This is something I’ve been wondering about for ages. In The Impact of Air Power on the British People and their Government, Alfred Gollin notes, but does not explain, a recurring theme: the idea that after a damaging air raid, angry mobs would string up government ministers (or other servants of the public) from lamp-posts […]
An impression by “J.P.” of the R.A.F. attack by Whitleys on the snow-covered Skoda armament works at Plzen in Czechoslovakia on the night of October 27 [1940]. Source: Flight, 29 December 1940, 536 (link). Perhaps I’m just cynical, but I’m guessing that this night raid on the Skoda works was not nearly as accurate as
OK, so I’ve poked a bit of fun at French aircraft design here from time to time, with a post on the fugliest aircraft of the Third Republic and another recoiling in horror at the aeroplane which should not be. But turnabout is fair play, and the British aviation industry has had plenty of shockers
The 17th Military History Blog Carnival has been posted at Military History and Warfare. (It was posted nearly a week ago, but I’ve been busy …) The most interesting post for me this week is on the Maginot Line, by the carnival host. He points out that, though much-maligned, the Maginot Line did its job:
One of my favourite posts here was one I wrote almost two years ago, about a claim that a certain well-known photo of the London Blitz was faked. Not only for the post itself, but for the ensuing discussion, which led me to change my mind on the issue more than once. My tentative conclusion
Last year I gave a lecture where I said that Things to Come, the 1936 Alexander Korda production of H. G. Wells’ novel The Shape of Things to Come, was not a very popular film, that not many people would have seen it. I had to retract that, but I then said that I stand
Recently I’ve come across a number of really good websites about the Blitz. Oddly, none of them are about London, but instead are about the experience of some of Britain’s other blitzed cities. Maybe London is just too big a subject, and the smaller scale of the regional blitzes is more congenial to thorough exploration.
Something which continues to surprise me (but probably shouldn’t, by now) is the way that people were evidently still worried, well into the Blitz, that Germany had not yet unleashed its full aerial might against Britain. That is, that despite victory in the Battle of Britain, and at least enduring the first few months of
What a difference two-thirds of a century makes. This photo was taken from the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral some time after the devastating air raid on the night of 29 December 1940, looking north-north-west. I think the street running diagonally from the lower-right hand corner is Paternoster Row, which had long been the centre
This is the talk I gave at Earth Sciences back in May. It’s long and picture heavy and much of it will be be familiar to regular readers, but some people expressed some interest in it so here it is. I’ve lightly edited it, mainly to correct typos in my written copy. I’ve put in
