History

Posts in The Copybook tagged ‘History’

505
A Personal Favour Clay Lane

Over a hundred young Greeks were slated to be shot after resistance fighters and British forces sabotaged an airfield.

The German occupation of Greece began in 1941, and continued for three years of forced labour, summary executions, and famines. By the summer of 1944, Berlin was struggling to keep hold of the Mediterranean, but airbases popping up on the Greek islands might have been a grave setback for the Allied cause.

Read

506
‘Not to Exploit, Sir, but to Help’ Herbert Bury

Herbert Bury believed that it was the British way to profit with another country, not to profit from it.

In 1912, the Lena massacre in Russia saw 250 gold miners shot during protests over low wages and harsh conditions in a mine backed by British money. Investors were ashamed when they learnt of the systematic exploitation, and Herbert Bury assured Tsar Nicholas II that decent Englishmen wanted Russia’s people to prosper.

Read

507
Rope Trick Orderic Vitalis

When Ranulf Flambard, Bishop of Durham, became the Tower of London’s first prisoner he did not intend making a long stay.

Ranulf Flambard followed William the Conqueror over to England, helped compile the Domesday Book, and collected eye-watering taxes for William II ‘Rufus’. On his accession in 1100, Henry I won many friends by making the abrasive and ambitious cleric, now Bishop of Durham, the Tower of London’s first prisoner.

Read

508
Dear Elizabeth Herbert Bury

Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna was a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria, but to one ordinary Russian she was simply ‘dear Elizabeth’.

Herbert Bury was Anglican bishop for Northern Europe from 1911 to 1926. His duties took him to Russia, where he met Tsar Nicholas II and was deeply impressed by the Royal Family. The following story about the Tsar’s sister-in-law Grand Duchess Elizabeth, who was later martyred by the Communists, shows why.

Read

509
The Birth of the Telephone Thomas A. Watson

Alexander Graham Bell was heading for a dead end when a broken component showed him the way.

In 1875, Alexander Graham Bell, a Scotsman working with deaf children in Boston, MA, had rigged up a complex apparatus to transmit sound by electric current. As his assistant Thomas Watson recalled, all was disappointment until one day a tiny contact jammed.

Read

510
Peter and Fevronia Clay Lane

Beneath a clutter of mediaeval legend lies a heartwarming tale of a Russian Prince and his peasant bride.

Over the centuries, the tale of St Peter and St Fevronia has been told and retold with growing embellishment. But at its core lies a touching and credibly historical story of married love from the infancy of Christian Rus’, and the Church keeps their feast on June 25th (July 8th) as a Day of Family, Love and Faithfulness.

Read