Growing up in Sussex during the turbulent 17th century, John became involved in the illegal 'owling' trade, where he learnt his seamanship. Whilst carousing in a Rye inn he was unexpectedly pressed into the Royal Navy. In 1694, disgruntled with the ill-fated Spanish Expedition, he joined 'Long Ben' Every's mutiny setting sail as his coxswain to the Indian Ocean in the Fancy, a ship of 46 guns,...'and bound to seek our fortunes' as they declared. It made Henry Every the richest pirate in the world, and was said, the most profitable raid in history. A popular ballad of the time proclaimed: "Here's to gentlemen at sea tonight, and a toast to all free men And when the devil comes to take us home, he'll drink With old Long Ben!" After the hue and cry, the slippery Every changed his name and disappeared. On returning to England John was caught and lost his fortune. Escaping the hangman, he emerges later as a respectable partner to John Coggs a London goldsmith banker, trading from the sign of the Kings Head in the Strand. Unfortunately he became disastrously embroiled in a massive bankruptcy fraud that shook the city.

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER

2025 marks the 80th anniversary of VE Day. Read and remember the history that led to this important moment.

'This book is his best yet . . . Dimbleby’s work is in a different league, told with such skill and judgment' Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times

A gripping and authoritative account of the year that sealed the fate of the Nazis, from the bestselling historian

June 1944: In Operation Bagration, more than two million Red Army soldiers, facing 500,000 German soldiers, finally avenged their defeat in Operation Barbarossa in 1941. The same month saw the Allies triumph on the beaches of Normandy, but, despite the myths that remain, it was the events on the Eastern Front that sealed Hitler's fate and destroyed Nazism.

In his new book, bestselling historian Jonathan Dimbleby describes and analyses this momentous year, covering the military, political and diplomatic story in his evocative style. Drawing on previously untranslated German, Russian and Polish sources, we see how sophisticated new forms of deception and ruthless Partisan warfare shifted the Soviets’ fortunes, how their triumphs effectively gave Stalin authority to occupy Eastern Europe and how it was the events of 1944 that enabled Stalin to dictate the terms of the post-war settlement, laying the foundations for the Cold War . . .