England Wars

When we seek an example of great leaders with unalloyed courage, the person who comes to mind is Winston Churchill: the iconic, visionary war leader immune from the consensus of the day, who stood firmly for his beliefs when everyone doubted him. But how did young Winston become Churchill? What gave him the strength to take on the superior force of Nazi Germany when bombs rained on London and so many others had caved? In this landmark biography of Winston Churchill based on extensive new material, the true genius of the man, statesman, and leader can finally be fully understood.

In the days between May 24th and 28th, 1940, the British War Cabinet held a historical debate over whether to negotiate with Hitler or to continue the war. In this magisterial work, John Lukacs demonstrates the decisive importance of those five days. Lukacs takes us hour by hour into the critical unfolding of events at 10 Downing Street, where Churchill, who had only been prime minister for a fortnight, painfully considered his war responsibilities.

To contemporaries, the Wars of the Roses were known collectively as a "cousins' war." The series of dynastic conflicts that tore apart the ruling Plantagenet family in 15th-century England was truly a domestic drama, as fraught and intimate as any family feud before or since. As acclaimed historian Sarah Gristwood reveals in Blood Sisters, while the events of this turbulent time are usually described in terms of the male leads who fought and died seeking the throne, a handful of powerful women would prove just as decisive as their kinfolks' clashing armies.

When published in hardcover in 1997, this book was praised for providing an engrossing education not only in naval strategy and tactics, but in Victorian social attitudes and the influence of character on history. In juxtaposing an operational with a cultural theme, the author comes closer than any historian yet to explaining what was behind the often-described operations of this famous 1916 battle at Jutland.

In this third volume of Michael Logusz's epic study of the Wilderness War of 1777, a sizable British military force, augmented with German and loyalist soldiers, attacks the Northern Army's southern front in the fall of 1777 in hopes of assisting a much larger British Army that is threatened to the north of New York City in the wilderness region of Saratoga.

From the Gilded Age until 1914, more than 100 American heiresses invaded Britannia and swapped dollars for titles - just like Cora Crawley, Countess of Grantham, the first of the Downton Abbey characters Julian Fellowes was inspired to create after reading To Marry An English Lord. Filled with vivid personalities, gossipy anecdotes, grand houses, and a wealth of period details-plus quotes and the finer points of Victorian and Edwardian etiquette - To Marry An English Lord is social history at its liveliest and most accessible.

After the death of her mother, Rebecca is sorting through her empty flat. Starting with the letters piling up on the doormat, she finds an envelope postmarked from Cornwall. In it is a letter that will change her life forever. A desperate plea from her mother’s elderly cousin, Olivia, to help save her beloved home. Rebecca arrives at Chynalls to find the house crumbling into the ground and Olivia stuck in hospital with no hope of being discharged until her home is made habitable.

In this monumental and provocative history, Patrick Buchanan makes the case that, if not for the blunders of British statesmen - Winston Churchill first among them - the horrors of two world wars and the Holocaust might have been avoided and the British Empire might never have collapsed into ruins.

In May 1941 the German battleship Bismarck, accompanied by heavy cruiser Prinz Eugen, broke out into the Atlantic to attack Allied shipping. The Royal Navy's pursuit and subsequent destruction of the Bismarck was an epic of naval warfare. In this new account of those dramatic events at the height of the Second World War, Iain Ballantyne draws extensively on the graphic eyewitness testimony of veterans to construct a thrilling story, mainly from the point of view of the British battleships, cruisers, and destroyers involved.

Katherine Woodville's sister never gave her a choice. A happy girl of modest means, Kate hardly expected to become a maker of kings. But when her sister impulsively marries King Edward IV in secret, Katherine's life is no longer hers to control....

The first Duke of Marlborough (1650-1722) was a soldier of such genius that a lavish palace, Blenheim, was built to honor his triumphs. Succeeding generations of Churchills sometimes achieved distinction but also included profligates and womanizers, and were saddled with the ruinous upkeep of Blenheim. The Churchills were an extraordinary family: ambitious, impecunious, impulsive, brave, and arrogant. Winston - recently voted "The Greatest Briton" - dominates them all. His failures and triumphs are revealed in the context of a poignant and sometimes tragic private life.

Nigel Hamilton's Mantle of Command, long-listed for the National Book Award, drew on years of archival research and interviews to portray FDR in a tight close-up as he determined Allied strategy in the crucial initial phases of World War II. Commander in Chief reveals the astonishing sequel - suppressed by Winston Churchill in his memoirs - of Roosevelt's battles with Churchill to maintain that strategy.

Dive into the epic saga of England's monarchy with "Monarchs of England: A Journey Through Time," a comprehensive and captivating exploration of the kings and queens who have shaped the history of England from the Norman Conquest to the modern day. This detailed narrative brings to life the Norman Kings who laid the foundations of the English monarchy, the formidable Plantagenets who ruled during an era of unprecedented expansion and conflict, and the rival houses of Lancaster and York, whose struggles culminated in the Wars of the Roses. Witness the rise of the Tudor dynasty, known for its...

To those who travel there today, the West Indies are unspoiled paradise islands. Yet that image conceals a turbulent, dramatic, and shocking history. For some 200 years after 1650, the West Indies became the strategic center of the Western world, witnessing one of the greatest power struggles of the age as Europeans made and lost immense fortunes growing and trading in sugar - a commodity so lucrative it became known as "white gold".

A devout Puritan minister in 17th-century New England, Roger Williams was also a social critic, diplomat, theologian, and politician who fervently believed in tolerance. Banished from Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1635, Williams purchased land from the Narragansett Indians and laid the foundations for the colony of Rhode Island as a place where Indian and English cultures could flourish side by side, in peace. James A. Warren tells the remarkable and little-known story of the alliance between Roger Williams's Rhode Island and the Narragansett Indians, and how they joined forces to retain their autonomy and their distinctive ways of life against Puritan encroachment.

In 1938, British statesman and soon-to-be Prime Minister Winston Churchill published his book Arms and the Covenant. It was published three months later in the US under the title While England Slept. In 1940, future President John F. Kennedy, who was a senior at Harvard University, wrote his dissertation, criticizing Churchill’s harsh blame of England’s leaders, even drawing comparisons between England and the United States for its own similar lack of preparedness against the totalitarian Nazi regime. Responding to Churchill's title, Kennedy named his book, Why England Slept.

For four centuries the British realm depended on sea power to defend itself against a myriad of threats. The Royal Navy established itself as the "Sovereign of the Seas", helping transform a small island nation into the center of a global empire. But Britain's maritime services faced an unprecedented challenge during World War II, and the survival of the nation was at stake. The Longest Campaign tells the epic story of British sea power in the Second World War.

Two sisters and one betrayal that will carry across generations . . . 1943 - Twins Adele and Amelia join the Women’s Royal Naval Service, keen to play their part in the war with Germany. Separated for the first time, Adele is sent to Dorset where she witnesses firsthand the full horrors of the disaster-struck dress rehearsal for D-Day at Slapton Sands, while Amelia is stationed near their grandmother’s home in Cornwall as a driver. As the war in Europe draws to its conclusion, one twin’s reckless act of betrayal will divide them forever. 2015 - On Cape Cod after hearing her great-...

“Watson, there is not a moment to lose. If you care to join the chase, pack your bag at once!” Likewise, enthusiasts of the greatest detective will not want to miss this opportunity to join Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson in a whirlwind of exciting new adventures… A daring thief penetrates the defenses of the Tower of London in search of a secret treasure. A profligate young actor is accused of murdering his exemplary sibling. From the safe of a prominent London banker, a priceless heirloom is stolen. Upon a high cliff, a ghostly assassin commits an impossible murder. A kingpin of ...

Surprisingly neglected in accounts of Allied wartime triumphs, in 1941 British and Commonwealth forces completed a stunning and important victory in East Africa against an overwhelmingly superior Italian opponent. A hastily formed British-led force, never larger than 70,000 strong, advanced along two fronts to defeat nearly 300,000 Italian and colonial troops.