Allan Mallinson
Forgotten Heroes
Dunkirk: Retreat to Victory
By Major General Julian Thompson
Sidgwick and Jackson 338pp £20
Dunkirk: The Men They Left Behind
By Sean Longden
Constable 466pp £20
King George VI summed up what must have been a widespread view among soldiers after Dunkirk: ‘Personally, I feel happier now that we have no allies to be polite to and to pamper.’ Julian Thompson quotes this in his masterly study of the military operations up to and during Operation Dynamo – the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) from Belgium and France in June 1940.
The king was referring to the French, who in the twentieth century proved almost as dangerous an ally as they had been an enemy in the previous two. The problem began – as it has often done, and continues to do – with a political imperative begetting a ludicrous military
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It wasn’t until 1825 that Pepys’s diary became available for the first time. How it was eventually decrypted and published is a story of subterfuge and duplicity.
Kate Loveman tells the tale.
Kate Loveman - Publishing Pepys
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Piers Brendon compares Benson’s journals to others from the 20th century.
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Piers Brendon: Land of Dopes & Tories - The Benson Diaries: Selections from the Diary of Arthur Christopher Benson by Eamon Duffy & Ronald Hyam (edd)
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Of the siblings Gwen and Augustus John, it is Augustus who has commanded most attention from collectors and connoisseurs.
Was he really the finer artist, asks Tanya Harrod, or is it time Gwen emerged from her brother’s shadow?
Tanya Harrod - Cut from the Same Canvas
Tanya Harrod: Cut from the Same Canvas - Artists, Siblings, Visionaries: The Lives and Loves of Gwen and Augustus John by Judith Mackrell
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