594. The First World War: The Invasion of Belgium (Part 1)
Following the declaration of war in 1914, how did the outbreak of the First World War unfold? What were the earliest military engagements of this terrible, totemic event? Who were its key political pl...
24 Aug 202556min
593. The Fight of the Century
Why did two men - John Heenan and and Tom Sayers - illegally meet in a field in Hampshire, in 1860, to brutally fight one another, captivating Britain in the process? What can the fight tell us about ...
20 Aug 202554min
592. Mad Victorian Sport
How and when was football invented, and what are the origins of football clubs? What is the connection between public hangings, highwaymen, and early sporting events? Which is the most historically im...
17 Aug 202553min
591. The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln: Manhunt for the Killer (Part 2)
How was President Abraham Lincoln murdered on Good Friday 1865, at Ford’s Theatre, just five days after Robert E. Lee’s surrender? Who was John Wilkes Booth, the racist actor with southern sympathies,...
13 Aug 20251h 4min
590. The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln: Death at the Theatre (Part 1)
After passing the 13th amendment, in the closing weeks of the brutal American Civil War, what did president Abraham Lincoln - recently re-elected - do next to inflame his detractors? Crippled with gui...
10 Aug 202559min
589. Mary, Queen of Scots: Downfall (Part 6)
Following the murder of her husband, Lord Darnley, how did Mary Queen of Scots - thought to have conspired for his death - navigate the most precarious situation of her young life so far? Would she ma...
6 Aug 20251h 2min
588. Mary, Queen of Scots: The Mystery of the Exploding Mansion (Part 5)
How and why was Mary Queen of Scots’ traitorous husband, Lord Darnley, murdered, and by whom…? Was Mary complicit? Why was his death one of the greatest mysteries in all British history? And, with Mar...
3 Aug 202556min
587. Mary, Queen of Scots: Murder Most Foul (Part 4)
Why did Mary Queen of Scots’ second marriage to the volatile Lord Darnley threaten to send Scotland into civil war? In what way did she essentially declare war upon her powerful cousin, Elizabeth I? W...
30 Juli 202551min
