by David West | Mar 24, 2026 | News
On the 24th of March, 1944, seventy-six allied prisoners of war escaped from Stalag Luft III in what has become known as The Great Escape. I wrote recently about Dachau and that when we were in Krakow we had decided not to visit Auschwitz. I did want to visit the site...
by David West | Mar 23, 2026 | News
On the 23rd of March, 1540, Waltham Abbey was surrendered to King Henry VIII. It was the last religious community to be closed during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. The origins of Waltham Abbey lie in the early Anglo-Saxon period. Tradition holds that in the 7th...
by David West | Mar 22, 2026 | News
On the 22nd of March, 1933, Nazi Germany opened its first concentration camp at Dachau near Munich. It is the only concentration camp I have visited. When we visited Kraków last year, we decided against visiting Auschwitz. One concentration camp is enough. My father...
by David West | Mar 21, 2026 | News
On the 21st of March, 630CE, Emperor Heraclius returned the True Cross to Jerusalem. For contemporaries, this was not merely the recovery of a sacred object, but the dramatic vindication of Christian empire after decades of catastrophe at the hands of the Sasanian...
by David West | Mar 20, 2026 | News
The Dutch East India Company, or the Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC), was established on the 20th of March, 1602. It became the most powerful commercial organisation the world had yet seen. It was not merely a trading company, but a hybrid of corporation,...
by David West | Mar 19, 2026 | News
On the 19th of March, 1649, the English House of Commons passed one of the most extraordinary measures in the history of Parliament: “An Act for the Abolishing of the House of Lords.” The statute declared that the Lords were “useless and dangerous to the people of...
