'An extraordinary biography by the very last witness of a devastating four years in British history' Daily MailOn 17 June 2009, Harry Patch celebrated his 111th birthday. At the time, he was the last living British Tommy who had fought in the trenches during the First World War. Now that direct link with the past has gone. From Patch's vivid memories of an Edwardian childhood, through the horrors of the battles of Ypres and Passchendaele to working on the ...

When Harry Patch wrote his memoir in 2007, he was the last British soldier alive to have fought in the trenches of the First World War. He was 109 years old and one of very few people who could directly recall the horror of that conflict. Born in 1898, Harry spent a rural childhood in Somerset before leaving school in 1913 to become a plumber. Three years later he was fighting in the mud and trenches during the Battle of Passchendaele. He saw a great many of his comrades die, and in one dr...

Jackie Moggridge was just nineteen when World War Two broke out. Determined to do her bit, she joined the Air Transport Auxiliary. Ferrying aircraft from factory to frontline was dangerous work, but there was also fun, friendship and even love in the air. At last the world was opening up to women... or at least it seemed to be.

In 1960, the Imperial War Museum began a momentous task. A team of academics, archivists and volunteers set about tracing ordinary men and women who had lived through one of the most harrowing periods of modern history, the First World War. Veterans were interviewed in details about their day-to-day experiences, on and off the front. The project has since grown to be the most important archive of its kind in the world, and provides a unique account of life during the Great War.Fort...

Love history? Know your stuff with History in an Hour.World War One brought with it the world’s first experience of Total War, involving all of the world’s great powers, polarized between the Triple Entente, lead by Britain, France and Russia, and the Central Powers, dominated by Germany and Austria-Hungary. Around 9 million men lost their lives in a conflict that introduced the horrors of trench warfare, machine guns and toxic gas attacks.WORLD WAR ONE: HISTORY IN AN HOUR ...

Against a backdrop of the clash of the Roman and Carthaginian empires, the battle for sovereignty takes place on the high seasAtticus, captain of one of the ships of Rome's small, coastal fleet, is from a Greek fishing family. Septimus, legionary commander, reluctantly ordered aboard ship, is from Rome, born into a traditionally army family. It could never be an easy alliance. But the arrival of a hostile fleet, larger, far more skilful and more powerful than any Atticus has encoun...

Love history? Know your stuff with History in an Hour.During the year 1066, England had three different kings and fought three huge battles in defence of the realm, including the bloody Battle of Hastings. The result was the Norman Conquest which defined England during the Middle Ages.1066 in an Hour will guide you through the politics and personalities of the Norman invasion. It will help you understand why William the Conqueror was victorious and introduce you to the new ...

Love history? Know your stuff with History in an Hour.What made a failed Austrian artist into the most reviled and destructive personality of the twentieth century? Where did the seeds of his rabid anti-Semitism lie? How did a marginalized loner become such a moving force in Germany? How could a nation have fallen for such a fanatic? What made him so determined to bring about war?Through manipulation of politicians and civilians, bullying, diplomacy, violence and lies, Hitl...

Love history? Know your stuff with History in an Hour.The American Civil War started when eleven southern ‘slave’ states declared their independence from the United States of America. Abraham Lincoln’s Republican government were strongly against slavery and fought to abolish it and keep the country united.The American Civil War: History in an Hour gives a concise and authoritative overview of these four years of bloody and devastating warfare to help you understand how the ...

The night of May 16th, 1943. Nineteen specially adapted Lancaster bombers take off from RAF Scampton in Lincolnshire, each with a huge 9,000lb cylindrical bomb strapped underneath them. Their mission: to destroy three dams deep within the German heartland, which provide the lifeblood to the industries supplying the Third Reich's war machine.From the outset, it was an almost impossible task, a suicide mission: to fly low and at night in formationover many miles of enemy occupied ter...

A naive young man, a railway enthusiast and radio buff, was caught up in the fall of the British Empire at Singapore in 1942. He was put to work on the 'Railway of Death' - the Japanese line from Thailand to Burma. Exhaustively and brutally tortured by the Japanese for making a crude radio, Lomax was emotionally ruined by his experiences. Almost 50 years after the war, however, his life was changed by the discovery that his interrogator, the Japanese interpreter, was still alive - their re...

From the breakneck pace of an opening where he is in action in Helmand province, under fire from the Taliban, Mick Flynn pulls no punches. It's obvious that he is a trained killer.But how did it reach this point? The journey starts with his childhood, a working class lad, learning to fight and finding himself repeatedly on the wrong side of the law. Even after joining the Army he is found at fault and jailed, an experience that finally shocks him into behaving himself. From there, ...