Conservative History Journal

Once again apologies for light posting. Other preoccupations, including dental appointments have been eating into time. Matters will improve. Well they can scarcely get worse.In the meantime there is only about 30 minutes left to remember the birthday in 1866 of one of the most delightful children's writers, Beatrix Potter. There can be no question but that what she wrote was masterful conservative tracts encased in easily understood stories...

Tory Historian is back in harness after a gap when time had to be devoted to a serious piece of work. An interesting anniversary needs to be noted. As Historic-UK.com points out for July 22, on this day in 1946 bread rationing was introduced in Britain, more than a year after the war ended. Unlike other European countries, this one managed to get through the six years of war without bread rationing and a year after the end it was introduced. How is one to explain this/The website says rather blandly: "The shortage is blamed...

This is not an anniversary any conservative can relish but neither can any historian ignore the beignning of the French Revolution, an event that changed the history of Western Europe and, in its wake, probably most of the world, whether for better of worse, we can argue about.As the complete quotation from "A Tale of Two Cities" sums up: It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it ws the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness;...

Tory Historian has something of an interest in popular and children's literature of the past and never ceases to marvel at the high quality of writing. Take Sexton Blake, the Sherlock Holmes for the masses (though, let's face it, Holmes was very popular, as well). As this website rightly says, Blake was a publishing phenomenon for most of the twentieth century.He was quite clearly a more exciting imitation of Sherlock Holmes, what with...

Colin Jones in his book, “Paris – Biography of a City”, already mentioned once by Tory Historian, describes an interesting example of a misunderstanding arising from best intentions.By 1814 Napoleon had become largely unpopular in Paris (and probably in the rest of the country), not least because of the constant economic crisis, caused partly by the strict control he imposed on such things as bread prices and tried to impose on British...

... a book that looks extremely interesting: "Between the Thin Blue Lines", edited by Jean M. Lucas. It is a story of the rise, powerful presence and gradual decline of the Conservative Party Agents. Not only do I intend to read it immediately but I shall be looking for someone to review it for the Conservative History Journal.In the meantime, the book is published by Trafford Publishing, a Canadian firm, and is available in Britain from Miss Lucas herself (jeanlucas_AT_uwclub.ne...

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.We hold these truths to be self-evident,...

This question has been exercising various people's minds ever since it has been decreed by the literary powers that be that Buchan is rather an inferior writer. There is no explanation why people still enjoy reading him and why his books keep being reprinted but that sort of thing does not bother the powers that be.Tory Historian is a Buchan fan as has been explained before. Tory Historian is also a fan of Gertrude Himmelfarb's the redoubtable...

Not one, not two but three books on the go. One was lent Tory Historian by a friend in Paris, whence the book bag came back with more volumes in it than it had departed with. It is a collection of essays by Christopher Hitchens, erstwhile left-wing and now rather right-wing though not precisely conservative scourge of all and sundry.Entitled "Love, Poverty and War", it is well worth reading for the evisceration of Michael Moore if nothing else. But, as it happens there are numerous fascinating pieces, not least on Winston Churchill,...