A run through the Southern States.

by | Sep 6, 2023 | Uncategorized

Two English officers see the American Civil War    Henry Charles Fletcher of the Scots Fusilier Guards (now Scots Guards) in November 1862, in just a few weeks travelling largely by rail, covered an immense distance through the Southern States.  It was...

Coming Soon my New Book

by | Jul 31, 2023 | Uncategorized

Coming Soon my New Book Memories and  Echoes: A Brits Journey into the American Civil War. For over thirty years my wife Margaret and I have been travelling to the USA. During that time we explored the background of the Civil War visiting all the major sites and...

Terrific Writer Re-Assessed

by | Jun 30, 2023 | Uncategorized

Gavin Lyall Gavin Lyall was born in Birmingham in 1932. He completed National Service 1951-1953 as a pilot officer in the RAF flying Gloster Meteors, after that he went to Cambridge and graduated in 1956 with honours in English. He went on to write for several...

What’s in a Name

by | Jun 6, 2023 | Uncategorized

James Bond Where did 007’s name come from? According to C.H. Forster of the Ministry of Aircraft Production, on hearing from Ian Fleming toward the end of World War II that he was writing a book, he asked how he would choose the characters names. Fleming, he says,...

Who did keep Spain out of WWII

by | May 18, 2023 | Uncategorized

Meeting at Hendaye The small far south westerly French town of Hendaye is the last stop on the Franco-Spanish railway line from Paris-Madrid before the border. Its palm tree lined waterfront lapped by Atlantic rollers to the west and to the east tower the mountains of...

Wizard trip inspired by a race and novel

by | May 10, 2023 | Uncategorized

Out of the trip came my book:  The Serpent & the Cross. The great Mille Miglia (Thousand Miles) road race was held twenty four times 1927-1957 with a gap during World War II. The race continues today as an historic classic car event. https://1000miglia.it...

Bond who was he?

by | May 7, 2023 | Uncategorized

Is the character of James Bond 007 based on anybody? Many people have been put forward as models. We can be fairly certain what Ian Fleming felt he looked like because he tells us. In Casino Royale his doomed girlfriend, Vesper Lynd, says to Rene Mathis of the French...

Did Bond make the right choice!

by | Apr 25, 2023 | Uncategorized

‘Thoughts in a DB III.’ In the novel Goldfinger we are told Bond is given the choice of cars ‘from the pool.’ An Aston Martin or a Jaguar 3.4, we are told either of the cars were suitable. Bond opts for the DB III; because it has more gadgets and is ‘battleship grey’...