77. Weird times

77. Weird times

Strange times for Britain. And for William Pitt the Younger. While at the beginning of his time as Prime Minister, he’d had to contend with being in a parliamentary minority, losing votes right and left, he’d enjoyed extraordinary economic success. Now, though, with a powerful majority, he faced economic hardship and the unrest to which it led.

Partly that was due to bad harvests as well as the impact of war. The turbulence was met with repression. Nowhere was that worse that in Ireland, where Britain put it down ferociously, though without addressing the fundamental problems, which would only lie in wait to preoccupy Pitt again later.

As for the war, Britain, with its allies dropping out one after the other, was doing badly on land. But it was doing superbly at sea, as each of its three main rivals, France, Spain and Holland went down to spectacular defeat.

And yet it was in the Royal Navy itself, that he came closest to facing his own defeat, as it too was caught up in the unrest sweeping the country.



Illustration: ‘The Delegates in Council, or Beggars on Horseback’. George Cruikshank. A contemporary cartoon of the delegation of sailors who devised the terms of settlement of the Mutiny of Spithead, 1797. This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author’s life plus 100 years or fewer.

Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

Jaksot(274)

273. From a humble address to a royal arrest

273. From a humble address to a royal arrest

Well, we’re living in curious times.For the first time in four centuries, a member of the British royal family has been arrested in connection with a criminal investigation. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor...

22 Helmi 14min

272. What a fine mess you've got us into

272. What a fine mess you've got us into

This is the last episode in this main series of A History of England. I may add others on specific topics – by all means use the comments to suggest any you’d like me to examine – or in response to in...

20 Joulu 202543min

271. Breaking records

271. Breaking records

Following the rather grim comedy of Boris Johnson, the Conservatives gave Britain the even more ridiculous spectacle of Liz Truss. She proceeded to push the British economy to the edge of the abyss, a...

7 Joulu 202514min

270. Phenomenal Boris

270. Phenomenal Boris

It’s the time of Boris. This episode tracks Boris Johnson’s character, starting with a less than complimentary report from his housemaster at Eton to this parents, through his time in the rich kids’ B...

30 Marras 202514min

269. Brexit

269. Brexit

In 2015, Cameron returned to office with a majority of his own even if it wasn’t particularly huge. At least it meant he no longer needed to be in a coalition with the Lib Dems, who’d taken a terrible...

23 Marras 202514min

268. The winners and the damned: peacetime coalition

268. The winners and the damned: peacetime coalition

It’s 2007, and Tony Blair is out. In his place is Gordon Brown, who’d proved his capacity as a Chancellor. Sadly, he was now to show that promotion to Prime Minister was one step too many , since he s...

16 Marras 202514min

267. Bliar

267. Bliar

As the title of this episode suggests, this is where we look at how Tony Blair’s reputation was wrecked by the growing awareness that he’d produced infamously bad justifications to launch Britain into...

9 Marras 202514min

266. A time of dodgy dossiers

266. A time of dodgy dossiers

When Tony Blair took Britain to war in Iraq in 2003, as part of a US-led and rather limited coalition of nations, it was against the will of large numbers of Brits expressed in possibly the biggest de...

2 Marras 202514min

Suosittua kategoriassa Historia

olipa-kerran-otsikko
gogin-ja-janin-maailmanhistoria
mayday-fi
huijarit
mystista
rss-ikiuni
tsunami
konginkangas
totuus-vai-salaliitto
rouva-diktaattori
rss-kirkon-ihmeellisimmat-tarinat
rss-i-dont-like-mondays-2
apinan-vuosi
sotaa-ja-historiaa-podi
rss-subjektiivinen-todistaja
rss-peter-peter
rss-sattuu-sita-suomessakin
historiaa-suomeksi
tiedetta-ja-sirkushuveja-vanhojen-aikojen-podcast
matakuu