Category: history

The Royal Gun Salutes For The Baby Prince

Following on from my blog post yesterday, I thought I thought some people may be interested in seeing the gun-salutes in central London yesterday. Gun salutes can be fired from land or on the sea and are a traditional sign of welcome or respect.  They use blank cannon shells as a sign of friendliness in… Continue reading The Royal Gun Salutes For The Baby Prince

Glastonbury – Then and Now

This weekend sees the world-famous musical festival in the sleepy Somerset town of Glastonbury. From out of nowhere a new city of around 180,000 people will settle down in the fields to enjoy music, dance and traditionally lots of mud. More of that later as the festival is only the latest event that has attracted… Continue reading Glastonbury – Then and Now

The signing of The Magna Carta 798 years ago today.

This weekend marks the 798th anniversary of the ‘signing’ of The Magna Carta or Great Charter.  It is known world-wide as being the founding of modern principles of democracy and individual rights and freedoms while curtailing the power of the State which at the time was King John. King John has a bad reputation but… Continue reading The signing of The Magna Carta 798 years ago today.

The beautiful, magical Silver Swan Automaton at The Bowes Museum

Every now and then when you go travelling, you come across something out of the ordinary.  If you are very lucky, you might see something unique and quite amazing, the Silver Swan is such a sight. The Silver Swan Automaton is housed in the Bowes Museum, just outside the small but pretty market-town of Barnards… Continue reading The beautiful, magical Silver Swan Automaton at The Bowes Museum

The State Opening of Parliament and the Official Role of The Queen

Wednesday saw the annual State Opening of Parliament centred around the Queens Speech.  It is perhaps the key moment for the Queen in political life and in it she explains of the coming policies and proposed laws for the future year in a similar way to the State of the Union speech in the United… Continue reading The State Opening of Parliament and the Official Role of The Queen

Margaret Thatcher, her life and legacy

Baroness Margaret Hilda Thatcher was born the daughter of a Grantham grocer in 1925. Never has a politician so split the country like Mrs Thatcher and as such it will be rather a challenge to give a neural account of her life and career but then Thatcher always preferred people who had wrong opinions than… Continue reading Margaret Thatcher, her life and legacy

History of social classes and does class matter?

Much attention was given in the news this week to the announcement that we in Great Britain no longer live in a society of three classes but what does this mean for us and is it important anyway? Britain is famous for its class system. This is largely due to our long history without internal… Continue reading History of social classes and does class matter?

Plague victims discovered in London and The Black Death

In recent days it has become clear that whilst building London’s new cross-rail project, archaeologists have found a mass underground burial.  It is suspected that the remains of these people are the unfortunate victims of The Plague or Black Death as it is often known as. Despite the rather stupid questioning from TV news presenters,… Continue reading Plague victims discovered in London and The Black Death

Commonwealth Day

The second Monday of March each year is Commonwealth Day.  The day is observed in all Commonwealth countries but is not necessarily a public holiday.  For people outside the Commonwealth of Nations, this is the name of  voluntary international organisation given to what was once the British Empire. Commonwealth Day started as Empire day before… Continue reading Commonwealth Day