Evacuation From Yalta 1919

In 1919, the Dowager Empress of Russia, Maria Feodorovna, was evacuated on a British ship from the Crimea peninsula. A new book tells the story of this evacuation based on the diaries of passengers and crew on that ship. The book captures one of those time capsules created by extraordinary events and presents them in a microcosm contained on one ship.

Prince Valdemar of Denmark and Too Many Thrones

Prince Valdemar of Denmark was three times in the running for the crowns and thrones of two European countries. Instead of becoming a ruling monarch like his two brothers and his two nephews, he remained with the Danish navy. What had happened? 

Royal Correspondence in the Curiosity Cabinet

The Leibniz Library in Hanover has published the results of three years’ research into a golden letter held in the library’s strong room for 250 years. It had been sent by King Alaungpaya of Burma to King George II of the United Kingdom in 1756. Instead of answering it, the latter put it in his curiosity cabinet in Hanover.

Money Married Title

When three American heiresses arrived from Maryland in London in 1816, they took the aristocratic society by storm. Their large fortunes would enable them to overcome two little drawbacks that might bar them from achieving advantageous marriages: they were American and Catholic. 

The First Flying Permits of 1909

When flying was all new and shiny, it was also a pilot's paradise. There were no permits to get and no exams to pass; you just got into your flying machine and took off. But paradise ended when the snake crept in; the snake was called officialdom and took the form of an international body which started to issue permits and organize exams.