
1215: The Magna Carta. 1415: Henry V. 1588: Defeat of the Spanish Armada. 1688: The Bill of Rights. 1815: Waterloo. 1833: Abolition of the slave trade. 1928: Women's suffrage. 1940: Dunkirk and Churchill's last stand. 1945: Creation of the welfare state. 1982: Falklands War. Was the longbow behind the victory at Agincourt, or was it just that the English are better in mud? Did Queen Elizabeth I know the Armada had capitulated when she drafted one of history's most inspiring speeches? Where did Wellington meet his Waterloo? Were the Falklands testament to Mrs Thatcher's steel or a grasping, imperial folly?
THE SCUM OF THE EARTH follows the men Wellington called just that from victory at Waterloo to a Regency Britain at war with itself, and explodes some of the myths on the way; such as that the defeat of Napoleon ended the threat of revolution spreading from France. Did the victorious soldiers return to a land fit for heroes? They did not. In 1819, the Peterloo massacre saw 15 killed and at least 500 injured when cavalry sabred a crowd demanding parliamentary reform. Peace in Europe perhaps for 50 years - but at home, repression and revolution in the air. And at the same time, the sheer exuberance of the Regency period, with new buildings, new art, even 17 new colonies more or less accidentally acquired. By 1848 the whole of Europe was once more set for complete upheaval. There is no one better to take a cold, hard look at the battle itself and its aftermath, in order to save us from an anniversary of misty-eyed backslapping, than political editor Colin Brown.
A professor of architecture at Cambridge University, Marcial Echenique, recently became curious when he found wiring concealed under the floorboards of his country mansion, Farm Hall in Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire. The mansion had an astonishing past as an MI6 staging post for some of the most daring secret operations of the Second World War. But in April 1945, Farm Hall was to play an even more astounding role, as a `country club' for ten of Germany's top nuclear physicists after they had been captured in Germany and secretly flown back to England in a daring raid code-named Operation Big. Every word they uttered was bugged by MI6 eavesdroppers using the wires found by the professor. After the dropping of the bomb these men would claim they could have developed it for the Third Reich but did not `for the greater good of mankind'. Most believe this to be a deception. But was there an even greater deception? Were they captured not to stop Hitler, but to stop Stalin? Did the US drop the bomb not as a show of power to the Japanese, but to the Soviets? Colin Brown guides us through a world of espionage, scientific discovery and questions of morality as he reveals the extraordinary truth surrounding Hitler's atomic bomb.
At a time of emerging women leaders, the life of Elizabeth Milbanke, Viscountess Melbourne, the shrewdest political hostess of the Georgian period, is particularly intriguing. It was Byron who called her `Lady M' and it was Byron's tempestuous and very public affair with Elizabeth's daughter-in-law Lady Caroline Lamb that was the scandal of the age. Lady M rose above all adversity, using sex and her husband's wealth to hold court among such glittering figures as Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, the Whig leader and wit Charles James Fox and the playwright Sheridan. Her many lovers included Lord Egremont, Turner's wealthy patron, and the future George IV. Elizabeth schemed on behalf of her children and her ambitions were realised when her son William Lamb (`Lord M') became the young Queen Victoria's confidant and Prime Minister. Based upon primary research - diaries, archives and extensive correspondence between Lady M and Lord Byron - Colin Brown examines the Regency period and its pre-Victorian code of morals from the perspective of a powerful and influential woman on the 200th anniversary of her death.
`We ourselves were almost awestruck, not so much at the power of the Bomb, for this we had expected, but because the Americans had used it with so little notice.' R. V. Jones, head of wartime British Scientific Intelligence Marcial Echenique, a Cambridge professor, recently became curious when he found wiring concealed under the floorboards of his country mansion, Farm Hall. The manor had an astonishing past as an MI6 staging post for some of the most secret operations of the Second World War. But in April 1945, Farm Hall was to play an even more astounding role, housing ten of Germany's top nuclear physicists captured in daring raids. Amid the chaos of the disintegrating Third Reich they were flown to England covertly in a mission code-named Operation Big. Every word they uttered was bugged by MI6 eavesdroppers using the wires found by the professor. After the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, these men would claim they could have developed A-bombs for the Third Reich, but did not `for the greater good of mankind'. Most believe this to have been a lie. But was there an even greater deception? Were they captured not to stop Hitler, but to stop Stalin? Did the US drop the Bomb as a show of power not to the Japanese, but to the Soviets? Colin Brown guides us through a world of espionage, scientific discovery and questions of morality as he reveals the extraordinary truth surrounding Hitler's atomic bomb.
`We ourselves were almost awestruck, not so much at the power of the Bomb, for this we had expected, but because the Americans had used it with so little notice.' R. V. Jones, head of wartime British Scientific Intelligence Marcial Echenique, a Cambridge professor, recently became curious when he found wiring concealed under the floorboards of his country mansion, Farm Hall. The manor had an astonishing past as an MI6 staging post for some of the most secret operations of the Second World War. But in April 1945, Farm Hall was to play an even more astounding role, housing ten of Germany's top nuclear physicists captured in daring raids. Amid the chaos of the disintegrating Third Reich they were flown to England covertly in a mission code-named Operation Big. Every word they uttered was bugged by MI6 eavesdroppers using the wires found by the professor. After the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, these men would claim they could have developed A-bombs for the Third Reich, but did not `for the greater good of mankind'. Most believe this to have been a lie. But was there an even greater deception? Were they captured not to stop Hitler, but to stop Stalin? Did the US drop the Bomb as a show of power not to the Japanese, but to the Soviets? Colin Brown guides us through a world of espionage, scientific discovery and questions of morality as he reveals the extraordinary truth surrounding Hitler's atomic bomb.
The Scum of the Earth explores the common soldiers the Duke of Wellington angrily condemned as `scum' for their looting at Vitoria, from their great victory over Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 to their return home to a Regency Britain at war with itself. It follows men like James Graham, the Irishman hailed as the bravest man in the British Army for his heroic action in closing the north gate at Hougoumont, and fresh documentary evidence that he was forced to plead for charity because he was so poor; Francis Styles, who went to his grave claiming that he had captured the eagle that was credited to his superior officer; and John Lees, a spinner from Oldham who joined up at 15, braved shell and shot to deliver ammunition to the guns at Waterloo and was cut down four years later at the Peterloo Massacre by some of the cavalry with whom he served. All this is set against a backdrop of civil unrest on a scale unprecedented in British history. The Regency age is famous for its elegance, its exuberance, the industrial revolution that made Britain the powerhouse of Europe and the naval might that made it a global superpower. But it was also an age of riots and the fear that the mob would win control just as it had done in Paris. Britain came closer to bloody revolution than ever before or since, as ordinary men - including some of the men whom Wellington called the scum of the earth - took to the streets to fight for their voices to be heard in Parliament. The riots were put down by a series of repressive measures while Wellington stood like a bastion against the tide of history. He was defeated with the passage of the Great Reform Act in 1832. There is no one better placed to take a cold, hard look at the battle and its aftermath in order to save us from a bicentenary of misty-eyed backslapping than a former political editor with a reputation for myth busting. Colin Brown provides original research into the heroes of Waterloo and the myths that have clouded the real story.
The Song of the Rose is a historical novel about the pioneer airmen of the Royal Flying Corps, set on the Western Front during the First World War. It's the story of fictional character Joe Graham, an educated working class lad who, having started his war in the trenches, first becomes an observer and then eventually a Sopwith Camel pilot during the period 1916 - 1918. The story is full of his adventures with real and imagined characters and encompasses the great battles of the Somme and Passchendaele as observed from the air. It also deals with the big questions around the conduct of the war, the unimaginable waste of millions of young lives and the unpredictable hand of Fate that took so many and spared so few.
10 defining events in British History, we take them for granted – the Suffrage movement, Abolition, the Armada and Waterloo but what do we really know about them? Is the version we have the true one or is it a polished and buffed-up misty-eyed looking back on past glory? Well, according to Colin Brown it’s a mix of the two, his delving in the archives reveals some surprising views on these key events, that the text-book version is not always right. Due to his use of archive material, reports and personal records from the time, Colin Brown has written an insightful and well-rounded view of 10 key events.Like for Like ReadingThe Interesting Bits: The History you might have missed, Justin PollardHow England Made the English, Harry Mount
No other street in Britain contains more landmarks to our island's history than Whitehall. Here, Colin Brown takes us behind its closed doors. We visit what was the most notorious address in London when Byron and Lady Caroline Lamb conducted their very public and tempestuous love affair; the Admiralty, where Nelson received his orders to attack the French; and fragments of the tennis courts where Anne Boleyn watched Henry VIII playing tennis in his 'slops'. We follow in Henry's footsteps down a secret passageway leading to Number Ten Downing Street, later used by Alastair Campbell to avoid the cameras outside Number Ten, and witness never-before-published documents that show how Churchill, in 1940, prepared for street fighting in Whitehall's departments. Whitehalltells the story of our island race, its empire, its conquests and its decline, encapsulated in one small corner of the capital.
The bestselling biography of the Deputy Prime Minister - fully revised and updated in paperback - Fully revised and updated after the 2005 General Election - Author has unparalleled access to Prescott's private papers - Author is Deputy Political Editor of the Independent - A bestseller in hardback with excellent reviews - The only biography of John Prescott on the market - Published to coincide with the 2005 Labour Party conference
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