Jago Hazzard
Published 1 Jan 2023It’s 100 years since the Grouping – what happened, why and how?
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April 22, 2023
The Big Four
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April 4, 2023
“We can at least appreciate the irony of an Indian and Pakistani coming to blows over the issue of partitioning Britain”
Ed West on the historical oddity of the three leaders of Eire, Scotland, and the United Kingdom all being of south Asian descent:
Irish Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak
Composite image from extra.ie
There’s a joke going around Irish WhatsApp that goes like this: “An Irishman, Englishman and Scotsman sit down for a historic summit regarding their ancient grievances.” The image shows the Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Humza Yousaf, newly elected First Minister of Scotland.
That three men of South Asian ancestry now lead those three nations is something which even ten years ago would have seemed implausible; a generation further back simply bizarre. And that doesn’t take into account Britain’s most senior directly elected politician, London Mayor Sadiq Khan.
What makes it stranger is that Mr Yousaf, of Pakistani origin, and Sunak, of Indian descent – although both via British East Africa – will be engaged in deciding the future of the Union. As one wit put it, “We can at least appreciate the irony of an Indian and Pakistani coming to blows over the issue of partitioning Britain.”
Yet although both Scotland and England are now led by men with roots in the subcontinent, that is where the comparisons between the two countries end. Yousaf might like to mimic American race talking points, but he presides over a country which is overwhelmingly white and will remain so (although we’re still awaiting the latest census results); the southern kingdom is in contrast now very multiracial, and projected to get more so – a process accelerated by the Tory Government.
Britain has undergone a demographic revolution since the Second World War, a transformation into a multicultural society. Out of the ashes of the British Empire the country’s rules ended up creating a new empire at home, one where this time they could be the good guys. Just like the first British Empire, this one might be called Anglo-Indian, with the two leading parties partly aligning along old divisions between Hindu and Muslim. Like the first empire, this new diverse rainbow of nations entails strict new blasphemy codes, even if now dressed up as hate speech.
Yet this great change has hardly affected Scotland. The two countries have diverged along different paths, and this is perhaps one reason why it may prove hard to hold our multicultural empire together, although it’s a cause liberal defenders of Britishness are loath to admit. Where once the countries were brought together by Protestantism, the English language and empire, now the new “good” British Empire drives them apart, while the English language is a global source of division.
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February 23, 2023
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon had become “a marmite figure during her time in office, loathed and loved in equal measure”
In The Line, Andrew MacDougall looks at what caused the departure of Nicola Sturgeon despite the continued strong support for her party in Scotland:
Last week, Scotland’s most popular politician suddenly announced that she would retire. While Sturgeon’s popularity has dipped in recent days, she remains, by a long way, the most recognized and respected politician in the land. And she is leaving absent any obvious firing offense, nor any looming electoral deadline.
More importantly, Sturgeon is leaving without her raison d’être — Scottish independence — fulfilled, with the next election having already been framed as an (unofficial) referendum on that most cherished of prizes for any leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party. That Sturgeon would choose this moment to exit has prompted a flurry of speculation.
To Sturgeon’s credit, she was admirably clear with her reasons during the press conference announcing her decision to stand aside. She decried the “brutality” and “intensity” of modern political life, stating the job took everything she could give and that, like Jacinda Arden before her, she had come to the realization she didn’t quite have enough left to get independence over the line.
On that front, Sturgeon also said it would be unfair on her colleagues and her party to have her views on independence — and how best to achieve it — bind them if she no longer had the will or energy to contest the next election. And fair enough. Sturgeon has been First Minister for eight years, and was number two to former First Minister Alex Salmond for the eight years prior to that, having assumed the leadership after Salmond’s failed push for Scotland’s independence in the 2014 referendum.
And yet, with support for Scottish independence still fairly strong — a poll taken in late January had it at 52 per cent, an eight-point gap over the forces of unity — it still seems a strange time for someone whose entire life’s work has been ditching the UK to ditch the most powerful post to help usher it along.
So, what gives?
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October 12, 2022
History’s Real Macbeth
Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 11 Oct 2022
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September 21, 2022
The Medieval Saint Diet
Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 20 Sep 2022
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September 14, 2022
Whisky – Scotland’s Water of Life
Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 13 Sep 2022
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September 6, 2022
Scotland’s AMAZING Jacobite Steam Train
Dylan’s Travel Reports
Published 4 Dec 2020An amazing day out on West Coast Railways’ iconic Jacobite steam train from Fort William to Mallaig and back, part of the stunning West Highland Line!
Date of Travel: 21 October 2020
Class of Travel: First Class
Rolling Stock: LMS Stanier Class 5 4-6-0/Mk1
Cost of Ticket: £133.75 ($176.10, €150; price for 2 people)
Origin: Fort William, United Kingdom (Scotland)
Destination: Mallaig, United Kingdom (Scotland)
*Currency conversions correct as of 09/11/2020 to nearest $/€0.05
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September 2, 2022
QotD: Historical parallels between the British and American empires
… let us compare the US imperial experience to its British model. A whimsical exercise in comparative dates.
England was colonised by the Norman Empire (a tribe that spread across France, Britain, Italy, and the Middle East can be referred to as an empire I believe), in 1066. After some initial fierce resistance, they settled well, integrated with the local economy, and started developing a more advanced economic society.
North America was colonised by the British Empire (and Spanish and French of course), in the sixteenth century. After some initial fierce resistance, they settled well, integrated with the local economy, and started developing a more advanced economic society.
Norman England spent the next few centuries gradually taking out its neighbours. Wales, Ireland, and eventually Scotland (though the fact that the Scottish King James I & VI actually inherited England confuses this concept a bit). The process was fairly violent.
The North American “English” colonies spent the next few centuries taking out their neighbours. Indian tribes, Dutch, Spanish and French colonists, etc. The process was fairly violent.
England fought a number of wars over peripheral areas, particularly the Hundred Years war over claims to lands in France.
The North American colonies enthusiastically joined (if not blatantly incited) the early world wars, with the desire of taking over nearby French and Spanish colonies
The English fought a civil war in the 1640s to 50s over the issue of how to share power between the executive government, the oligarchs, and the commons. It appears that the oligarchs incited the commons (which was not very common in those days anyway). It was extremely bloody, and those on the periphery — particularly the Scots and Irish — came out badly (and with a long term bad taste for their over-mighty neighbour).
The Colonies fought their first civil war over the issue of how to share power between the executive, the oligarchs and the commons in the 1770s to 80s. It is clear that the oligarchs incited the commons (who in the US were still not very common — every male except those Yellow, Red or Black. An improvement? Certainly not considering the theoretical philosophical base of the so-called Revolution!). It was not really so bloody, but those on the periphery — particularly the Indians and slaves (both of which were pro-British), and the Loyalists and Canadians — came out badly. (60-100,000 “citizens” were expelled or forced to flee for being “loyalists”, let alone Indians and ex-slaves). Naturally the Canadians and their new refugee citizens developed a long term bad taste for their over-mighty neighbour — who attempted to attack them at the drop of a hat thereafter.
The British spent the next century and a half accumulating bits of empire — the Dominions, the Crown Colonies, and the Protectorates — in a haphazard fashion. Usually, but not always, troops followed traders and settlers.
The United States spent the next century and a half accumulating bits of empire — conquests from the Indians, purchases from France and Russia, conquests from Mexico and Spain, annexations of places like Hawaii, etc. — in a haphazard fashion. Usually, but not always, troops followed traders and settlers.
Nigel Davies, “The Empires of Britain and the United States – Toying with Historical Analogy”, rethinking history, 2009-01-10.
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May 15, 2022
The young man who might have been King Henry IX of England
In the latest Age of Invention newsletter, Anton Howes considers what might have been had the eldest son of King James I and VI lived to take the thrones of England and Scotland:
Portrait of Prince Henry Frederick (1594-1612), Prince of Wales by Isaac Oliver
National Trust, Dunster Castle; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/prince-henry-frederick-15941612-prince-of-wales-99804 via Wikimedia Commons.
Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales, was the eldest son and heir of James I of England. He would presumably have become Henry IX had he managed to outlive his father. But he died in 1612 aged just 18. The kingdom instead ended up with his younger brother Charles I and civil war. I’m not sure how far Prince Henry was influenced, but it seems that many of the major innovators of the period were purposefully cultivating him as a kind of inventor-scientist king.
It reminds me of a very similar and successful scheme, which I noticed when researching my first book on the history of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. This was the scheme to cultivate George III — famed for his madness and losing the Thirteen Colonies, but also for his collection of scientific instruments and interest in agricultural innovation. Those interests were no accident: his upbringing had included lessons in botany from the inventor Stephen Hales, in art and architecture from William Chambers, and in mathematics from George Lewis Scott. These were not just experts, but active innovator-organisers. Hales was a key founder of the Society of Arts; Chambers helped organise the artists who split off from it to form the Royal Academy of Arts; and Scott was involved in updating Ephraim Chambers’s Cyclopaedia, or Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences — an early encyclopaedia focused on technical knowledge. And their efforts bore fruit. Unlike his predecessor and grandfather George II — whose interests mainly fell under the headings of Handel, Hanover, hunting, and heavy women — George III became an active patron of science, invention, and the arts.
Given how successfully the inventors cultivated George III, it makes me wonder how things might have looked had Prince Henry lived to be king. His younger brother Charles I had an education heavily geared towards languages, theology, and overcoming various health issues through sports. But Henry — naturally athletic and charismatic — had an upbringing tightly controlled by Sir Thomas Chaloner, who had a major financial stake in innovation.
Chaloner housed and supported his alchemist cousin (also, confusingly, called Thomas Chaloner). This cousin had published an early treatise on the medical applications of saltpetre, or nitre (what we now call potassium nitrate), and had tried to produce alum on the isle of Lambay, off the coast of Ireland. Alum was a valuable substance used to fix cloth dyes, which had hitherto been monopolised by the Pope, who owned Europe’s only alum mine. Opening a competing, English-controlled, Protestant supply of alum was not just about starting a new industry. It was a matter of Europe-wide religious and strategic urgency.
[…]
Henry’s circle also included the Dutch polymath Cornelis Drebbel, who would become famous all over Europe for travelling in a submarine under the Thames, for his improvements to microscopes, and for inventing a perpetual motion machine (which isn’t as silly as it sounds — it was effectively a kind of barometer, exploiting changes in temperature and air pressure to move).
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The more I look into the circle of inventors around Prince Henry, the more familiar names crop up. There even seems to be some connection to Simon Sturtevant, one of the original patentees of a method to make iron by using coal instead of wood — Chaloner was seemingly responsible for evaluating Sturtevant’s inventiveness, to see if he merited a patent. I found it very striking that when Sturtevant’s iron-making business was about to get going, Prince Henry was to have a share.
Given such innovative company, we can only imagine what kind of a king Prince Henry might have been. If George III grew up to be “Farmer George”, might a Henry IX have become associated with navigation or hydraulic engines? We’ll never know. But even during his brief lifetime, there was plenty of patronage to be had for inventors at the court of their would-be Inventor-King.
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April 22, 2022
Lucy Worsely on The Jacobites & the Scottish Enlightenment
Whitehall Moll History Clips
Published 22 Jul 2018A segment on the Jacobites and the Scottish Enlightenment that blossomed in the face of Hanoverian oppression.
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March 23, 2022
In The Highest Tradition — Episode 6
British Army Documentaries
Published 9 Nov 2021This is the final part of the six-part series which delves into the world of the British Army’s regimental traditions and the stories behind them. This is a world where a Napoleonic Drum Major’s staff remains prized booty, a dog wears campaign medals awarded at Queen Victoria’s command, and snuff is served from a ram called George.
© 1989
This production is for viewing purposes only and should not be reproduced without prior consent.
This film is part of a comprehensive collection of contemporary Military Training programmes and supporting documentation including scripts, storyboards and cue sheets.
All material is stored and archived. World War II and post-war material along with all original film material are held by the Imperial War Museum Film and Video Archive.
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March 15, 2022
In The Highest Tradition — Episode 5
British Army Documentaries
Published 4 Nov 2021The fifth in the series, this episode features stories about the Grenadier Guards, the favourite tipple of the Queen’s Lancashire Regiment, and how the King’s Own Scottish Borderers made porridge palatable.
© 1989
This production is for viewing purposes only and should not be reproduced without prior consent.
This film is part of a comprehensive collection of contemporary Military Training programmes and supporting documentation including scripts, storyboards and cue sheets.
All material is stored and archived. World War II and post-war material along with all original film material are held by the Imperial War Museum Film and Video Archive.
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March 7, 2022
In The Highest Tradition — Episode 4
British Army Documentaries
Published 30 Oct 2021The fourth in a six-part series that delves into the world of regimental tradition. It looks at the illustrious history of the Royal Scots Greys with an account of how a French Imperial Eagle was won at Waterloo, and covers the tragic events of the Charge of the Light Brigade, the origins of the Victoria Cross, and follows the transition from horse to the tank.
© 1989
This production is for viewing purposes only and should not be reproduced without prior consent.
This film is part of a comprehensive collection of contemporary Military Training programmes and supporting documentation including scripts, storyboards and cue sheets.
All material is stored and archived. World War II and post-war material along with all original film material are held by the Imperial War Museum Film and Video Archive.
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February 15, 2022
King James I and his court favourites
In the latest Age of Invention newsletter, Anton Howes continues the tale of King James I of England (also King James VI of Scotland at the same time, the crowns still being legally separate) and his use of favourites to help him avoid going back to Parliament to ask for money:
Portrait of George Villiers, First Duke of Buckingham, 1625.
Oil painting by Peter Paul Rubens (1577-1640) via Wikimedia Commons.
At the same time, James found a way to filter many of the petitions before they even reached him. This was something he already did in his original kingdom, Scotland, occasionally sending a noble “favourite” — like his kinsmen the duke of Lennox and the marquess of Hamilton — to dispense patronage and manage its parliament. Yet he increasingly, and even scandalously, relied on favourites in England too.
Using a favourite could make some sense from a political standpoint. Favourites often owed everything they had in terms of wealth, protection, titles and standing to the king personally. As creatures of the king, their loyalty was assured. They served an important practical function by dispensing patronage and absorbing pesky petitions, and could insulate the king himself from blame. Should the king make a mistake, his favourite was the obvious man to take the fall.
But for James, the use of favourites went beyond mere practicality, if they were ever practical at all. His interest could also be romantic.
Although James was married with kids, his favourite by 1607 was one Robert Kerr, the younger son of a minor Scottish laird. A mere groom of the bedchamber, about twenty years James’s junior, he had fallen from his horse in a jousting accident and broken his leg. The king helped nurse him back to health, and was soon besotted. Kerr — often anglicised to Carr — was very rapidly given money, titles, and lands. Within a year he had been knighted, after four years made a viscount, and in 1613 an earl.
But what had been so rapidly gained, could be just as rapidly lost. In 1614, a rival faction at court made sure that another, even younger and more attractive man would catch the king’s eye. This was George Villiers, the 22-year-old younger son of an obscure knight. With his “effeminate and curious” hands and face, as well as a remarkable physique — a clergyman, later a bishop, marvelled at his “well compacted” limbs — Villiers’s rise made Kerr’s seem slow. Every year brought him a new title: in 1615 Villiers was made a knight, 1616 a viscount, 1617 an earl, and 1618 a marquess — a very rare title in England, last given to an influential co-regent of Edward VI, and before that to Anne Boleyn so that she could marry king Henry VIII.
Eventually, incredibly, in 1623 James made Villiers a duke. This was a title that was typically reserved for members of the royal family, or else given by very powerful regents to themselves — Villiers was the first in neither of those categories to be made a duke in 140 years. And he hadn’t even been born into the nobility! The apparent lesson: working on your triceps can really, really pay off.
Yet Villiers had more than just an angelic face and muscles. He seems to have had a real talent for politics, very quickly asserting independence from the faction that had put him before the king. And he would somehow remain the favourite even after James died and was succeeded by his heterosexual son, Charles I. In the dangerous waters of courtly faction — Robert Kerr had meanwhile been found guilty of murder and was imprisoned in the Tower — Villiers knew how to keep himself afloat, and even to chart a course of his own.
And he was extraordinarily corrupt.
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December 31, 2021
Hogmanay Shortbread from 1779
Tasting History with Max Miller
Published 28 Dec 2021Use my exclusive link here https://cen.yt/TastingHistory5 to get $15 off your first three bags.
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Black Bun: IMBJR, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/…, via Wikimedia CommonsMUSIC CREDIT
“Achaidh Cheide – Celtic” by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/…
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