‘one of the most memorable nights of my life’

The fighting in Europe was over, but lifting up a shattered nation would be a battle of a different kind

SORRY, did I wake you up?” Linda asked. Her bleary-eyed and pyjama-clad flatmate, Pat, had stumbled into their tiny kitchen one summer morning. “It’s five o’clock in the morning, Linda,” Pat moaned, s

On a frosty New Year’s Day in 1944, a young soldier from Newcastle married the love of his life with barely four hours to spare. My father, Corporal George Bell, a conscript with the Royal Electrical

On 21 October 1805, smoke filled the skies over the seas west of Cape Trafalgar, a headland in the Province of Cádiz in the southwest of Spain, as a fierce battle raged. After nearly five hours of int

I n 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. That, at least, is what the famous rhyme tells us. Memorising such dates is a common experience of being taught history – a cliché superbly lampooned by the w

Edward VII swept away the cobwebs of mid-Victorian style, Queen Mary had passion for all things small and the Queen Mother bought rather avant-garde art. In a forthcoming talk, Tim Knox, director of the Royal Collection, charts a century of regal taste