Jack Sweet takes a personal look back to Yeovil during the six momentous years of the Second World War and during the time when he grew up. He tells of the air raids, how people rallied to civil defence, welcomed thousands of young evacuees in 1939 and again in 1944. How people dealt with the many trials of a population facing and enduring total war. Sitting for hours in uncomfortable air raid shelters hearing German bombers flying overhead and wondering whether the bombs would fall on Yeovil. How the townsfolk saved to buy, a destroyer and a Spitfire, and 'Saluted the Soldier'. Heard the roar of aircraft engines from the Westland Aircraft works and watched Lysanders, Whirlwinds and Spitfires flying overhead. Enjoyed the 'friendly invasion' of the US Army preparing for D-Day, saw them go off to battle and finally the joy of VE and VJ-Days. Total war meant that no-one in the town, young and old alike escaped unaffected.

Explore 'Beatle Land' and the iconic sites associated with The Beatles' fame. The 'Fab Four' - John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr - were all born and brought up in Liverpool, and this illustrated guide reveals why the city was crucial to their musical success. Following in their footsteps around Liverpool and Merseyside, the book explores the places that influenced The Beatles' musical direction and eventual stardom. Discover the significance of the locations behind hit singles such as 'Strawberry Fields Forever' and 'Penny Lane', as well as iconic music venue The Cavern Club. The book's handy location map will guide you to all the sights, including: * St Peter's Church where Paul famously first met John, who was playing in his band The Quarrymen in the grounds. * The Mersey Ferry which provided a great venue for the Beatles to perform in 1961 and 1962. * Strawberry Fields where John visited summer fairs with his aunt, and which was the inspiration behind the hit single 'Strawberry Fields Forever' * Penny Lane and its bus roundabout, celebrated in the song with the same name. * The Cavern Club, the iconic music venue where The Beatles played 292 times and where Brian Epstein first saw them perform in 1961. * John, Paul, George and Ringo's childhood homes. The book also looks at the band's early childhood influences including schools, parents and relatives that left an indelible mark on the character of the boys as they grew up, as well as their manager Brian Epstein's role and influence as another Liverpool lad. Fully illustrated, this is the ultimate Beatles fan's guide to Liverpool.

Kent has a long and illustrious military history dating back to the Roman occupation but the first great conflict of the twentieth century brought the horrors of war to a new generation. Thousands of the county's finest young men were sent off to fight in battlefields around the world including Europe's Western Front, which was less than a day's travel from Kent. Because of its proximity to this major war zone, Kent came to play a pivotal role in the conflict. The ports of Dover and Folkestone were the main staging posts for the British Expeditionary Force and the primary points of arrival for the thousands of wounded servicemen being repatriated from the Front. Its hospitals cared for the wounded and its munitions factories produced the armaments needed to fight the war. The county's geographical position also made it a prime target for German air raids and naval bombardments, which brought the terrors of modern war to the civilian population for the first time. Kent at War tells the remarkable story of the First World War as it unfolded and affected the county and its people.

Duncan Harley takes the reader on a grand tour through Aberdeenshire's fascinating and rich history, culminating in a collection of stories and facts that will make you marvel at the events this county has witnessed. Read about the Beaker People, blue-painted Picts and the Roman legionnaires who tried, but ultimately failed to subdue the local populace. William Wallace, Robert the Bruce and Donald Trump inhabit these pages alongside tales of Bloody Harlaw, the Herschip of Buchan and the battle of Mons Graupius. Discover the painter priest of Macduff, the English Dillinger, the famous diggers of Inverurie's George Square and the strange tale of how Lawrence of Arabia 'got his scuds' over at Collieston. The Little History of Aberdeenshire is guaranteed to enthral both residents and visitors alike.

This is a book about Glasgow, but not your everyday history book. Glasgow By the Way But is a contemporary series of essays examining different aspects of Glasgow in a historical and cultural context, revealing a unique, amusing and sometimes critical, perspective of Cairney's beloved city. Those who remember John Cairney's performances and have read his other books will enjoy the insightful anecdotes from Cairney's career.

St Andrews is without doubt one of Scotland's most historic and beautiful cities. Once the ecclesiastical capital of Scotland, it played a prominent role in the nation's political life until the seventeenth century. In addition, it is also home of the nation's oldest university; and whilst claims that it is the birthplace of golf may remain controversial, there is no doubt it is regarded as world capital of the game today. This fascinating and comprehensive account of St Andrews traces its history from Pictish times to the present day. It is based not only on a huge amount of original research, but also on an intimate knowledge of the town which Raymond Lamont-Brown accumulated in over twenty years' residence there. In addition to facts and figures, the book also introduces many of the people who have featured prominently in the story of St Andrews - from doughty residents such as Sir Hugh Lyon Playfair and Cardinal Archbishop David Beaton to illustrious visitors like Mary, Queen of Scots, John Knox and Samuel Johnson.

As settlements and civilization moved West to follow the lure of mineral wealth and the trade of the Santa Fe Trail, prostitution grew and flourished within the mining camps, small towns, and cities the nineteenth-century Nevada and Utah. Whether escaping a bad home life, lured by false advertising, or seeking to subsidize their income, thousands of women chose or were forced to enter an industry where they faced segregation and persecution, fines and jailing, and battled the other hazards of their profession. Some dreamed of escape through marriage or retirement, and some became infamous and even successful, but more often found relief only in death. An integral part of western history, the stories of these women continue to fascinate readers and captivate the minds of historians today. Nevada and Utah each had their share of working girls and madams who remain notorious celebrities in the annals of history, but Collins also includes the stories of lesser-known women whose roles in this illicit trade help shape our understanding of the American West.

Arran is an archaeological and geological treasure trove of stunning scenic beauty. Its history stretches back to the great stone circles, more than 5,000 years old, whose remnants still decorate the plains of Machrie. Runic inscriptions tell of a Viking occupation lasting centuries. Later, in 1307, King Robert the Bruce began his triumphant comeback from Arran. Subsequently, the island was repeatedly caught up and devastated in the savage dynastic struggles of medieval Scotland. After the 1707 Parliamentary Union, came a new and strange upheaval - unwarlike but equally unsettling: Arran became a test-bed for the new theories of the ideologists of the Industrial Revolution. The ancient 'runrig' style of farming gave way to enclosed fields and labour-saving methods, which eventually lead to the socially disastrous Highland Clearances to Arran, and the misfortune of the times was culminated by the Great Irish Potato Famine of 1845. At last, the area began to settle down through an increasingly stable mixture of agriculture and tourism in the 19th and 20th centuries. In this book, Thorbjorn Campbell gives an original, fascinating and comprehensive account of Arran's long and eventful history.

This text features 150 detailed historical photographs from The Francis Frith Collection with extended captions and a full introduction. It is suitable for tourists, local historians and general readers. Includes a voucher for a free mounted print redeemable with the publisher.

Washington, D.C. Then and Now presents a fascinating portrait of the evolution and history of America's capital city since the dawn of photography in the mid-nineteenth century. It pairs vintage black-and-white photographs-including those of pioneers of American photography such as John Plumbe and Mathew Brady-with splendid color photographs taken from the same vantage points today. The book includes all the tourist must-see places of the capital city. Sites include, the Capitol, White House, Library of Congress, Supreme Court, Treasury Building, Lincoln Memorial, Jefferson Memorial, Smithsonian Museum, Union Station, Ford's Theatre, Pentagon, Arlington Cemetery, Folger Shakespeare Library, Old Post Office and the offices that Mark Twain described as "the ugliest building in America." It also features some breathtaking vintage panoramas taken from the Washington Monument showing the nascent capital in glorious detail.

"Swanson has done a crucial public service by exposing the barbarous side of the Rangers." -The New York Times Book Review A twenty-first century reckoning with the legendary Texas Rangers that does justice to their heroic moments while also documenting atrocities, brutality, oppression, and corruption The Texas Rangers came to life in 1823, when Texas was still part of Mexico. Nearly 200 years later, the Rangers are still going--one of the most famous of all law enforcement agencies. In Cult of Glory, Doug J. Swanson has written a sweeping account of the Rangers that chronicles their epic, daring escapades while showing how the white and propertied power structures of Texas used them as enforcers, protectors and officially sanctioned killers. Cult of Glory begins with the Rangers' emergence as conquerors of the wild and violent Texas frontier. They fought the fierce Comanches, chased outlaws, and served in the U.S. Army during the Mexican War. As Texas developed, the Rangers were called upon to catch rustlers, tame oil boomtowns, and patrol the perilous Texas-Mexico border. In the 1930s they began their transformation into a professionally trained police force. Countless movies, television shows, and pulp novels have celebrated the Rangers as Wild West supermen. In many cases, they deserve their plaudits. But often the truth has been obliterated. Swanson demonstrates how the Rangers and their supporters have operated a propaganda machine that turned agency disasters and misdeeds into fables of triumph, transformed murderous rampages--including the killing of scores of Mexican civilians--into valorous feats, and elevated scoundrels to sainthood. Cult of Glory sets the record straight. Beginning with the Texas Indian wars, Cult of Glory embraces the great, majestic arc of Lone Star history. It tells of border battles, range disputes, gunslingers, massacres, slavery, political intrigue, race riots, labor strife, and the dangerous lure of celebrity. And it reveals how legends of the American West--the real and the false--are truly made.

Westward expansion in the United States was deeply intertwined with the technological revolutions of the nineteenth century, from telegraphy to railroads. Among the most important of these, if often forgotten, was the lithograph. Before photography became a dominant medium, lithography-and later, chromolithography-enabled inexpensive reproduction of color illustrations, transforming journalism and marketing and nurturing, for the first time, a global visual culture. One of the great subjects of the lithography boom was an emerging Euro-American colony in the Americas: Texas. The most complete collection of its kind-and quite possibly the most complete visual record of nineteenth-century Texas, period-Texas Lithographs is a gateway to the history of the Lone Star State in its most formative period. Ron Tyler assembles works from 1818 to 1900, many created by outsiders and newcomers promoting investment and settlement in Texas. Whether they depict the early French colony of Champ d'Asile, the Republic of Texas, and the war with Mexico, or urban growth, frontier exploration, and the key figures of a nascent Euro-American empire, the images collected here reflect an Eden of opportunity-a fairy-tale dream that remains foundational to Texans' sense of self and to the world's sense of Texas.

Discover the fascinating life of a master of 19th century art and designWilliam Morris was a man of extraordinary diversity and application, turning his attention to the mastery of as many skills in one lifetime as most men would achieve in several. He became an artist in oils, stained glass and ceramic tiles, a weaver, decorator, textile designer, calligrapher, type designer, typesetter, bookbinder, printer, novelist, poet and lecturer. One of his most influential concepts embraced the 'small is beautiful' ideal: suppose people lived in little communities ... and had few wants; almost no furniture for instance, and no servants, and studied ... what they really wanted. Then, Morris felt, life might begin to take on its proper form. He was unquestionably one of the first conservationists. Certainly, a century later, his ideas and his designs are still valued and enjoyed by people everywhere.

Challenging the conventional interpretation of Mary of Guise as the defender of Catholicism whose regime climaxed with the Reformation Rebellion, Pamela Ritchie shows that Mary was, on the contrary, a shrewd and effective politique, whose own dynastic interests and those of her daughter took precedence over her personal and religious convictions. Dynasticism, not Catholicism, was the prime motive force behind her policy. Mary of Guise's dynasticism, and political career as a whole, were inextricably associated with those of Mary Queen of Scots, whose Scottish sovereignty, Catholic claim to the English throne and betrothal to the Dauphin of France carried with them notions of Franco-British Imperialism. Mary of Guise's policy in Scotland was dictated by European dynastic politics and, specifically, by the Franco-Scottish alliance of 1548-1560. Significantly more than a betrothal contract, the Treaty of Haddington established a 'protectoral' relationship between the 'auld allies' whereby Henri II was able to assume control over Scottish military affairs, diplomacy and foreign policy as the 'protector' of Scotland. Mary of Guise's assumption of the regency in 1554 completed the process of establishing French power in Scotland, which was later consolidated, albeit briefly, by the marriage of Mary Stewart to Francois Valois in 1558. International considerations undermined her policies and weakened her administration, but only with her death did Mary of Guise's regime and French power in Scotland truly collapse.

The University of Cambridge has always inspired artists and writers, and these sumptuous volumes from 1840 portray some of its most important historic buildings, institutions and people. Each volume includes a collection of essays, anecdotes, poems and reminiscences on the colleges, museums, gardens, streets and character of the town, as well as historical essays on the Boat Race and university teaching. The many illustrations of major sights and important views, such as the Backs, the river Cam and Grantchester meadows, include works by or after several well-known artists, engraver Charles George Lewis and landscape painter John Murray Ince among them. With contributors drawn from the various colleges, the volumes include much interesting material on the history and customs of the University up to 1840. This miscellany is an ideal gift or collector's item for all those interested in the University of Cambridge.

The University of Cambridge has always inspired artists and writers, and these sumptuous volumes from 1840 portray some of its most important historic buildings, institutions and people. Each volume includes a collection of essays, anecdotes, poems and reminiscences on the colleges, museums, gardens, streets and character of the town, as well as historical essays on the Boat Race and university teaching. The many illustrations of major sights and important views, such as the Backs, the river Cam and Grantchester meadows, include works by or after several well-known artists, engraver Charles George Lewis and landscape painter John Murray Ince among them. With contributors drawn from the various colleges, the volumes include much interesting material on the history and customs of the University up to 1840. This miscellany is an ideal gift or collector's item for all those interested in the University of Cambridge.

Beyond its housing estates and identikit high streets there is another Britain. This is the Britain of mist-drenched forests and unpredictable sea-frets: of wraith-like fog banks, druidic mistletoe and peculiar creatures that lurk, half-unseen, in the undergrowth, tantalising and teasing just at the periphery of human vision. How have the remarkably persistent folkloric traditions of the British Isles formed and been formed by the identities and psyches of those who inhabit them? In her sparkling new history, Carolyne Larrington explores the diverse ways in which a myriad of imaginary and fantastical beings has moulded the cultural history of the nation. Fairies, elves and goblins here tread purposefully, sometimes malignly, over an eerie, preternatural landscape that also conceals brownies, selkies, trows, knockers, boggarts, land-wights, Jack o'Lanterns, Barguests, the sinister Nuckleavee, or water-horse, and even Black Shuck: terrifying hell-hound of the Norfolk coast with eyes of burning coal. Focusing on liminal points where the boundaries between this world and that of the supernatural grow thin those marginal tide-banks, saltmarshes, floodplains, moors and rock-pools wherein mystery lies the author shows how mythologies of Mermen, Green men and Wild-men have helped and continue to help human beings deal with such ubiquitous concerns as love and lust, loss and death and continuity and change. Evoking the Wild Hunt, the ghostly bells of Lyonesse and the dread fenlands haunted by Grendel, and ranging the while from Shetland to Jersey and from Ireland to East Anglia, this is a book that will captivate all those who long for the wild places: the mountains and chasms where Gog, Magog and their fellow giants lie in wait."

Whether hailing from the open Pennine hills or the close-knit neighbourhoods of industrial towns, West Yorkshire folk have always been fond of a good tale. This collection of stories from around the county is a tribute to their narrative vitality, and commemorates places and people who have left their mark on their communities. Here you will find legendary rocks, Robin Hood, tragic love affairs, thwarted villainy, witches, fairies, hidden treasure and much more. The intriguing stories, brought to life with illustrations from a local artist, will be enjoyed by readers time and again.

Charles Henry Cooper charted over half a millennium of life at Cambridge in the five volumes of Annals of Cambridge. Cooper practised as a solicitor in Cambridge, and was also town clerk from 1849 until his death in 1866. He was a keen historian and devoted a great deal of time to archival research, particularly into local history. Drawing on extensive public and private records, including petitions, town treasurers' accounts, restoration records, death certificates, legal articles and letters to ruling royalty, Cooper compiled a comprehensive chronological history of Cambridge, documenting the 'city of scholars' through its tumultuous political and religious growing pains. It was published in parts, in the face of considerable opposition from the university authorities, but was eventually acclaimed as an authoritative account. This first volume, published in 1842, spans the centuries from the town's beginnings to the surveys of the colleges in 1546.

Charles Henry Cooper charted over half a millennium of life at Cambridge in the five volumes of Annals of Cambridge. Cooper practised as a solicitor in Cambridge, and was also town clerk from 1849 until his death in 1866. He was a keen historian and devoted a great deal of time to archival research, particularly into local history. Drawing on extensive public and private records, including petitions, town treasurers' accounts, restoration records, death certificates, legal articles and letters to ruling royalty, Cooper compiled a comprehensive chronological history of Cambridge, documenting the 'city of scholars' through its tumultuous political and religious growing pains. It was published in parts, in the face of considerable opposition from the university authorities, but was eventually acclaimed as an authoritative account. This second volume, published in 1843, covers the Elizabethan period, from 1546 1601, and includes the founding of the University Press.

Charles Henry Cooper charted over half a millennium of life at Cambridge in the Annals of Cambridge. Cooper practised as a solicitor in Cambridge, and was also town clerk from 1849 until his death in 1866. He was a keen historian and devoted a great deal of time to archival research, particularly into local history. Drawing on extensive public and private records, including petitions, town treasurers' accounts, restoration records, death certificates, legal articles and letters to ruling royalty, Cooper compiled a comprehensive chronological history of Cambridge, documenting the 'city of scholars' through its tumultuous political and religious growing pains. It was published in the face of considerable opposition from the university authorities, but was eventually acclaimed as an authoritative account. Volume 3, published in 1845, begins with the accession of James I, covers the Civil War and the Commonwealth, and ends in 1688 on the eve of the Glorious Revolution.

Charles Henry Cooper charted over half a millennium of life at Cambridge in the five volumes of the Annals of Cambridge. Cooper practised as a solicitor in Cambridge, and was also town clerk from 1849 until his death in 1866. He was a keen historian and devoted a great deal of time to archival research, particularly into local history. Drawing on extensive public and private records, including petitions, town treasurers' accounts, restoration records, death certificates, legal articles and letters to ruling royalty, Cooper compiled a comprehensive chronological history of Cambridge, documenting the 'city of scholars' through its tumultuous political and religious growing pains. It was published in the face of considerable opposition from the university authorities, but was eventually acclaimed as an authoritative account. Volume 5 was published posthumously in 1908 and contains the annals for 1850 1856, together with additions, corrections and an index for the first four volumes.

In the mid-nineteenth century, a royal commission was appointed to investigate 'the state, discipline, studies, and revenues' of Cambridge University, and eventually recommended radical reforms. As part of its brief, it gathered records that had been preserved for centuries as the university evolved. Published in three volumes in 1852 under the title Documents Relating to the University and Colleges of Cambridge, the compilation, much of it in its original Latin, charts the university's emergence as one of the world's leading academic institutions and the challenges it faced along the way. This material remains a valuable resource for historians of British education and society. Volume 1 covers the period to the mid-sixteenth century and contains, among other historical gems, an abstract of records spanning nine monarchies, and an earlier compilation ordered by Henry VIII in the 37th year of his reign.

First published in 1913, John Venn's collection of writings describes college life in the early days of the University of Cambridge. Venn, a leading British logician and moral scientist, was president of Gonville and Caius College, and had been a student at Cambridge in the 1850s. This volume of 'reminiscences of a reading man' contains articles he contributed to the college magazine, The Caian and speeches and addresses given at College Chapel and Hall. These are interspersed with letters written by seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Cambridge scholars, and embedded in a commentary that provides additional insights into student life and university politics. He also includes, as an appendix, 'College Life and Ways Sixty Years Ago', recounting his own student experiences. Ranging from the Elizabethan to the Victorian era, Early Collegiate Life offers an honest and delightful glimpse into the daily lives of Cambridge scholars of the past.