Search results for ""the history press ltd""

Take a photographic journey into London’s often overlooked advertising history and see how the capital’s businesses of old made use of hand-painted signs to inform, advertise and appeal to consumers. This intriguing book profiles hand-painted advertising from across the city and investigates the companies that commissioned the signs that now appear faded – like ghosts – on the brickwork of buildings. It is a snapshot of a time that is almost forgotten but which lives on through the sometimes haunting presence of ghost signs on the city’s streets. Richly illustrated with 150 full-colour signs, this collection reveals the many varied industries and businesses of London’s past. Fading Ads of London is a must for all true local historians.

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They ruled the streets of London in the 1960s. Half a century later, Ronnie and Reggie Kray, unrepentant purveyors of violence and murder, hold more fascination than ever before. Portrayed as charismatic gangsters on the big screen, the saga of the twins, their firm and their thirty-odd years behind bars is one that is determinedly and deliberately embellished with every passing year. Yet it is only recently that the stark, unvarnished truth about the twins has started to emerge after being so cunningly concealed behind the façade of charitable deeds and East End loyalties. Bestselling author Jacky Hyams has carefully re-examined some of the stories, the lies and the myths to reveal a very different portrait of the twins and those closest to them. She reveals the complexity of their relationships and their closest bonds, and contests the police’s belief that Ronnie Kray senselessly murdered ‘one of their own’. Ronnie Kray is said to have described he and his twin as ‘vicious, elegant bastards’. It is one of the few truths ever uttered by either of them.

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Born into the gap between the eras of austerity and boom, David grew up in Merseyside amid an inexorable tide of progress, developing a fascination with the past. With a vivid eye for detail and boundless childhood curiosity for everything from steam trains to ‘My Old Man’s a Dustman’, his account documents the uneasy relationship between worlds old and new. Featuring unique photographs and authoritative observations on architecture, social and local history based on forty years' work in museums and heritage conservation, Escaping Suburbia offers a different view of the ‘swinging’ sixties.

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Jane Austen is the world’s bestselling novelist – 200 years after her death. We seem to have a never-ending appetite for the swooning of Sense & Sensibility; smouldering passion of Pride & Prejudice – resulting in a near constant supply of film adaptations and spin-off books. The fan market for Austen – the Austenites - is huge and international. Her novels are about to celebrate their bicentennials (Sense & Sensibility 2011). 30,000 visitors each year to Chawton, Hamspshire and Jane Austen Centre, Bath. This book will reveal the real Jane: bitchy, gossipy, badly behaved at times as well as show the side we all love: the writer, sister, true romantic.

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The greatest airborne operation in history commenced on 17 September 1944. Nine days later nearly four out five of the British 1st Airborne Division and their Polish comrades would be killed, wounded or captured as Germany secured her last great battlefield victory of the war. The ferocious and gallant actions in Arnhem and Oosterbeek have fascinated historians and students ever since. Drawing extensively on eye-witness experience and unit diaries, and providing a detailed tactical and technical analysis of the arms, equipment and practices of the day, Arnhem: Nine Days of Battle provides a fascinating day-on-day account of one of the most iconic actions of the Second World War. Supported by battle maps, timelines, troop diagrams as well as touring guides – this is the perfect companion for the armchair historian or the intrepid battlefield traveller.

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The sixth book in a thrilling series of mediaeval mysteries by C.B. Hanley. November 1217: Edwin Weaver is back in his home village of Conisbrough. But if he thinks life is going to be peaceful, he’s wrong: the new bailiff is unpopular and cruel, and soon his murdered corpse is discovered. Everything points to the culprit being a foreigner, and the villagers are happy to have an outsider take the blame; Edwin isn’t so sure and is determined to investigate. However, his former friends, all with something to hide, are increasingly hostile to him and resent his interference. The more he discovers, the more he is convinced that the stranger is innocent, but this comes with dangers of its own. With the sheriff due to arrive any day expecting to supervise a swift execution, Edwin and his wife Alys must join forces to solve the mystery before it is too late.

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Thalidomide: patented in Germany as a non-toxic cure-all for sleeplessness and morning sickness. A wonder drug with no side effects. We know differently now. Today, thalidomide is a byword for tragedy and drug reform – a sign of what happens when things aren’t done ‘the right way’. But when it was released in the 1950s, it was the best thing since penicillin – something that doctors were encouraged to prescribe to all of their patients. Nobody could anticipate what it actually did: induce sleeping, prevent morning sickness, and drastically harm unborn children. But, whilst thalidomide rampaged and ravaged throughout most of the West, it never reached the United States. It landed on the desk of Dr Frances Kelsey, and there it stayed as she battled bureaucracy, patriarchy, and the Establishment in an effort to prove that it was dangerous. Frankie is her story.

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Petrol stations have been with us for 100 years. They have been built on countless rural and industrial landscapes, often becoming a linchpin of the communities they serve. Men and women in slightly oily overalls would fill up your car’s tank, wipe the windscreen and even check the oil for you. Football coins, Green Shield Stamps, soup bowls or wine glasses might be handed over to keep your custom – all in the days when a single £1 note was enough to buy hundreds of miles of happy motoring. This vivid, illustrated history takes the reader on a journey from collecting a tin can at the local ironmonger’s to filling up on the forecourt, and on to the possibility of not using petrol at all.

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A lone man wanders from swamp to swamp searching for himself, a wolf-girl visits Wales and eats the sheep, a Welsh criminal marries an 'Indian Princess', Lakota men re-enact the Wounded Knee Massacre in Cardiff and, all the while, mountain women practise Appalachian hoodoo, native healing and Welsh witchcraft. These stories are a mixture of true tales, tall tales and folk tales, that tell of the lives of migrants who left Wales and settled in America, of the native and enslaved people who had long been living there, and those curious travellers who returned to find their roots in the old country. They were explorers, miners, dreamers, hobos, tourists, farmers, radicals, showmen, sailors, soldiers, witches, warriors, poets, preachers, prospectors, political dissidents, social reformers, and wayfaring strangers. The Cherokee called them: 'the Moon-Eyed People'.

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More than 400 million years ago, the oldest rocks in Somerset were formed. On those rocks, a county was built over thousands of years; from prehistoric man and Roman invasion, through a Pitchfork Rebellion and two world wars to where we are today. Revolution, wassailing, Templars and alchemists – all can be found in this friendly guide to Somerset’s colourful history.

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Five Million Tides is the story of Cornwall’s Helford River from the Stone Age to the dawning of the twenty-first century. From prehistoric pioneers and their megalithic successors, this account goes on to expose a remarkable truth: the Helford became one of Europe’s most significant waterways during the Iron Age and Roman periods. Despite being mainland Britain’s southernmost safe haven, it has not always been a place of good fortune – once a thriving seat of Celtic Christianity the river would ultimately become more synonymous with lawless seafarers. Nor could it be relied upon for sanctuary from every storm, as the graves of mariners in its village churchyards attest. Although now overshadowed by its more famous sibling estuaries, the Helford is an enigmatic beauty of the family whose rich past deserves wider knowledge.

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Twisting and turning its way through great cities and towns is the eternal navigation: a network of canals that fed the industrial growth of our country. Nowadays we might consider our waterways a place to find peace and relaxation, but under that tranquil surface hides a turbulent past.Storyteller and narrowboat dweller Ian Douglas has salvaged a wealth of stories from the depths. Murder and mystery, heroes and love, devils and oatcakes are all wrapped up in this wonderful book – but beware … you will never see the towpath in the same way again!

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What was the secret of The White Trout? Who owned a great boat called 'The Wave Sweeper'? What gave the giant jellyfish its sting? Here you will find the answers, as well as some traditional facts and modern musings. Wild Waves and Wishing Wells is full of hidden story treasures, lost lore and watery whimsy. These stories of the waters of Ireland have been selected by writer and storyteller Órla Mc Govern, and illustrated by Gala Tomasso. Dive in for adventures not to be missed.

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What will happen when the ties are cut? Whatever view you take on Brexit, innovative ideas are needed to thrive. The UK needs to get itself into shape. This book suggests how. We consider radical ideas to reform the voting system, transform the economy via a whole range of initiatives, including a sovereign wealth fund, drastically improve health, welfare and education provision and secure Britain’s place in a fast-changing world. Most commentaries criticise what others do. Britain Post Brexit spells out what needs to be done.

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Stroud is a compact cultural soup of stories waiting to be told. Rupert's photographs take you under the skin of the people in this unique town, at times part of the picture-perfect Cotswolds it occupies and at times set very apart.

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The blackout went into effect three days before the declaration of war and transformed nocturnal London into a criminal’s paradise. As the city pulled together in the face of terrible adversity, the bomb-ravaged streets became the stalking grounds for killers, rapists, looters and gangs. The number of bodies retrieved during the Blitz made it impossible for the authorities to autopsy them all, providing cover to those who worked with blades, guns and more sinister tools. Scotland Yard – its resources stretched to the limit – did its best to tackle a rogues’ gallery born of bombs and blackout, and crimes that continue to fascinate from history’s darkest corners. In Dark City, award-winning crime writer Simon Read paints a vivid picture of the other side of wartime London, from the Blackout Ripper and the Acid Bath Murders, to the notorious Rillington Place killer and his house of corpses.

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When the Queen Elizabeth 2 entered service in 1969 she was the last of the great transatlantic liners and the sole survivor of a bygone era. The modern ship was 963 feet long, 70,000 gross tons, and boasted a service speed exceeding 30 knots. The QE2 made an instant impact worldwide and went on to have an illustrious career spanning four decades. This long-awaited new edition presents the colourful history of the Cunard Line and an engrossing narrative of the ship’s eventful history, including construction and launch, service in the Falklands War, various mishaps, the sale of Cunard to Carnival, and the introduction of the new flagship Queen Mary 2. Also covered is the ship’s final decade, leading up to her eventual sale to become a floating hotel in Dubai. The story ends with a personal afterword by Commodore Ronald Warwick, recounting his long and unique association with the renowned vessel.

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In May 1940 Francis Suttill was commissioned into the East Surrey regiment of the British Army. He was later recruited by the SOE, and after being trained during the summer of 1942, Suttill was chosen to create a new resistance network in northern France, based in Paris, with the operational name Physician. His code name was Prosper and his assumed identity was François Desprées. The circuit of agents grew fast until June 1943, when the Gestapo discovered letters, instructions, crystal sets and addresses in a car and false ID papers in an apartment. Over the next three months, more then eighty agents died or were killed, mostly in concentration camps. Major Suttill DSO would be killed in Sachsenhausen in May 1945. Rumours of betrayal by MI6, even of the involvement of Winston Churchill, have abounded ever since. For the first time, Major Suttill’s son tells the whole story of the tragedy basing his meticulous research on primary sources.

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Artisan Bristol is the culmination of interviews and studio visits with some of the city’s finest makers, and reveals their personal relationship to the area and how it inspires their work. From ceramicists to glassblowers, silversmiths to textile designers, here traditional methods blend with modern, cutting-edge techniques to create wonderful and unique objets d’art.

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The Jaguar name is synonymous with style, power, performance, luxury and an intangible element of Britishness. It’s hard to imagine its humble origins in a Blackpool backstreet as the Swallow Sidecar Company. Jaguar Cars was formed in 1945, and the metamorphosis began: superb engines, knockout design, epic racing victories and thrilling sports saloons followed. Over the years it has become a living legend. Here, Giles Chapman captures the astounding story of this iconic car company with a collection of beautiful pictures.

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When Hitler ordered the north of Nazi-occupied Norway to be destroyed in a scorched earth retreat in 1944, everything of potential use to the Soviet enemy was destroyed. Harbours, bridges and towns were dynamited and every building torched. Fifty thousand people were forcibly evacuated – thousands more fled to hide in caves in sub-zero temperatures. High above the Arctic Circle, the author crosses the region gathering scorched earth stories: of refugees starving on remote islands, fathers shot dead just days before the war ended, grandparents driven mad by relentless bombing, towns burned to the ground. He explores what remains of the Lyngen Line mountain bunkers in the Norwegian Alps, where the Allies feared a last stand by fanatical Nazis – and where starved Soviet prisoners of war too weak to work were dumped in death camps, some driven to cannibalism. With extracts from the Nuremberg trials of the generals who devastated northern Norway and modern reflections on the mental scars that have passed down generations, this is a journey into the heart of a brutal conflict set in a landscape of intense natural beauty.

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Leafy avenues, artisan eateries and eclectic inhabitants encapsulate the Cardiff suburbs of Canton and Pontcanna. Mark’s photographs take you under the skin of the people and places in this unique area of the city, capturing impromptu moments and creating a picture of everyday life here.

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For most prisoners of war in the Second World War, life behind bars was nothing like the films. The tales of brave escape attempts told in accounts such as the iconic film The Great Escape are exciting enough, but how much of the detail is true? In Great Escapes ex-RAF officer and researcher for the RAF Escaping Society Terry Treadwell tells the incredible tales of some of the lesser known attempts to escape POW camps. All the amazing details are from real-life escape attempts, but as this book reveals, fact is often more extraordinary than fiction. Using personal accounts, authentic reports from German guards and debrief documents in the National Archives, Terry Treadwell traces the astounding stories of these heroic escapees. Some were successful, others not, but in each case the inspired methods devised and executed by the prisoners show bravery and ingenuity on a greater scale than any film. With incredible stories such as the Wooden Horse, the French Tunnel and the Colditz Ghost, this ground-breaking new book tells the stories of some of the bravest, and most reckless, men in history.

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When Jim Body joined Great Northern Railway in 1916, he could never have imagined that it would become ‘the family business’, with both his son Geoff and his grandson Ian taking to the rails. Through the eyes of three generations of Bodys, the rail industry changed beyond recognition, going through two world wars, grouping, nationalisation, the end of steam and privatisation before ending up as the industry we know today. With tales that include being suspected of spying, dealing with dramatic flooding, and the first Glastonbury Festival, Three Generations of Railwaymen is a rare behind-the-scenes look at one family’s life and experiences in the railway industry.

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Beginning in 1936, just two years after Ron Buckley started what was to be almost half a decade working for the railways, London Midland Steam shows the changes in locomotive power taking place throughout the London Midland and Scottish Railway and its successor, the London Midland Region of British Railways. The photographs show the design work of Samuel Johnson, Henry Fowler, John Aspinall, George Hughes and William Stanier, featuring celebrated locomotives such as Fowler’s three-cylinder ‘Royal Scot’ class and Stanier’s impressive ‘Princess Royal’ and ‘Princess Coronation’ classes, as well as the ‘Black Five’ and ‘Jubilee’ classes. With previously unpublished images from Buckley’s archive and expert captions from Brian Dickson, London Midland Steam is a unique look at the glory days of steam.

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When Henry VIII passed through Canterbury in 1532, a young woman in her mid-twenties named Elizabeth Barton, widely revered as a visionary and prophetess, burst into his presence and warned him that he was ‘so abominable in the sight of God that he was not worthy to tread on hallowed ground’. Two years later, the self-same ‘Holy Maid of Kent’ would suffer a grisly fate at Tyburn and trigger a wave of bloody repression that consumed not only Sir Thomas More, but two other less widely-known individuals, whose exceptional sacrifices were, arguably, even more compelling. One was a combative cleric as renowned for his integrity as his intellect, prepared to sacrifice both life and country in defence of Queen Catherine of Aragon and the old religion; the other a courtier-turned-ascetic, plucked from the shelter of the cloister by a religious and political revolution, in which he had little stake beyond the dictates of his own conscience. For these three unique individuals of widely contrasting backgrounds, temperaments and motives, drawn together at a critical watershed in English history by a common cause and destiny, the path to Tyburn was a long and painful one, paved with fear, hardships, vilification and intrigue.

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Why did London have to wait so long for a main-line railway beneath its streets? For a few years in the mid-nineteenth century, Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s broad-gauge Great Western trains ran from Reading to Faringdon. Now, after many false starts, his vision is being realised as the Elizabeth Line prepares to carry passengers from Reading to the City once again, and beyond to Essex and Kent, using engineering that would have earned the admiration of the greatest Victorian engineers. London historian Stephen Halliday presents an engaging discussion of Crossrail’s fascinating origins and the heroic engineering that made it all possible.

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Our image of workhouses has often been coloured by the writings of authors such as Charles Dickens. But what was the reality? Where exactly were all these institutions located - and what happened to them? You might be surprised to discover that a building in your own town, now transformed into flats or part of a local hospital, was once a workhouse. Revealing buildings steeped in social history, Workhouses of London and the South East provides a comprehensive and copiously illustrated guide to the workhouses that were set up across London and the neighbouring counties of Middlesex, Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Berkshire.

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"NAVIGATING AND ENGINEERING OFFICERS REQUIRED IMMEDIATELY FOR VERY LARGE CRUDE OIL CARRIER. TANKER EXPERIENCE PREFERRED." - Lloyd’s List and Shipping GazetteThe advertisement captured Ray Solly’s attention whilst he was on leave and demanded direct action! Viewed from the bridge of dry-cargo ships, the sleek lines of VLCCs and their potential navigational challenges always intrigued Ray – so, without hesitation, he grabbed the chance, leaving his current employer, and setting out to fulfil a dream. Supertanker examines life at sea aboard a 1970s monster where reader and author meet on board, encountering and overcoming exciting new challenges in navigation, ship handling, and cargo control. All the while, overshadowing everything else, is the awareness that this loaded ship carries around 80 million gallons of oil every day. But Supertanker is more than just the record of a new adventure. It lifts the lid on the realities of life far out at sea handling such behemoths and reveals why international safety and competency bars had to be raised.

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Where in Yorkshire can you walk on a dragon’s backbone? Who goes dancing at the Spot Bottom Hops? Which very old story gives advice about loading a dishwasher? Which mischievous child invented Yorkshire pudding? And is it safe to offer a gift to a small-toothed dog? Yorkshire has a rich heritage of fantastical folk stories, traditional tales and words of wisdom handed down through generations. These tales are beautifully retold here for 7- to 11-year-old readers, written and illustrated by storyteller and artist Carmel Page –a southerner by birth but who has lived in Sheffield for so long that she now uses her backdoor as her frontdoor and has started to eat her dinner at lunchtime.

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The first Irish railway ran from Westland Row, in the centre of Dublin, to Kingstown, then a seaside resort on the coast south of the city. This historic line is now the DART line, Kingstown has become Dún Laoghaire and the world has changed around it. In this work, historian and author Kurt Kullmann recreates this era and takes us on a scenic journey through Ireland’s past.

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Where do stories come from, and how do we come to know them? Daughters listen with wonder to their grandmothers’ tales. Journalists have their trusted sources. Writers of storybooks draw unconsciously from the works of their predecessors. It is as if every story has within it an infallible truth, contained in the echo of its original telling. The storyteller recounts the tale. The listener hears, learns and remembers. In due course they will retell the same tale, adding in something of their own. And so listeners in time turn into storytellers. This inspiring book brings together the stories from across the world of listeners who themselves became storytellers. They reveal who influenced them the most, what drew them further in, what they learnt, and what they now wish to share with new generations. Tips, tools and tales: read this book, and take your turn.

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Television, penicillin, the telephone, A Haverin' History of Scotland. All of these have been created by a Scotsperson, although not all will appear on a tea towel listing great Scottish inventions.* Scotland is as old as any other country – maybe even more so, judging by the state of the pavements. This means that it has a lot of a history. A lot! Some of those whose epic deeds have echoed down the centuries include William ‘Braveheart’ Wallace, King Robert ‘the Bruce’ the Bruce and Queen Mary ‘Queen of Scots’ Queen of Scots. Among many others, they all feature in this concise and relatively cheap history of the country people all over the world call Scotland. Because that is its name. Whether you know your Scottish history, or you think the Lewis Chessmen were a 1960s beat combo, A Haverin’ History of Scotland is the unreliable history book for you. *Does anyone still watch television?

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Katherine Soutar has provided the cover illustrations for the vast majority of books in The History Press’ popular Folk Tales series. This new collection features the best of these illustrations along with an explanation of the inspiration behind each design. Through the introductory text accompanying each illustration we gain an insight into how this artist works, learn how creating her fascinating artwork is often very much a family affair, and read anecdotes about working with storytellers.

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The Brief History of Lancashire starts, as all good histories should, with the beginning – the moment when the detritus of a dying star, spinning through the depths of the Milky Way, began to cool and coalesce, and rain – typically for Lancashire – began to fall as the moisture in the new atmosphere began to condense. A planet was formed, and history as we know it had begun. Racing through the history of Lancashire, with Neolithic residents, Romans, Civil War victories and Victorians – and, of course, a few cotton mills along the way – this delightful book will tell you everything you ought to know about the dramatic and fascinating history of the county – and a few things you never thought you would.

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Queen Victoria was the first in a new breed of Cunard Ships: her design is enhanced to give her the ability to cross the North Atlantic. Introduced to service in 2007, Queen Victoria’s reign is young; however, she has had a notable career with royal engagements, tandem Atlantic crossings and Gala-World Cruises where she has been welcomed with open arms. Illustrated with stunning colour photographs taken by the authors from every area of the ship, and fully updated after the extensive 2017 refit, this book provides a lasting memento of a voyage aboard Cunard’s stately monarch.

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This fascinating book provides a unique record of the careers and final underwater resting places of ships of the Cunard Line, whose rich history spans over 300 ships and nearly two centuries. Many books have been published on Cunard’s heritage but the final fate of these ships is often little more than a footnote of history. Authors Sam Warwick and Mike Roussel have taken the shipwrecks as a starting point to create a vivid new history. Featured vessels include the well-known Caronia, Lancastria, Campania, Lusitania, Malta, Oregon, Scotia and Carpathia, famous for rescuing the survivors from the Titanic, as well as many others. Events surrounding the wrecking of each vessel are thoroughly explored and unique diver accounts are incorporated, along with never-before-seen underwater images of the wrecks. Finishing off with practical data for interested divers, this book offers a fresh analysis of Cunard’s maritime history.

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Celebrating Liverpool’s cultural heritage, world-class sport and unrivalled musical legacy, this quiz book invites you to come on a wide-ranging exploration of this vibrant city. Peel away its many layers in the company of one of Liverpool’s top Blue Badge tourist guides. These 22 tours will inspire you, your family, colleagues and friends to leap from page to pavement in the entertaining company of a local expert. Have fun! This book is a welcome addition to a series of regional quiz books written exclusively by Blue Badge guides – ‘Britain’s best guides’ – local, professional guides rigorously examined by the Institute of Tourist Guiding, the industry’s standard-setting body. World-renowned for their knowledge, interpretation skills and enthusiasm for their area! www.britainsbestguides.org

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The bloody Albigensian Crusade launched against the Cathar heretics of southern France in the early thirteenth century is infamous for its brutality and savagery, even by the standards of the Middle Ages. It was marked by massacres and acts of appalling cruelty, deeds commonly ascribed to the role of religious fanaticism. Here, in the first military history of the whole conflict, Sean McGlynn tells the story of the crusade through its epic sieges of seemingly impregnable fortresses, desperate battles and destructive campaigns, and offers expert analysis of the warfare involved, revealing the crusade in a different light – as a bloody territorial conquest in which acts of terror were perpetrated to secure military aims rather than religious ones. The dramatic events of the crusade and its colourful leading characters – Simon de Montfort, Louis the Lion, Innocent III, Peter of Aragon, Count Raymond of Toulouse – are brought to life through the voices of contemporary writers who fought and experienced it.

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The Ironbridge Gorge, a cradle of the Industrial Revolution, in the late 18th century was a magnet for writers, artists and industrial spies. The latest wonders of engineering and metallurgical technology were to be seen in a spectacular natural setting, where the fast-flowing Severn passed between towering cliffs of limestone, and hillsides honeycombed with mine workings amid the smoke of furnaces and the clanking of engines. Barrie Trinder, the acknowledged authority on the subject, has selected the most interesting descriptions and pictures to provide an invaluable anthology, through contemporary evidence, of the place and the people in that pioneering period, when this corner of Shropshire was changing the world and was indeed, as Charles Hulbert described it in 1837, ‘the most extraordinary district in the world’. This book has become essential reading for anyone with an interest in the history of this fascinating area, or in the Industrial Revolution in general. It brings new understanding of the gorge itself and the industrial monuments preserved there and new insights for the specialist historian, whether concerned with social conditions, popular religion or industrial technology. This edition will continue to serve the same main groups of readers – local historians, educational groups and specialist historians – and, most of all, those general readers who know the area and recognise that something strange and seminal happened there that transformed not only Ironbridge and Coalbrookdale but the whole of our civilisation. The activity that once made the gorge so extraordinary has spread and grown to become a commonplace in modern industrial societies, leaving the place where it began a monument and a museum.

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Duncan Harley takes the reader on a grand tour of the curious and the bizarre, the strange and the unusual from Aberdeenshire’s past. Read about the Beatles’ first, and almost their last, tour of the North-east, the Deeside artist who tended plaster sheep, and the strange tale of the Typhoid Queen. Learn about Hitler’s secret bunker at Stonehaven, the doomed Marquis of Montrose, and the mysterious Mound of Death at Inverurie. Along the way you’ll also meet scandalous residents, determined inventors, and Royal personages galore. The A-Z of Curious Aberdeenshire is guaranteed to enthrall both residents and visitors alike.

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Great passenger ships that never were is a completely revised and updated version of Damned by Destiny (Teredo Books, 1982), a comprehensive account of the large passenger ships that, for one reason or another, never entered commercial service. Some never made it off the drawing board or out of the model shop, some met with disaster after launch and some were diverted to wartime service but didn’t survive, never used for their original purpose. They were all the victims of circumstance, whether due to financial crises, timing or changing technology. Some of these liners and cruise vessels may have become the greatest passenger ships ever achieved. They would have surpassed the most famous, not only in speed and splendour but in size and appearance, besides setting trends that were subsequently adopted for ships that did enter service. With beautiful pictures and detailed diagrams this book is a true insight into what might have been.

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‘To shoot a man on the spur of the moment in the presence of the king and his court, not to mention the cardinal and his household, that took a boldness … Or utter despair.’ - Hampton Court, 1522Lawyer Hugh Mac Egan has arrived from Ireland to draw up the marriage contract between James Butler, son of his employer the Earl of Ormond, and Anne Boleyn – a dynastic alliance that will resolve an age-old inheritance dispute. But Anne, it seems, has other ideas. Her heart is set on Harry Percy, heir to the magnificent earldom of Northumberland, sparking rivalry between the two young men. When a member of Cardinal Wolsey’s palace staff is found shot dead with an arrow, Percy is quick to give evidence that implicates Butler. And with Percy’s testimony backed up by Butler’s artful bride-to-be, things start to look bleak for the young Irishman. In Tudor England, the accused is guilty until proven innocent. Against the backdrop of the Lenten festivities, Mac Egan sets out to exonerate his patron’s heir and find the real killer, uncovering as he does so the many factions and intrigues that lie beneath the surface at the cardinal’s court.

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1950s Ireland was the age of De Valera and John Charles McQuaid. It was the age before television, Vatican II, and home central heating. A time when motor cars and public telephones had wind-up handles, when boys wore short trousers and girls wore ribbons, when nuns wore white bonnets and priests wore black hats in church. To the young people of today, the 1950s seem like another age. But for those who played, learned and worked at this time, this era feels like just yesterday. This delightful collection of memories will appeal to all who grew up in 1950s Ireland and will jog memories about all aspects of life as it was.

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A knight in glass armour, the basilisk of Saffron Walden, Old King Cole of Colchester – Essex is a place full of fantastical characters and mysterious tales. Storyteller Jan Williams is a familiar sight around the county, entrancing locals with her tales of ghostly Romans and vicious Vikings. These stories – specially chosen to be enjoyed by 7- to 11-year-old readers – will unlock the colourful world of Essex and help children to engage with their surroundings.

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The Second World War saw heroic efforts made by the Allied forces from its very outset, but in May 1940 disaster befell the British Expeditionary Force in France. Isolated from the rest of their allies, they faced insurmountable numbers of enemy troops. All was so very nearly lost, until the German land forces were given the surprise order by Adolf Hitler to halt briefly. Taking advantage of this unexpected but welcome turn of events, the British troops fled for the beaches of Dunkirk and fortified them while the Royal Navy dispatched almost 900 ships and boats to rescue British and Allied soldiers from the jaws of defeat. In all, over 300,000 men were evacuated, while 40,000 brave rearguard troops lost their lives or their freedom for the good of their allies. Operation Dynamo, and its remarkable evacuations from the beaches of Dunkirk, was hailed by Winston Churchill as a ‘miracle of deliverance’, but he also warned that ‘wars are not won by evacuations’. This was only the beginning of a conflict that was to last five long years, but for now the fight for freedom could continue. Here Tim Lynch presents the true story of this miraculous event using stunning, rare images from the Mirrorpix archive.

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The Southern Railway may not have been the most glamorous of the ‘Big Four’ companies that emerged from the grouping of 1923, but it was the great innovator. In the 1930s the Southern pioneered the first main-line electrification and created the largest electrified suburban railway network in the world. It was also one of the few to offer regular departures and the first to run true international services, introducing the ‘Night Ferry’ through-trains from London to Paris using special ferries. Forming part of a series, along with The GWR Handbook, The LMS Handbook and The LNER Handbook, this new edition provides an authoritative and highly detailed reference of information about the Southern Railway.

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In 1933 the Admiralty banned ‘Blinker’ Hall from publishing his autobiography, but here, for the first time, those chapters that survived are presented in full. See what the renowned spymaster had to say about the British Naval Intelligence – the pinnacle of the world’s secret intelligence services. He explores the function of secret intelligence in wartime, censorship, subterfuge, the significance of Churchill in the Dardanelles campaign, the Zimmermann Telegram, the USA’s entry to the First World War and more. With supporting text and images by Philip Vickers and a foreword by expert author Nigel West, A Clear Case of Genius provides a unique insight into the thinking of one of Britain’s pioneering intelligence leaders.

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