The state funeral of Sir Winston Churchill, last Prime Minister to have one as Lady Thatcher's was not one, officially. There are many clips of it available of YouTube. I chose this one because it has the moment that always brings a lump to my throat: the cranes of the East End docks bowing to the coffin as it is being taken down the Thames. The country was saying good bye to more than just one man and politician.
...

Execution of Charles I outside Whitehall Palac...

Having re-read Harold Nicolson's diary I turned to that kept by another MP, a Conservative one this time, "Chips" Channon and it is my intention to write a long blog that would compare the two. When I say I re-read Nicolson's I mean that I re-read the original three volumes (the middle one of which is now falling apart as I had acquired them all, as is my wont, in second hand bookshops). There is another edition, a one volume one, published...
Not by me as I did not know either of these two men each of whom, in his own way, contributed a great deal to Conservative politics.
First, the colourful and highly opinionated Lord McAlpine of West Green, known for many things such as his euroscepticism and his exceedingly successful fundraising for Thatcher, his sociable habits and his art collection, his writing and, more recently, the new business of running a hotel in Italy. There was also the question of wrongful accusations of paedophilia in 2012 by someone who ought...
An interesting aspect of Churchill's life is his relationship with various women, which is not as salacious as it sounds. The women range from his nurse, whom he loved dearly, his mother, whom he loved from a distance and who helped and supported him through various friends to the great love of his life, his wife Clementine. You can see a selection of letters to and from WSC and various women in his life as well as a few related items here at the Churchill Archives.
In the Cabinet War Rooms there is a letter from...
And what could be more conservative than a family business that has lasted for several centuries, in some cases from the sixteenth, seventeenth and early eighteenth. BBC 4 started a series on that very subject this evening (apologies for not notifying readers before). The programme was about Balson the Butcher in Bridport, Dorset, that has been in the same family since 1515. Further broadcasts of the programme are listed here.
Next Wednesday's programme will be about Toye the Medal Maker, in existence probably since 1685, and...

... to one of the greatest cultural and educational institutions in the world, the British Museum. It opened its doors to the public on January 15, 1759 with exhibits that had come largely from the collection of Sir Hans Sloane. Since then it has grown and multiplied with new institutions, wonderful exhibitions and some very interesting (and some not so interesting) events. The biggest change came when the British Library broke off and...

That debate, as readers of this blog will realize, is about 1914 and all attendant circumstances. Who caused the catastrophe and why? Indeed, was it a catastrophe and if not why not? That sort of thing. Tory Historian's blog raised one or two important issues about the confusion in various aspects of the Great War debate and the need to look beyond the Western Front and its poetry. This is more of a contribution to the discussion about...
Tory Historian was not going to comment on the row between Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, Tristram Hunt, his Shadow and the egregious Blackadder series but an article in yesterday's Evening Standard by Anthony Beevor seemed too good to ignore.
Mr Beevor, who is known as an historian of the Second World War and its immediate aftermath, tells both Mr Gove and Mr Hunt that they are wrong (and sometimes right) about the reasons for Britain getting involved in the First World War and whether it was a good idea or...
.... well, not everything that is listed in this article by the BBC History Magazine. The hysteria around the centenary of the beginning of what was a disastrous war, followed by an even more disastrous peace, the effects of which are still tormenting us, has already been too much for me. The BBC's mega-event and the various official memorials do not fill me with joy. Even Nigel Jones's book, Peace and War - Britain in 1914 seems, at present, of moderate interest.
Still there are other events and publications to come this...
A very happy New Year from Tory Historian and a link to a fascinating article on Stratfor on the Gregorian Calendar, how it came about and why it ought to be reformed (at least, according to some people). Calendar reforms are never that popular and TH predicts that this will not happen, particularly as by now the Gregorian Calendar has spread through the world and is used practically everywhere even if there is another, parallel one for certain purposes.
Some interesting quotes from the article:
The Gregorian calendar, introduced...
Links
Powered by Blogger.
Followers
Labels
- 1922 Committee (1)
- abolition of slave trade (1)
- Abraham Lincoln (2)
- academics (2)
- Adam Smith (2)
- advertising (1)
- Agatha Christie (4)
- American history (33)
- ancient history (4)
- Anglo-Boer Wars (1)
- Anglo-Dutch wars (1)
- Anglo-French Entente (1)
- Anglo-Russian Convention (2)
- Anglosphere (19)
- anniversaries (175)
- Anthony Price (1)
- archaelogy (8)
- architecture (8)
- archives (3)
- Argentina (1)
- Ariadne Tyrkova-Williams (1)
- art (14)
- Arthur Ransome (1)
- arts funding (1)
- Attlee (2)
- Australia (1)
- Ayn Rand (1)
- Baroness Park of Monmouth (1)
- battles (11)
- BBC (5)
- Beatrice Hastings (1)
- Bible (3)
- Bill of Rights (1)
- biography (21)
- birthdays (11)
- blogs (10)
- book reviews (8)
- books (78)
- bred and circuses (1)
- British Empire (7)
- British history (1)
- British Library (9)
- British Museum (4)
- buildings (1)
- businesses (1)
- calendars (1)
- Canada (2)
- Canning (1)
- Castlereagh (2)
- cats (1)
- censorship (1)
- Charles Dickens (3)
- Charles I (1)
- Chesterton (1)
- CHG meetings (9)
- children's books (2)
- China (2)
- Chips Channon (4)
- Christianity (1)
- Christmas (1)
- cities (1)
- City of London (2)
- Civil War (6)
- coalitions (2)
- coffee (1)
- coffee-houses (1)
- Commonwealth (1)
- Communism (15)
- compensations (1)
- Conan Doyle (5)
- conservatism (24)
- Conservative Government (1)
- Conservative historians (4)
- Conservative History Group (10)
- Conservative History Journal (23)
- Conservative Party (25)
- Conservative Party Archives (1)
- Conservative politicians (22)
- Conservative suffragists (5)
- constitution (1)
- cookery (5)
- counterfactualism (1)
- country sports (1)
- cultural propaganda (1)
- culture wars (1)
- Curzon (3)
- Daniel Defoe (2)
- Denmark (1)
- detective fiction (31)
- detectives (19)
- diaries (7)
- dictionaries (1)
- diplomacy (2)
- Disraeli (12)
- documents (1)
- Dorothy L. Sayers (5)
- Dorothy Sayers (5)
- Dostoyevsky (1)
- Duke of Edinburgh (1)
- Duke of Wellington (14)
- East Germany (1)
- Eastern Question (1)
- economic history (1)
- Economist (2)
- economists (2)
- Edmund Burke (7)
- education (3)
- Edward Heath (2)
- elections (5)
- Eliza Acton (1)
- engineering (3)
- English history (56)
- English literature (34)
- enlightenment (3)
- enterprise (1)
- Eric Ambler (1)
- espionage (2)
- European history (4)
- Evelyn Waugh (1)
- events (22)
- exhibitions (12)
- Falklands (3)
- fascism (1)
- festivals (2)
- films (13)
- food (7)
- foreign policy (3)
- foreign secretaries (2)
- fourth plinth (1)
- France (1)
- Frederick Burnaby (1)
- French history (3)
- French Revolution (1)
- French wars (1)
- funerals (2)
- gardeners (1)
- gardens (3)
- general (17)
- general history (1)
- Geoffrey Howe (2)
- George Orwell (2)
- Georgians (3)
- German history (3)
- Germany (1)
- Gertrude Himmelfarb (1)
- Gibraltar (2)
- Gladstone (2)
- Gordon Riots (1)
- Great Fire of London (1)
- Great Game (4)
- grievances (1)
- Guildhall Library (1)
- Gunpowder Plot (3)
- H. H. Asquith (1)
- Habsbugs (1)
- Hanoverians (1)
- Harold Macmillan (1)
- Hatfield House (1)
- Hayek (1)
- Hilaire Belloc (1)
- historians (38)
- historic portraits (6)
- historical dates (10)
- historical fiction (1)
- historiography (5)
- history (3)
- history of science (2)
- history teaching (8)
- History Today (12)
- history writing (1)
- hoaxes (1)
- Holocaust (1)
- House of Commons (10)
- House of Lords (1)
- Human Rights Act (1)
- Hungary (1)
- Ian Gow (1)
- India (2)
- Intelligence (1)
- IRA (2)
- Irish history (1)
- Isabella Beeton (1)
- Isambard Kingdom Brunel (1)
- Italy (1)
- Jane Austen (1)
- Jill Paton Walsh (1)
- John Buchan (4)
- John Constable (1)
- John Dickson Carr (1)
- John Wycliffe (1)
- Jonathan Swift (1)
- Josephine Tey (1)
- journalists (2)
- journals (2)
- jubilee (1)
- Judaism (1)
- Jules Verne (1)
- Kenneth Minogue (1)
- Korean War (2)
- Labour government (1)
- Labour Party (1)
- Lady Knightley of Fawsley (2)
- Leeds (1)
- legislation (1)
- Leicester (1)
- libel cases (1)
- Liberal-Democrat History Group (1)
- liberalism (2)
- Liberals (1)
- libraries (6)
- literary criticism (2)
- literary magazines (1)
- literature (7)
- local history (2)
- London (14)
- Londonderry family (1)
- Lord Acton (2)
- Lord Alfred Douglas (1)
- Lord Hailsham (1)
- Lord Leighton (1)
- Lord Randolph Churchill (3)
- Lutyens (1)
- magazines (3)
- Magna Carta (7)
- manuscripts (1)
- maps (9)
- Margaret Thatcher (21)
- media (2)
- memoirs (1)
- memorials (3)
- migration (1)
- military careers (1)
- monarchy (12)
- Munich (1)
- Museum of London (1)
- museums (5)
- music (7)
- musicals (1)
- Muslims (1)
- mythology (1)
- Napoleon (3)
- national emblems (1)
- National Portrait Gallery (2)
- nationalism (1)
- naval battles (3)
- Nazi-Soviet Pact (1)
- Nelson Mandela (1)
- Neville Chamberlain (2)
- newsreels (1)
- Norman conquest (1)
- Norman Tebbit (1)
- obituaries (25)
- Oliver Cromwell (1)
- Open House (1)
- operetta (1)
- Oxford (1)
- Palmerston (1)
- Papacy (1)
- Parliament (3)
- Peter the Great (1)
- philosophers (2)
- photography (3)
- poetry (5)
- poets (6)
- Poland (3)
- political thought (8)
- politicians (4)
- popular literature (3)
- portraits (7)
- posters (1)
- President Eisenhower (1)
- prime ministers (27)
- Primrose League (4)
- Princess Lieven (2)
- prizes (3)
- propaganda (8)
- property (3)
- publishing (2)
- Queen Elizabeth II (5)
- Queen Victoria (1)
- quotations (31)
- Regency (2)
- religion (2)
- Richard III (6)
- Robert Peel (1)
- Roman Britain (3)
- Ronald Reagan (4)
- Royal Academy (1)
- royalty (9)
- Rudyard Kipling (1)
- Russia (10)
- Russian history (2)
- Russian literature (1)
- saints (7)
- Salisbury (6)
- Samuel Johnson (1)
- Samuel Pepys (1)
- satire (1)
- scientists (1)
- Scotland (1)
- sensational fiction (1)
- Shakespeare (16)
- shipping (1)
- Sir Alec Douglas-Home (1)
- Sir Charles Napier (1)
- Sir Harold Nicolson (6)
- Sir Laurence Olivier (1)
- Sir Robert Peel (3)
- Sir William Burrell (1)
- Sir Winston Churchill (17)
- social history (2)
- socialism (2)
- Soviet Union (6)
- Spectator (1)
- sport (1)
- spy thrillers (1)
- St George (1)
- St Paul's Cathedral (1)
- Stain (1)
- Stalin (3)
- Stanhope (1)
- statues (4)
- Stuarts (3)
- suffragettes (3)
- Tate Britain (2)
- terrorism (4)
- theatre (4)
- Theresa May (1)
- thirties (2)
- Tibet (1)
- TLS (1)
- Tocqueville (1)
- Tony Benn (1)
- Tories (1)
- trade (1)
- treaties (1)
- Tudors (2)
- Tuesday Night Blogs (1)
- Turkey (3)
- Turner (2)
- TV dramatization (1)
- twentieth century (2)
- UN (1)
- utopianism (1)
- Versailles Treaty (1)
- veterans (2)
- Victorians (13)
- War of Independence (1)
- Wars of the Roses (1)
- Waterloo (5)
- websites (7)
- welfare (1)
- Whigs (4)
- William III (1)
- William Pitt the Younger (4)
- women (11)
- World War I (20)
- World War II (54)
- WWII (1)
- Xenophon (1)
Counters
Blog Archive
-
▼
2014
(66)
-
▼
January
(11)
- January 30, 1965
- January 30, 1649
- We really need the whole of Chips Channon's diary ...
- Obituaries
- A new exhibition at the Churchill Archive
- Family businesses that have lasted
- Happy 255th Birthday ...
- Another contribution to that debate
- Tory Historian's blog: Anthony Beevor wades in
- Looking forward to ....
- Tory Historian's blog: A Matter of Calendars
-
▼
January
(11)