by Margaret Pearce
Tutankhamun is sometimes described as the most famous and
least important of all the Pharaohs, he was completely forgotten after his
death. He was a minor child king who
ruled for 9 years from about 1332 BC until his death aged 18 or 19 years old.
Originally my
subject was the history of the Bayeux tapestry – the information taken from a
book called The Threads of Life by someone who was a textile curator for 20
years. But as I continued to read this
book, I soon found it was not only about the tapestry but also contained other
stories, in fact a History of the World through the eye of a needle!
by Jenny Meader
My talk is about someone who used to live in my village,
Woodsford, and what happened to him during WW2.
First, a few words about Woodsford. It’s a very small village,
more of a hamlet, with a few houses and a church, but it also has the only
thatched castle in Britain. In the early
14th century, William de
Whitefield asked permission to ‘crenellate the dwelling place of his manor’, in
other words to add defences, possibly against raids by the French. Most
of the present building is the work of Sir Guy de Bryan, who bought the manor
in 1367. Sir Guy de Bryan was a
favourite of Edward III, and among his many honours, he was made Admiral of the
West.
By
Jeremy Cranmer
In 1999 I stayed in Monchengladbach and my host took us to Aachen. We visited the Dom (cathedral). This was the Capital in the North and the last resting place of Charlemagne, the first Holy Roman Emperor. There is also a Somerset connection.
Charlemagne was King of the Franks. Who were they?
by Graham Hoddinott
I’m calling this talk “Japan and
its History”, and we are a “history” group. But as well as history I shall
introduce some pre-history, meaning before “recorded history”, before writing
systems were invented. I will also mention a few aspects of Japanese culture or
art, and so on. A warning about dates
though: the more sources I have looked at for Japan the more variation I have
found, particularly in the first millennium. I’ve tried to use the most
up-to-date findings, I’ll mention in particular recent discoveries due to DNA
research.
as told to her daughter; Vivien Leonard
It
was December 1945 when we first met. I
was 26 years old and living in northern Italy in a small town called
Montebelluna with my mother and one sister.
My father had passed away just a year before and we lived comfortably on
the wealth from the knitwear factory he had owned and run. The war had ended not long before and it was
a time when homes were still being requisitioned for American and Polish
soldiers to live with Italian families.
The Polish soldiers could not go back to Poland because the Russians
were now in occupation.
by Brian Hudson
To access Brian's talk on the Getty Villa, please click on the link below:
by John Pennington
General
I have had an interest in Portland ever since arriving in
Dorset in Oct 1966 to join a RN ship’s flight at the Naval Air Station. I was
also lodged in MQs in Weston for about 6 months, over the winter, not that
great an experience, due to the weather on the top.
Lester, who was born and bred on Portland will hopefully
keep me on the right track.
I found and still find Portland, a very interesting place in
military history terms, somewhat of lesser importance than the naval and
military cities of Plymouth and Portsmouth. Both these were the major
concentrations of military infrastructure in the UK, both Naval and Army. Both
had large dockyards and surrounding fortifications. Portland as an island was
different, a miniature version.
I have made some references to non-military places, but they
are important to Portland as a military base, such as prisons and railways.
by Des Derrien
On the 28th of June, 1940, the Bailiff of
Guernsey, Sir Ambrose Sherwill, was telephoned by the Home Office. “Our assessment,” he was told, “Is that any
attack on the Channel Islands is unlikely in the near future.” As he spoke,
German aircraft appeared over St Peter Port, bombing the harbour and
machine-gunning trucks waiting to load vegetables on ships for export to
England. He held the phone to the window as the sound of machine guns could be
heard. The war had reached the Channel Islands.
By Jenny Meader
By Graham Hoddinott
Today is Wednesday the 4th January 2023.
On the 4th January 1205, which happened to be a Tuesday, rather than
a Wednesday, King John was here in Dorchester. I’m going to talk about a man
who lived and died over 800 years ago, that’s roughly halfway back to when the
Romans were still in England. A very different time, and quite remote from us,
but I’m able to say without a shadow of doubt that King John was here that day.
I’ll tell you how I know this, and I’m going to
tell you where else in Dorset King John made visits, and when. There are other
things we know about John, you’ll think at once of Magna Carta, but mostly
I’ll try to stay local to Dorset.
By Sheila Alderman
Recent research by Peter Rex has put
forward the theory that Hereward may have been the son of a prominent
Anglo-Danish magnate called Asketil, the brother of Abbot Brand of Peterborough.
by Judith Cooper
A century ago the most famous Irish
man in the world was shot dead in mysterious circumstances, his name was Michael
Collins
Michael Collins was born in
Woodfield, Kilkeranmore, County Cork on the October 16th 1890, and was the youngest of eight
children. He died on the 22nd
August 1922 aged 32 years.
When he was 16 years old he moved to
London in 1906 and worked as a clerk in the Post Office Saving Bank at Blythe
House. He became associated with the
Irish Republican brotherhood, and the Gaelic league.
