Based on previously unseen sources in Russia, Spain, the US and the UK, this book reveals the numerous plots to save them that were launched by their royal relatives, other governments and Russian monarchists, and examines the reasons for their failure.

    However, the full story of the couple's links with the German aristocracy and Hitler has until now remained untold.Meticulously researched, 17 Carnations chronicles this entanglement, starting with Hitler's early attempts to matchmake between Edward and a German noblewoman. While the German foreign minister sent Simpson seventeen carnations daily, each one representing a night they had spent together, she and the Duke of Windsor corresponded regularly with the German elite. Known to be pro-German sympathizers, the couple became embroiled in a conspiracy to install Edward as a puppet king after the Allies were defeated. After the war, the Duke's letters were hidden in a German castle that had fallen to American soldiers. They were then suppressed for years, as the British establishment attempted to cover up this connection between the House of Windsor and Hitler. Drawing on FBI documents, material from the German and British Royal Archives, and the personal correspondence of Churchill, Truman, Eisenhower and the Windsors themselves, 17 Carnations reveals the whole fascinating story, throwing sharp new light on a dark chapter of history.

    This highly acclaimed biography reveals for the first time the true story behind her sensational life and scandalous 'Memoirs'. When her former lovers - including much of the British aristocracy - turned against her, she knew exactly how to take revenge . . .'A wonderful book. Much more than a biography of one attractive, witty woman, it offers a deft analysis of how Britain dealt with celebrity, sex, power and popular journalism in an age that bears remarkable similarities to our own . . . Frances Wilson is not only a first-rate scholar but also a wonderful storyteller who manages to get inside her namesake's famously creamy skin and tell her story with wit and understanding.' Kathryn Hughes, Mail on Sunday'Lively and stylish . . . Reveals how dangerous the courtesan who operated at the heart of the political world was thought to be.' Anne Sebba, Spectator'Harriette's story is deftly and stylishly told. It beats most novels with its rich ingredients.' Frances Spalding, Daily Mail

    Murrow, the handsome, chain-smoking head of CBS News in Europe; Averell Harriman, the hard-driving millionaire who ran FDR’s Lend-Lease program in London; and John Gilbert Winant, the shy, idealistic U.S. ambassador to Britain. Each man formed close ties with Winston Churchill—so much so that all became romantically involved with members of the prime minister’s family. Drawing from a variety of primary sources, Lynne Olson skillfully depicts the dramatic personal journeys of these men who, determined to save Britain from Hitler, helped convince a cautious Franklin Roosevelt and reluctant American public to back the British at a critical time. Deeply human, brilliantly researched, and beautifully written, Citizens of London is a new triumph from an author swiftly becoming one of the finest in her field.

    Its principles can be found in our Bill of Rights and in the Constitution. But what was this strange document that dwells on tax relief and greater fishing rights, and how did it gain legendary status?Dan Jones takes us back to 1215, the turbulent year when the Magna Carta was just a peace treaty between England’s King John and a group of self-interested, violent barons who were tired of his high taxes and endless foreign wars. The treaty would fail within two months of its confirmation. But this important document marked the first time a king was forced to obey his own laws. Jones’s 1215 follows the story of the Magna Carta’s creation, its failure, and the war that subsequently engulfed England and is book that will appeal to fans of microhistories of pivotal years like 1066, 1491, and especially 1776—when American patriots, inspired by that long-ago defiance, dared to pick up arms against another English king.

    Intellectuals, politicians, scientists, and artists?among them Arnold Toynbee, Aldous Huxley, and H. G. Wells?sought a vision for a rapidly changing world. Coloring their innovative ideas and concepts, from eugenics to Freud's unconscious, was a creeping fear that the West was staring down the end of civilization. In their home country of Britain, many of these fears were unfounded. The country had not suffered from economic collapse, occupation, civil war, or any of the ideological conflicts of inter-war Europe. Nevertheless, the modern era's promise of progress was overshadowed by a looming sense of decay and death that would deeply influence creative production and public argument between the wars. In "The Twilight Years," award-winning historian Richard Overy examines the paradox of this period and argues that the coming of World War II was almost welcomed by Britain's leading thinkers, who saw it as an extraordinary test for the survival of civilization? and a way of resolving their contradictory fears and hopes about the future.

    But this award-winning biography offers a more humane and measured perspective on the life of this tormented woman. With sympathy, Prescott examines just how Mary, who was swept to the throne on a wave of popular acclaim, fell so far in her countrymen's esteem that just five years after her coronation, her death was greeted with universal relief.

    He believed that to achieve his goal he must do something spectacular on the battlefield. Despite deliberately putting himself in extreme danger as a British Army officer in colonial wars in India and Sudan, and as a journalist covering a Cuban uprising against the Spanish, glory and fame had eluded him.Churchill arrived in South Africa in 1899, valet and crates of vintage wine in tow, there to cover the brutal colonial war the British were fighting with Boer rebels. But just two weeks after his arrival, the soldiers he was accompanying on an armored train were ambushed, and Churchill was taken prisoner. Remarkably, he pulled off a daring escape--but then had to traverse hundreds of miles of enemy territory, alone, with nothing but a crumpled wad of cash, four slabs of chocolate, and his wits to guide him.The story of his escape is incredible enough, but then Churchill enlisted, returned to South Africa, fought in several battles, and ultimately liberated the men with whom he had been imprisoned.Churchill would later remark that this period, "could I have seen my future, was to lay the foundations of my later life." Millard spins an epic story of bravery, savagery, and chance encounters with a cast of historical characters--including Rudyard Kipling, Lord Kitchener, and Mohandas Gandhi--with whom he would later share the world stage. But Hero of the Empire is more than an adventure story, for the lessons Churchill took from the Boer War would profoundly affect 20th century history.From the Hardcover edition.

    Amidst all the jewels, and velvet and coronets, and the fine uniforms, she exuded an unworldly simplicity. Seated with the royal family, she was a part of them, yet somehow distanced from them. Inasmuch as she is remembered at all today, it is as this shadowy figure in gray nun's clothes..."Princess Alice, mother of Prince Phillip, was something of a mystery figure even within her own family. She was born deaf, at Windsor Castle, in the presence of her grandmother, Queen Victoria, and brought up in England, Darmstadt, and Malta.In 1903 she married Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, and from then on her life was overshadowed by wars, revolutions, and enforced periods of exile. By the time she was thirty-five, virtually every point of stability was overthrown. Though the British royal family remained in the ascendant, her German family ceased to be ruling princes, her two aunts who had married Russian royalty had come to savage ends, and soon afterwards Alice's own husband was nearly executed as a political scapegoat.The middle years of her life, which should have followed a conventional and fulfilling path, did the opposite. She suffered from a serious religious crisis and at the age of forty-five was removed from her family and placed in a sanitarium in Switzerland, where she was pronounced a paranoid schizophrenic. As her stay in the clinic became prolonged, there was a time where it seemed she might never walk free again. How she achieved her recovery is just one of the remarkable aspects of her story.

    Acknowledged as her heir by Elizabeth 1, Arbella's right to the English throne was equaled only by James. Raised under close supervision by her grandmother, but still surrounded by plots -- most of them Roman Catholic in origin -- she became an important pawn in the struggle for succession, particularly during the long, tense period when Elizabeth lay dying. The accession of her cousin James thrust her into the colourful world of his extravagant and licentious court, and briefly gave her the independence she craved at the heart of Jacobean society. At thirty-five, however, Arbella's fate was sealed when she risked everything to make a forbidden marriage, for which she was forced to flee England. She was intercepted off the coast of Calais and escorted to the Tower where she died some years later, alone and, most probably, from starvation.This is a powerful and vivid portrait of a woman forced to carve a precarious path through turbulent years. But more remarkably, the turmoil of Arbella's life never prevented her from claiming the right to love freely, to speak her wrongs loudly, and to control her own destiny. For fans of historical biography, Arbella is possibly the most romantic heroine of them all. Hers was a story just waiting to be told.Sarah Gristwood is a journalist and broadcaster, specializing in the arts and women's issues. She is the author of one previous book, Recording Angels, a study of women's diaries through the ages.

    She was the first woman to be crowned queen of England, sharing her husband King Edgar's imperial coronation at Bath in 973. The couple made a love match, with claims that they plotted the death of her first husband to ensure that she was free. Edgar divorced his second wife, a former nun, after conducting an adulterous affair with Elfrida, leading to an enmity between the two women that lasted until their deaths.During her marriage, Elfrida claimed to be the king's only legitimate wife, but she failed to secure the succession for her son, Ethelred. Elfrida plotted against her stepson, King Edward the Martyr, before arranging his murder at Corfe Castle, where she lived with her son. She then ruled England on behalf of her young son for six years before he expelled her from court. Elfrida was eventually able to return to court but, since he proved himself unable to counter the Viking attacks, she may have come to regret winning the crown for Ethelred the Unready.Wife, mother, murderer, ruler, crowned queen. The life of Queen Elfrida was filled with drama as she rose to become the most powerful woman in Anglo-Saxon England.

    An invasion force on a scale not seen since the days of the Romans. One of the bloodiest and most decisive battles ever fought. This riveting book explains why the Norman Conquest was the single most important event in English history.Assessing the original evidence at every turn, Marc Morris goes beyond the familiar outline to explain why England was at once so powerful and yet so vulnerable to William the Conqueror's attack. Why the Normans, in some respects less sophisticated, possessed the military cutting edge. How William's hopes of a united Anglo-Norman realm unravelled, dashed by English rebellions, Viking invasions and the insatiable demands of his fellow conquerors. This is a tale of powerful drama, repression and seismic social change: the Battle of Hastings itself and the violent 'Harrying of the North'; the sudden introduction of castles and the wholesale rebuilding of every major church; the total destruction of an ancient ruling class. Language, law, architecture, even attitudes towards life itself were altered forever by the coming of the Normans. Marc Morris, author of the bestselling biography of Edward I, A Great and Terrible King, approaches the Conquest with the same passion, verve and scrupulous concern for historical accuracy. This is the definitive account for our times of an extraordinary story, a pivotal moment in the shaping of the English nation.

    Witty, wealthy and beautiful, Catherine was the most eligible of young ladies and was courted by royalty but, ignoring the warnings of her closest confidantes, she married for love. Her choice of husband was the charming but feckless dandy William Wellesley Pole, nephew of the Duke of Wellington.The pair excited the public's interest on an unprecedented scale with gossip columns reporting every detail of their magnificent home in Wanstead, where they hosted glittering royal fetes, dinners and parties. But their happiness was short-lived; just a decade later William had frittered away Catherine's inheritance and the couple were forced to flee into exile. As they travelled across Europe, they became embroiled in a series of scandals that shocked the public and culminated in a landmark court case.Meticulously researched and rich with dazzling detail, The Angel and the Cad is a gripping and tragic tale of love and drama that twists and turns until the final page.

    Martin Pugh offers a uniquely untraditional view of Britain’s inter-war period; that among the many dramatic social changes taking place, our modern consumer society of dedicated shoppers effectively took shape during the 1930s.

    In a book which argues that previous scholars have been looking in the wrong place, Moffat identifies Arthur as a cavalry general of a Welsh-speaking southern Scottish tribe. Through archaeology, documentary and place-name evidence, Moffat weaves a history of this truly British hero' and asks whether the real Camelot is to be found in the borders of Scotland.