General History

Hundreds of African American soldiers and regimental employees represented Wisconsin in the Civil War, and many of them lived in the state either before or after the conflict. And yet, if these individuals are mentioned at all in histories of the state,...

Rorke's Drift in 1879 is undoubtedly the most famous of Britain's imperial battles. With South Africa becoming a more popular tourist destination, never has there been a better time to visit this iconic battlefield and trace the steps of the red-coated...

By the end of the nineteenth century the fame of the Zulu was world-wide, and their army was one of the few non-European military organizations to have become the subject of serious historical study. Their very name is still synonymous with bravery,...

Telling the stories of African American domestic workers, this book resurrects a little-known history of domestic worker activism in the 1960s and 1970s, offering new perspectives on race, labor, feminism, and organizing. In this groundbreaking history...

Why do the English keep apologizing? Why are they so unenthusiastic about enthusiasm? Why does rain surprise them? When are they being ironic, and how can you tell? Even after eighteen years in London, New York Times reporter Sarah Lyall remained...

From the New York Times bestselling author of River of Doubt and Destiny of the Republic, the stirring story of one of the great feats of exploration of all time, and its complicated legacy For millennia the location of the Nile River's headwaters was...

At the start of the American War of Independence, Great Britain dominated overseas commerce and was the leading slave-trading nation in the world. In 1776, American privateers--privately owned ships granted commissions by the Continental Congress to...

The master of literary reportage reflects on the West's encounters with the non-European In this distillation of reflections accumulated from a lifetime of travel, Ryszard Kapuscinski takes a fresh look at the Western idea of the Other. Looking at this...

On 11 January 1879 the British Empire went to war with the independent kingdom of Zululand. The British anticipated a swift and decisive victory, placing great faith in modern firepower; no plans were made for suppressing the Zulu over a protracted...

Although it occurred nearly a century ago, the Elaine Massacre of 1919 remains the subject of intense inquiry as historians try to answer a multitude of questions, such as why authorities in the Arkansas Delta used such overwhelming violence to put down...