Hollywood vs History #2: U-571

"The film tries to ape classics like Das Boot, but fails spectacularly...succumbing to the bleak depths of the Sea of Indifference"

Hollywood vs History #1: Braveheart

"To begin with, the opening narration drawls "the English will tell you I am a liar" when recounting the backdrop to the events that are about to unfold. This is sure-fire way to let the audience know that you're about to make shit up"

We the people: Shays’ Rebellion

And so it is with this knowledge that we come to the task at hand: a forgotten uprising of working people in the newly founded United States - merely little over a decade after "the shot heard around the world" at Lexington and Concord - were poor, angry farmers decided to take a stand at excessive, punishing taxation by the ruling classes and inadvertently put the theory of the "land of the free" to the test.

A Quick Look: Margaret Thatcher and Liverpool

"Managed decline" It's a simple enough phrase. Two words. Two words part of a bigger whole, a letter, in fact, written in 1981 to the then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher by the Chancellor Geoffrey Howe. It argued that any kind of assistance, financial or social, that was given to Liverpool from central government was akin...

The Giants Whose Shoulders We Stand On

"If Dr King were alive today, I'm sure he would go spare at the idea that he alone was the sum total of black peoples contribution to the human story" - the historian and writer Akala, speaking at the Oxford union, 2018, about the narrowing of historical focus in Black History Month

The Leisure Peninsula: Slavery, the Confederacy and the Castle builder of Birkenhead

The Wirral isn't short of its share of fantastic buildings; think of the medieval Birkenhead Priory, the 20th century engineering marvels that are the Mersey tunnels or the fantastic Victorian structures that line the edges of Birkenhead Park. But one thing that the Leisure Peninsula once had that is no more could quite possibly have...

Unsolved M-histories: The Woodchurch Pillbox Murder

However, despite nearly 40,000 people across the country being questioned or suspected of involvement in her murder, no arrests were ever made and as such, the identity of Alice Barton's killer remained a mystery.

The Big Picture: Wirral, the Domesday Book and the birth of state surveillance

It could, therefore, be argued that King William I of England was the first ruler to carry out a root and branch surveillance of the population - making Domesday the first example of the state interfering in the lives of the people.

Unsolved M-histories: Who killed Martha Tabram?

"They had lives and families. They loved, and lived. Martha Tabram had been married, although estranged, and had two sons. Polly Ann Nichols had five children and Catherine Eddowes had a fine singing voice and worked as a tinplate stamper. These women had stories - and sadly that tends to be overlooked when involved in a case like the Whitechapel Murders"