Text this colour is a link for Members only. Support us by becoming a Member for only £3 a month by joining our 'Buy Me A Coffee page'; Membership gives you access to all content and removes ads.
Text this colour links to Pages. Text this colour links to Family Trees. Place the mouse over images to see a larger image. Click on paintings to see the painter's Biography Page. Mouse over links for a preview. Move the mouse off the painting or link to close the popup.
All About History Books
The Chronicle of Geoffrey le Baker of Swinbroke. Baker was a secular clerk from Swinbroke, now Swinbrook, an Oxfordshire village two miles east of Burford. His Chronicle describes the events of the period 1303-1356: Gaveston, Bannockburn, Boroughbridge, the murder of King Edward II, the Scottish Wars, Sluys, Crécy, the Black Death, Winchelsea and Poitiers. To quote Herbert Bruce 'it possesses a vigorous and characteristic style, and its value for particular events between 1303 and 1356 has been recognised by its editor and by subsequent writers'. The book provides remarkable detail about the events it describes. Baker's text has been augmented with hundreds of notes, including extracts from other contemporary chronicles, such as the Annales Londonienses, Annales Paulini, Murimuth, Lanercost, Avesbury, Guisborough and Froissart to enrich the reader's understanding. The translation takes as its source the 'Chronicon Galfridi le Baker de Swynebroke' published in 1889, edited by Edward Maunde Thompson. Available at Amazon in eBook and Paperback.
History of the Greek Revolution by George Finlay is in Georgian Books.
Georgian Books, History of the Greek Revolution by George Finlay, History of the Greek Revolution Book III by George Finlay
Georgian Books, History of the Greek Revolution by George Finlay, History of the Greek Revolution Book III by George Finlay, History of the Greek Revolution Book III Chapter II by George Finlay
The prudence of Miaoulis, and the skill with which he contrived to introduce some degree of order into the fleet under his command during this cruise, afforded hope of further improvements in the Greek navy which were never realised. The skill of the captains in handling their ships received well-merited praise from all naval officers of every nation who witnessed their manoeuvres. But their ignorance of military science, and their awkwardness in the use of their imperfect artillery, did not allow them to derive any very decided advantage from their superior seaman-ship. The necessity of effecting a complete change in the naval system of the Greeks made a strong impression on an English officer who served as a volunteer at this time, and who made several proposals to attain the desired end by introducing steam-ships1. His name was Frank Abney Hastings.
Note 1. General Gordon says, i. 364, "It was then that Frank Hastings commenced that course of honourable service which must ever connect his name with the emancipation of Greece." See also page 870, where it is mentioned that Hastings saved a vessel. He did so by going out on the bowsprit under a heavy fire of musketry. - Vol. ii. 441. Gordon adds, "If ever there was a disinterested and really useful Philhellene it was Hastings: he received no pay, and had expended most of his slender fortune in keeping the Karteria afloat for the last six months .... His ship, too, was the only one in the Greek navy where regular discipline was maintained." The sum expended by Hastings in the cause of Greece eventually exceeded £7000.