Bertie of Thame

Sir Francis Bertie (from 1915 Lord Bertie of Thame) was a senior British diplomat of the late Victorian and Edwardian eras. He is perhaps best known for the thirteen years between 1905 and 1918 during which time he was Britain's ambassador in Paris, and it is with this period of his life that Dr Hamilton is mainly concerned. The book thus examines his contribution to the evolution and maintenance of the entente cordiale, the nature of his 'anti-Germanism', his influence upon Sir Edward Grey and other British statesmen, and the eclipse of professional diplomacy during the first world war. Above all it is a study of a man whom another British diplomat was later to describe as 'the very last of the great ambassadors'.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-861-93217-7

Price:  £40.00

Christopher Wyvill and Reform 1790- 1820

This is one of an on-going series of publications from the Borthwick Insitute for Archives, intended to provide insights into new research concerning the history of Yorkshire and the North of England.   pp 32   ISBN 0-900701-06-4

Price:  £4.00

Henry Ireton and the English Revolution

A devout puritan, Henry Ireton was an immediate parliamentarian activist rising to the rank of Commissary-General of the New Model Army. Ireton shared Oliver Cromwell's religious enthusiasm and acted as one of his political mentors. Ireton, more than any other individual, even Cromwell, brought about the execution of Charles I.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83235-5

Price:  £55.00

John Burns

A fresh look at Labour's `lost leader', exploiting the the opening of government records and the private papers of his most important contemporaries.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-901-05034-2

Price:  £40.00

John Goodwin and the Puritan Revolution

John Goodwin [1594-1665] was one of the most prolific and controversial writers of the English Revolution; his career illustrates some of the most important intellectual developments of the seventeenth century. Educated at Queens' College, Cambridge, he became vicar of a flagship Puritan parish in the City of London. During the 1640s, he wrote in defence of the civil war, the army revolt, Pride's Purge, and the regicide, only to turn against Cromwell in 1657.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83265-2

Price:  £60.00

John Henry Williams (1747-1829): `Political Clergyman'

John Henry Williams was the vicar of Wellesbourne in south Warwickshire from 1778 until his death some fifty years later. A dedicated pastor, displaying an `enlightened and liberal' outlook, his career illuminates the Church of England's condition in the period, and also a clergyman's place in local society. However, he was not merely a country parson.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83330-7

Price:  £45.00

Letters from Redgrave Hall

The Bacon family fortunes were founded by Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal to Elizabeth I, and father to the philosopher Francis Bacon; among their properties was the now-vanished Suffolk mansion of Redgrave Hall,and it is from here that this fascinating collection of letters originates. The correspondence centres on Francis's half-brother Nicholas, Premier Baronet of England, one of the Puritan gentry who ran the government of Elizabethan and Jacobean Suffolk, and touches on many of the most important issues and events of the period. One important component is a fascinating run of letters describing a failed marriage negotiation for young Nicholas's sister between the Protestant Lord Keeper and the wily guardians of a young Catholic, William Yaxley, in the fragile opening years of Elizabeth I's Protestant religious settlement. It also includes papers of the flamboyant courtier and diplomat Sir Robert Drury, a Bacon relative by marriage [and original inhabitant of 'Drury Lane' in London]: he was friend and patron to John Donne, who features in the correspondence. Later letters touch on the Civil War in East Anglia. Overall, the letters reveal a wealth of detail about the lives and preoccupations of English provincial magnates and their often uneasy relationship to the great political figures of the realm.
DIARMAID MACCULLOCH is Professor of the History of the Church, University of Oxford.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83286-7

Price:  £35.00

Oliver Cromwell's Letters and Speeches

In three large volumes these are the words of the man who was one the most influential Englishman in history. These letters and speeches start in 1636, six years before the Civil War and continue until 1658. Absolutely unmissable, especially for those interested in the English Civil War, as it documents Cromwells thoughts and reasoning behind his actions. Fully searchable in Adobe Acrobat Reader.    

Price:  £17.87

Sir Robert Heath, 1575-1649

Sir Robert Heath's career in public office illustrates the workings of early Stuart government and politics, while his private life throws light on the structure of English society as it moved towards civil war. This biography is particularly welcome, and Kopperman makes excellent use of a wide range of primary sources...   hardback   ISBN 978-0-861-93213-9

Price:  £40.00

Sir Thomas Gray: Scalacronica (1272-1363)

In 1355, Sir Thomas Gray, a Northumbrian knight and constable of Norham castle, was ambushed and captured by the Scots. Imprisoned in Edinburgh castle, he whiled away the hours by writing a chronicle charting the history of Britain from the Creation. The bulk of the work, written in Anglo-Norman French, is based on existing sources.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-854-44064-1

Price:  £50.00

The Autobiography of Gerald of Wales

Gerald of Wales, the son of a Norman Baron and the grandson of a Welsh Princess, is one of the most gifted and entertaining of medieval writers. His autobiography, translated from the Latin, presents the story of an Archdeacon who, despite his passionate efforts, never became a Bishop...   paperback   ISBN 978-1-843-83148-8

Price:  £25.00

The Bigod Earls of Norfolk in the Thirteenth Century

The Bigods were one of the most powerful and important families in thirteenth-century England. They are chiefly remembered for their dramatic interventions in high politics. Roger III Bigod [c. 1209-70] famously led the march on Westminster Hall in 1258 against Henry III, while Roger IV Bigod [1245-1306] confronted Edward I in 1297 in similar fashion.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83164-8

Price:  £40.00

The Journal of William Dowsing

During the Civil War, in late 1643 and 1644, the Suffolk puritan William Dowsing visited some hundred parish churches in Cambridgeshire, and about a hundred and fifty in Suffolk, smashing stained glass and other 'superstitious' imagery, ripping up monumental brass inscriptions, destroying altar rails and steps, and pulling down crucifixes and crosses.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-851-15833-4

Price:  £50.00

The Justicing Notebook (1750-64) of Edmund Tew, Rector of Boldon

Edmund Tew's notebook is a remarkable if cryptic record of the troublesome relationships of local people in a rapidly developing area of North-East England.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-854-44044-3

Price:  £40.00

The Letters and Charters of Cardinal Guala Bicchieri, Papal Legate in England 1216-1218

The legation of Guala Bicchieri of Vercelli, the third papal legate specifically appointed to England during the reign of King John, coincided with a turbulent period in England's history. Guala played a leading role in events, presiding over the resettlement of the English church after 1217, and is a figure of great importance in English political history. This volume assembles a comprehensive collection of his charters and letters.
Dr NICHOLAS VINCENT/teaches at Christ Church, Canterbury.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-907-23953-6

Price:  £25.00

The Letters of Theophilus Lindsey (1723-1808)

The letters of Theophilus Lindsey (1723-1808) illuminate the career and opinions of one of the most prominent and controversial clergymen of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. His petitions for liberalism within the Church of England in 1772-3, his subsequent resignation from the Church and his foundation of a separate Unitarian chapel in London in 1774 all provoked profound debate in the political as well as the ecclesiastical world.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83344-4

Price:  £90.00

The Life and Family of Robert Large, mercer

Mayor of London 1439-1440, first employer of William Caxton. Robert Large's career followed a route from apprenticeship to membership of the influential Mercers Company, where he became warden. He developed trading activities overseas as a merchant of the Calais staple, emerging as a ship-owner able to make substantial loans to the Crown.   Paperback   ISBN 978-0-9546812-2-7

Price:  £12.00

The Memoirs and Memorials of Sir Hugh Cholmley of Whitby, 1600-1657

Adds significantly to the small number of personal records that have come down to us of what it was like to live through the Civil Wars. TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT [John Morrill]
Sir Hugh Cholmley played many roles in an extraordinary life, transforming himself from a spendthrift play-boy into a successful estate manager, local militia officer, and member of parliament for Scarborough.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-902-12283-3

Price:  £50.00

Thomas Becket and his Biographers

In the wake of his murder in December 1170, an extraordinarily large number of Lives of Thomas Becket were produced. They provide an invaluable witness to the life and death of Thomas and the dramatic events in which he was involved, but they are also works of great literary value, more complex and sophisticated than has been recognised.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83271-3

Price:  £45.00

Tory and Whig

The parliamentary papers of Edward Harley and William Hay offer a unique insight into the politics of the 1730s and 1740s. The journals kept by the men during the latter part of Sir Robert Walpole's premiership provide two contrasting perspectives: Harley was a leading figure in the Tory party, and a fierce critic of the Whig ministry; Hay was an independently-minded but committed ministerialist. Hay gives an account of events in the Commons, while Harley,who succeeded to the earldom of Oxford in 1741, has a rare insider's view into proceedings in the House of Lords during the Whig supremacy. Other parliamentary papers include Hay's letters to Newcastle, providing a fascinating account of the bitterly contested elections of 1734 in Sussex and Lewes.
Dr STEPHEN TAYLOR is lecturer in history at the University of Reading; Dr CLYVE JONES is assistant librarian at the Institute of Historical Research, University of London.   hardback   ISBN 978-0-851-15589-0

Price:  £60.00

Unrepentant Tory

The diaries of the fourth duke of Newcastle-under-Lyne [1785-1851] provide an unrivalled insight into the politics of the 'age of reform', during the late-1820s and 1830s, from the perspective of a prominent political critic. Newcastle was a well known defender of the constitutional status quo and used his position in the house of lords, his family's historic electoral influence and personal contacts with the leading royal and political figures of the dayto argue the case against change. He was also a leading participant in ultra-tory parliamentary groups such as the 'king's friends' and the 'country party'. His diaries offer not just invaluable detail on these activities, but also a vivid personal testimony of Newcastle's political creed, and cast important light on the hopes, fears and strategies of those who resisted 'the triumph of reform' during these years. This edition reproduces the politicalcontent of the diaries and Newcastle's published letters to the press for the period 1827-38; it is accompanied with an extensive introduction placing the diaries in their historical context, and other apparatus.   hardback   ISBN 978-1-843-83266-9

Price:  £50.00