The text of this book includes the official diplomatic papers passed between Great Britain and Germany in the months before the declaration of war in September 1939.

The 'Irish Crown Jewels' - the regalia or insignia of the Order of St Patrick, a chivalric order founded by the government in 1783 - mysteriously disappeared on or before 6th July 1907, as King Edward VII was on the point of visiting Ireland to invest a knight of the Order of St Patrick. The task entrusted to the Vice-Regal Commission appointed by the Lord Lieutenant-General and General Governor of Ireland was not to conduct a criminal investigation but to determine whether Sir Arthur Vicars, the Ulster King of Arms (the state heraldic and genealogical officer in charge of the Of ce of Arms in Dublin Castle) had 'exercised due vigilance and proper care' as the custodian of the star and badge. The report of the Vice-Regal Commission and Sir Arthur Vicars' statements to the police are reproduced here in full.

This book is one of a series of official documents republished in order to describe a moment in history. The series is edited by Tim Coates'Dealing with Josef Stalin' describes the diplomatic negotiations between The Soviet Union, Great Britain and France between March and September 1939""Papers Regarding the Anglo-Soviet Negotiations 1939, Russia No.... (1939)" is a document prepared for publication by The British Government in 1940, but withdrawn on the instructions of the Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, for reasons that are explained in the introduction to this book.The collection, known as a 'Blue Book' was intended to describe the progress of negotiations between the Governments of The Soviet Union, Great Britain and France from March to September 1939, following the German invasion of Czecho-Slovakia Prior to this edition this selection of papers has not been previously published and only a few copies of the original proof of the Blue Book are to be found. The Government proof edition is reproduced here, in full with an explanatory introduction by Professor Sidney Aster of The University of Toronto.

On 13 December 1903, Colonel Francis Edward Younghusband, Commander of the Order of the Indian Empire, British Commissioner for Tibet Frontier Matters, once more crossed over from Sikkim to Tibet, this time over the Jelap (Dzelap) La. True to his Edwardian heritage, his personal luggage alone filled 29 containers and included 67 shirts, camp suit, camp dinner suit, an assortment of coats and hats, a prodigious supply of underwear, an umbrella and a campaign bath. This is the story of the British invasion of Tibet, the negotiations with the Tibetan government and the eventual signing of a peace treaty on 7 September 1904, told through excerpts from official correspondence between the Commission and India and from diaries kept by Colonel Younghusband and Captain O'Connor. The transliteration of names, in the text and in the maps, follows the usage of the period.

In November 1841 Sir William Macnaghten reduced his payments of what were effectively bribes to the leaders of particular factions in Afghanistan--the precipitation of the events described in this book. The first part provides extracts of the official government account of events between October 1841 and January 1842; the second is extracted from the diaries of two of the survivors--Lieutenant Vincent Eyre and Lady Florentia Sale, both of whom were finally released in September 1842 after eight months of being moved around the region in dread fear of their lives. They provide critical and moving accounts of one of the most appalling captivities in history.