Wireless 20 July

Various people have made a number of more or less ribald comments about my use of the word wireless. People have intimated that the word is old fashioned - some have suggested that it is anachronistic! Well, all I can say is "tosh" or possibly "fiddlesticks" because on this day, the 20th of July, in 1872, an American, Mahlon Loomis was granted the first ever patent for the transmission of intelligence without the aid of wires - wireless (or radio as some people erroneously call it). Almost everyone thought that he was potty, indeed Loomis himself was none too sure of his sanity and was heard to say; "I know that I am regarded as a crank, perhaps a fool by some, and as to the latter, possibly I am, for I could have discarded this thing entirely and turned my attention to making money." Nevertheless, he should receive the credit for being the first to use a complete antenna and ground system, carrying out the first experimental transmission of wireless telegraph signals, being the first to use of kites to carry an antenna aloft and being the first user of balloons to raise an antenna wire. He also built the first vertical antenna (steel rod mounted on top of a wooden tower) and was the first person to formulate the idea of ‘waves’ travelling out from his antenna. He is, of course, completely unknown and all the kudos for the invention of wireless goes to Nikola Tesla in 1893 and to Guglielmo Marconi in 1896. It was the continuing spat between these two men and arguments over patents and royalties that started the now more common usage of the American word 'radio' – Tesla insisting on ‘radio’ and Marconi on ‘wireless’. Neither Tesla’s nor Marconi’s systems could do more than transmit morse code and it wasn't until 1906 that Canadian-American scientist Reginald Aubrey Fessenden was the first to wirelessly transmit a human voice. On Christmas Eve, 1906, using his heterodyne principle, Fessenden transmitted the first audio radio broadcast in history from Brant Rock, Massachusetts. Ships at sea, that were equipped with wireless sets, heard a broadcast that included Fessenden playing the song O Holy Night on the violin and reading a passage from the Bible. To quote Mahlon Loomis' dying words, uttered in 1886: "I know that I am by some, even many, regarded as a crank - by some perhaps a fool.... But I know that I am right, and if the present generation lives long enough their opinions will be changed - and their wonder will be that they did not perceive it before. I shall never see it perfected - but the wireless will be, and others will have the honour of the discovery ". Wireless – possibly the greatest invention ever.

Great Fire of Rome 18 July

On this day, 18 July in 64 AD, a fire started in some shops that were close to the Circus Maximus, in Rome. The fire quickly spread and eventually 10 of the 14 districts that comprised ancient Rome were destroyed. The fire raged, in all, for nine days. The story that everyone remembers is that the Emporer Nero started the fire in order to clear space for his planned new palace the Domus Aurea (Golden House). He is supposed to have stood on his private stage and extemporized verses comparing the present disaster to the Fall of Troy, accompanying himself on the lyre, while he watched the fire burn from a safe distance at his villa on the Quirinal Hill. Interestingly however, this may not be entirely, or even slightly, correct. The story was reported by Tacitus who, at the time of the fire, was a young teenager. Tacitus describes the story as a rumour that was going about during the time of the fire. Nero was away at Antium when the fire started,

What certainly is true is that many Romans lived in insulae, which were apartment buildings of three to five floors, with wooden floors and partitions that were built closely packed together in ancient winding lanes. Fires broke out in these conditions all the time. The fire burned hot enough to melt iron gates and nails in the roofs and it seems certain that a firestorm raged, which allowed the fire to advance in the opposite direction to the way the wind was blowing.

What is also certainly true is that Nero accused the Christian sect of starting the fire and embarked on the most appalling persecutions of Christians, with much feeding to the lions, using them as human torches and as targets for gladiators. It has been suggested that the Christians set the fire in order to fulfil an Egyptian prophecy that stated that the day Sirius (the dog star) first rises would mark the fall of the great evil city. Even if they did not start it, some Christians certainly added to the fire after it began. Nero built his Domus Aurea but it was of little use to him - he committed suicide in 68 AD.

Rosetta Stone 15 July

During the early part of the Napoleonic war, Bonaparte attempted to threaten the British position in India by conquering Egypt. On this day, July 15, 1799, while supervising the digging of foundations for an extension to a fort near the town of el-Rashid (Rosetta), French Captain Pierre-Francois Bouchard discovered a black basalt, inscribed tablet, which became known as the Rosetta Stone. The scientists on the expedition realised that the stone was of significance because it was carved with an inscription in three different scripts. One in Egyptian hieroglyphs at the top, a second in what is known as 'demotic script' (a sort of 'everyday use' type of hieroglyph) in the middle, and Greek at the bottom. The translation of the Greek passage revealed that the inscription was a royal edict issued on March 27, 196 BC. Hieroglyphs had slipped from use in the 4th century AD, so for 1400 years, no one had known how to read them. The Greek inscription was a translation of the upper two Egyptian passages. It wasn't too long before the bright sparks on the spot realised that the Greek bit might be used as a key to decipher the Egyptiann bits - and hence all the other hieroglyphs that were laying about all over Egypt.
At the second battle at Abu Qir in 1801, Bonaparte was defeated in Egypt and the Rosetta Stone became forfeit, in the name of King George III and the stone found its way to the British Museum. By now, the scientific community was getting excited and copies of the inscriptions were sent to linguistic experts all over Europe. Finally, after only 14 years of trying, in 1822, a Frenchman, Jean-Francois Champollion, solved the puzzle. Interestingly, the beginnings of Bonapartes defeat in Egypt began with the Battle of Abu Qir Bay (Battle of the Nile) in which Admiral Nelson's fleet defeated the French Mediterranean fleet. The first ship to open fire in the battle was HMS Bellerophon (Bellerophon means 'bearing darts' and he is the hero from Greek mythology that killed the Chimera). On this day in 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte finally surrendered aboard HMS Bellerophon before being transported to St Helena (named after the Greek 'Helena of Constantinople', who is said to have discovered the whereabouts of the True Cross). Handy, the Greeks.

Bastille Day 14 July

Back in 1789, on this day, 14 July, 600-odd disgruntled Frenchmen, wearing silly hats, assembled at the Hôtel des Invalides with the intention of attacking the notorious Parisian gaol, the Bastille. Although this act was an important development in, and later a symbol of, the French Revolution, the main aim of the attackers at the time was to obtain large quantities of arms and ammunition that were stored there. Apart from the armaments, the gaol was nearly empty with only seven residents - four forgers, two "lunatics" and one "deviant" aristocrat, the Comte de Solages (there’s always one!). As the day wore on, ninety-eight attackers died and just one defender; nevertheless, at around 17.30, the governor, De Launay, realising that he couldn’t hold out for much longer surrendered. De Launay was stabbed repeatedly and his head was then sawn off and fixed on a pike and paraded through the streets. Thus was Liberté, égalité, fraternité and the age of enlightenment born.
Two years later, in 1791, On July 14, in not-particularly-revolutionary Birmingham, the Constitutional Society of Birmingham arranged a dinner to celebrate the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille. Members of the Lunar Society, including Josiah Wedgwood, Erasmus Darwin, James Watts and Joseph Priestley attended the dinner. A well-organised mob, orchestrated by the Church and the British government, chose the occasion to attack the homes of several of the diners. This event became known as the Priestley Riots. Sadly, Joseph Priestley lost all his material possessions in the riots and the labour of years was gone with them. Despite this setback, we have Priestley to thank for discovering 9 gases including nitrous oxide. He invented soda water, (which is handy for those of us who like a fizzy drink after a hot summers day storming grubby French prisons), refrigeration, and gum erasers for which he coined the term "rubber". He discovered photosynthesis and he contributed towards the discovery of oxygen, which he referred to as ‘dephlogisticated air’ (Phlogisticated substances are those that were thought to contain ‘phlogiston’ and are "dephlogisticated" when burned. Priestley, when he discovered oxygen, thought it was ‘dephlogisticated air’ because it was capable of combining with more phlogiston and thus supporting combustion for longer than ordinary air). After the Priestley Riots, Priestley left England and emigrated to Pennsylvania where he built a home and laboratory and collected a 1600 volume library, which was then among the largest in America. He is regarded as a founder of liberal Unitarian thinking. A lasting legacy, if another were needed, of his philosophy and insight was that he persuaded his friend Thomas Jefferson to initiate what Americans call a liberal arts education.
An interesting addendum to the tale takes us back to revolutionary France. In the spirit of the now burgeoning age of enlightenment, in September of 1774, Priestley took his ‘dephlogisticated air' to a leading French scientist called Lavoisier. Lavoisier proved that air contained a new element, oxygen, which combined with hydrogen to make water and, in the process disproved the phlogiston theory. Controversially, a Swedish apothecary Carl Wilhelm Scheele claimed to have beaten Priestley by 2 years but was deprived of credit because Lavoisier denied receiving a letter Scheele claims to have sent in September 1774 describing his 1772 discovery of "fire air". History favoured our hero Priestley - until Scheele's missing letter was found in 1992 in Paris, 218 years late. Lavoisier received it on Oct 15, 1774. Incroyable! Crapaud français! (trans: Incredible French clamping plate).

Ruth Ellis 13 July

On this day, the 13 July in 1955, Ruth Ellis became the last woman in Britain to be executed. The hanging took place at 9.00 am BST at Holloway Prison and was carried out by the executioner Albert Pierpoint. She left behind an 11-year-old son. Ellis was sentenced to death at the Old Bailey for shooting her lover, racing driver David Blakeley, 25, outside the Magdala public house in north London on Easter Sunday. Despite the fact that, at her trial, the jury took only 14 minutes to find her guilty, the hanging of Ruth Ellis was one of the most controversial executions ever to have taken place. It is now widely accepted that this case was in large part instrumental in the bringing about the eventual suspension of the death penalty in Britain in 1965. It has often been postulated that, in any other country, Ruth Ellis would not have been hanged. If ever there was a crime of passion, this was it.
Ellis had been in her short life a photographic model, a club hostess, a mother and a divorcee. Ruth Ellis was no saint, a peroxide blonde, she often came across as a "brassy tart" (to quote the press of the day). She had a tragic attraction to men who drank heavily, who abused her, who two-timed her with other women and who liked to live what passed for the 'high life' in the West End clubs and bars of the 1950s. Ruth Ellis was David Blakeleys lover. Ruth said of him in evidence, "He was violent on occasions...always because of jealousy in the bar…he only used to hit me with his fists and hands, but I bruise easily, and I was full of bruises on many occasions.." Ruth was also living with Desmond Cussen, another fast car fan and it was Desmond Cussen who drove her, with her .38 revolver, to the Magdala Public House. Blakeley was in the pub with a friend, Clive Gunnel who was a friend also of Anthony and Carole Findlater. Blakeley had been having an affair with Carole Findlater for some time, with the full knowledge of Anthony Findlater, who serviced Blakeleys cars, and this was no secret to Ruth. Blakeley and Gunnel had gone from the Findlater’s home, where they were drinking, to the Magdala to buy more cigarettes and booze. Four days before the murder Blakeley had left Ellis after yet another fight and gone to stay with the Findlater’s. Ellis was beside her self with anger, hurt and jealousy. She drank Absinthe for four days, could not sleep and was taking tranquillisers. She had also had an abortion just ten days previously . As the two men stepped from the pub, Ruth walked up and emptied her Smith and Wesson revolver into Blakeley, in full view of witnesses. As Blakeley lay in a pool of blood, a Metropolitan Policeman came out of the pub and arrested Ruth Ellis for murder.
In September of 2003, the Criminal Cases Review Commission brought the case to the Court of Appeal arguing that Ellis was suffering "battered woman syndrome". The appeal judges ruled she had been properly convicted of murder according to the law as it stood at the time. The defence of diminished responsibility did not then exist.

The Battle of The Boyne 12 July

On this day, the 12 July, in 1690, the first proper victory for the League of Augsburg, which was the first ever alliance between Catholic and Protestant countries, was won. The opposing armies in the battle were led by King James of England, Scotland and Ireland who had been deposed from his English and Scottish thrones in the previous year and his successor, the co-monarch William III (William reigned jointly with his wife, James's daughter Queen Mary II). Despite being deposed in England and Scotland, James’s supporters still controlled much of Ireland and the Irish Parliament. The battle was the culmination of James's unsuccessful attempt to regain the thrones of England and Scotland. William’s army at the Boyne was about 36000 men and was comprised of mixed religions, the Dutch Blue Guards for example, had the Papal Banner with them on the day, and many of the Guardsmen were Dutch Catholics. The Jacobites were 25,000 strong and James had several regiments of protestant French troops and a number of regiments of German Protestants. The crucial difference between the two sides was not religion but the fact that William’s army was equipped with the new and hugely efficient flintlock musket while James’s men had the obsolete matchlock musket. Over the years, the war metamorphosed into, on the one hand an issue of Irish sovereignty as well as religious toleration and land ownership and on the other about maintaining Protestant and British rule in Ireland. Nowadays, of course it is an occasion for waving orange flags about and being unpleasant to ones neighbours. Which is strange, because originally, Irish Protestants commemorated the Battle of Aughrim on the 12th of July. At Aughrim, which took place a year after the Boyne, virtually all of the old native Irish Catholic and Old English aristocracies were wiped out. What was celebrated on the Twelfth was the extermination of the elite. What happened was that by the time the Orange Order was founded in the 1790s, a new Gregorian calendar had been introduced. A consequence of this was that the date of the Battle of the Boyne was now also on the 12 of July (it had, originally been the First) and the entirely erroneous celebration of William's "victory over popery at the Battle of the Boyne" was born. I shall leave greater minds than mine to decide whether or not this forms the basis for stamping about the "Queen's highway" wearing daft hats to celebrate a spurious identity earned in the not very ‘Glorious Revolution’ settlement or just an excuse for anti social behaviour.

Waterloo Railway Station 11 July

The Waterloo district of London, was named after the Battle of Waterloo in which Napoleon was defeated near Brussels. Waterloo Railway Station, somewhat ironically, was for a time London’s gateway for train passengers from France and Belgium and the original station was opened on this day, 11 July, in 1848 by the London and South Western Railway Company. The Station was, originally, fairly small and was situated where the present-day platforms 7 to 12 are found. However as rail travel became more popular, the station required extra capacity and three more stations were added to the original: ‘Windsor’ to the north-west in 1860; ‘Cyprus’ to the south east in 1878 and ‘Khartoum’ to the north in 1885. The stations were, for years, known by both their original names and by cardinal points - Cyprus Station was also known, often in the same timetable, as Waterloo South, for example. By the turn of the twentieth century, the platform numbering system was beyond the wit of man to comprehend. The first platform of the original station was designated as Platform 1, despite now being in the middle of the station; the remaining fifteen platforms shared the numbers 2-10, resulting in platforms sharing the same number. Waterloo South had no platform numbers at all. To add to the confusion, Waterloo had a further station, with another Platform 1, that was originally the terminus for London’s daily funeral express to Brookwood Cemetery. Trains bearing coffins (at 2s/6d for a single fare) left from the ‘Necropolis Station’ which was immediately adjacent to the main station. In the end it was decided that the only way to sort out the muddle was to knock down the whole thing and start again. Waterloo Station was completely rebuilt in 1902. The idiosyncrasies of the old Station ensured that it was much loved by writers. Jerome K. Jerome, in his novel ‘Three Men In A Boat’, fondly describes the difficulties of finding a train at Waterloo - in the end having to bribe an engine driver to find the right train. H.G. Wells referred to the now long disappeared Waterloo East station in ‘The War of the Worlds’ as the station troop trains to the Martian landing site departed from. Waterloo Station is said to have prompted G K Chesterton to observe "The only way of catching a train I have ever discovered is to miss the train before."

Richard III 6 July

On this day, 6 July in 1483, Richard, Duke of Gloucester was crowned King Richard III. The story goes that after the death of his brother King Edward IV, Richard briefly governed as a regent for Edward’s son King Edward V, but he imprisoned Edward and his brother Richard in the Tower and acquired the throne for himself. Many of the facts about Richard are disputed, largely because his dynasty, the House of York, died with him at the Battle of Bosworth Field and the Tudors, being the victors, wrote the history. At that time history was considered to be a branch of literature. Nevertheless, Richard stands accused of a number of ‘misdemeanours’. To start with, the murder of his 2 nephews, the Princes in the Tower, the murder of Henry VI, the "private execution" of his brother George, Duke of Clarence, the murder of his wife’s first husband, Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales and the murder of William, Lord Hastings. Slightly more controversially, he is also accused of forcing his wife, Anne Neville, to marry him against her will, of planning an incestuous marriage to his niece Elizabeth of York (and perhaps killing his wife so he could), of accusing his own mother of adultery. Finally of accusing his late brother the king of being illegitimate, of accusing Jane Shore and Elizabeth Woodville of witchcraft in withering his arm and finally of being illegitimate himself. Imagine these attributes in a modern Labour Party politician?

A soothsayer in, of all places, Leicester, prophesied his death. She is purported to have told him, as he headed off for the Battle of Bosworth Field on August 22 1485 to meet Lancastrian forces led by Henry Tudor: "where your spur should strike on the ride into battle, your head shall be broken on the return". On the ride into battle his spur struck the bridge stone of the Bow Bridge; as he was being carried back after the battle, slung over the back of a horse, his head struck the same stone and was broken open, spilling his brains onto the cobbles. His burial site is currently under a car park in Leicester. Oh how the mighty have fallen.

Bikini 5 July

Imagine, if you can, a scenario where the immortal words "She’s got an itsey-bitsy, teenie-weenie yellow polka dot bikini" would have no meaning. This would be the unhappy situation if, on this day, the 5th of July, in 1946, a type of women’s bathing suit, characterised by two separate parts-one covering the breasts, the other the groin and buttocks, leaving an uncovered area between the two garments - had not been invented by engineer Louis Reard in Paris. The bikini was named after Bikini Atoll, the site of nuclear weapon tests in the Marshall Islands, on the reasoning that the burst of excitement it would cause would be like the atomic bomb. Reard’s suit was a refinement of the work of Jacques Heim who, two months earlier, had introduced the "Atome" (named for its size) and advertised it as the world’s "smallest bathing suit". Reard, cunning engineer that he was, split the "atome". The Bikini was, amazingly, fairly difficult to explode into the market places of the world. Initially, Reard could not find a model that would dare to wear his design. He ended up hiring Micheline Bernardini, a nude dancer from the Casino de Paris. The swimwear was banned from the Miss World contests and public places in the USA. Strangely though, Brigitte Bardot’s bikini in the 1957 film ‘And God Created Woman’ created a market for the swimwear and suddenly all sorts of inappropriate individuals were sporting the bikini at every turn. Back in the UK, with amazing foresight, the introduction of the National Health Service by the Labour government on this day in 1948 ensured that, if someone was foolish enough to wear a bikini in the English summer, treatment for the inevitably ensuing pneumonia was free.

Independance Days and Biscuits 4 July

Today, 4 July is a remarkable day in history. Not only did the Congress of the United States of America ratify the Declaration of independence on this day in 1776 but also, on this day in 1946 the United States of America gave the Philippine Islands their independence after 381 years of colonial rule under, initially, the Spanish and later (for 87 years) the Americans - which was frightfully good of them. But there is more: today in 1807 was the birthday of Giuseppe Garibaldi. Garibaldi was an Italian patriot and soldier of the Risorgimento. He personally led many of the military campaigns that brought about the formation of a unified Italy - having first lost twice as many battles as he eventually won. Garibaldi was an influential and colourful character who, rightly deserves to have the Garibaldi biscuit named after him - he was, apparently, prone to handing raisin biscuits out to his men. His men were no doubt thankful to receive these as a welcome change from sun-dried tomatoes, pasta, artichokes, olives and salami pizza. An orange North American fish is also named after him. If that wasn’t enough drama and history to be going on with, at 0550 GMT this morning in 2005, someone crashed a washing machine-sized "impactor" into Comet Tempel 1 at a relative speed of 37,000km/h, throwing up a huge plume of icy debris - most careless, although probably fairly exciting for anyone loafing about in space close enough to have seen it happen.

Penguins 3 July

The origin of the word 'penguin' has, over the years, been the subject of heated debate. For example, John Latham, in 1785 suggested that the word came from the Latin 'pinguis' meaning fat, which, supposedly refers to the appearance of the bird. Fatuous. It is now widely accepted that in fact the name stems from an ancient description of a bird that was, at one time, found in great numbers on islands off eastern Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Ireland and Britain (including Wales). The word stems from the welsh phrase 'pen gwyn', meaning "white head" and referred originally to the Great Auk (Pinguinus impennis). (Although the head of the Great Auk is not in fact white, there is a white patch behind the beak.) Later, when explorers discovered apparently similar birds in the southern hemisphere, the term was supposedly transferred to them. The Great Auks were excellent swimmers, using their wings to swim underwater. Unlike other auks, however, the Great Auk could not fly, which made it vulnerable to being hunted by humans and it was eventually hunted, for food and down for mattresses, to extinction. The last pair was killed on this day July 3, 1844, on the island of Eldey, near Iceland. This day is clearly a remarkable one for flightless birds. Take the Mallard for example, and I don’t mean the duck but rather the beautiful blue and magnificently streamlined steam locomotive that is the holder of the world speed record for steam locomotives at 126 mph (203 km/h). The record was achieved on July 3, 1938 on the slight downwards grade of Stoke Bank south of Grantham on the East Coast Main Line, and the highest speed was recorded at milepost 90¼, between Little Bytham and Essendine. It broke the German 1936 record of 200.4 km/h. Apparently, it was one of a small number of locomotives equipped with a double Kylchap blastpipe, which is a useful thing to know if ever you should need to pass the time of day with an anoraked and be-Thermos’d train spotter.

The Somme 1 July

1 July 1916, was the opening day of the British and French offensive that became the Battle of the Somme. The middle day of the middle year of the First World War, it is remembered as the bloodiest day in the history of the British Army. For many people, the first day has come to represent the futility and sacrifice of the war, with lines of infantry being mowed down by German machine guns. The main attack was to be carried out by the Fourth Army under the command of General Sir Henry Rawlinson. A diversionary attack was to be made on the northern flank by two divisions of General Edmund Allenby’s Third Army. When the breakthrough was achieved, the exploitation phase would be carried out by the three cavalry divisions of General Sir Hubert Gough’s Reserve Army. For all three men, the Somme would be their first battle in command of an army. Many commanders approached the battle with great optimism. The pre-battle speech delivered to the 8th Battalion, King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry included the memorable, though slightly inaccurate: "When you go over the top, you can slope arms, light up your pipes and cigarettes, and march all the way to Pozières before meeting any live Germans." On this day 57,470 men became casualties of which 19,240 were killed or died of wounds.

Night of the Long Knives 30 June

On this day, the 30th June, in 1934, Adolf Hitler led the ‘Night of the Long Knives’, against the Sturmabteilung (SA) paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. The S.A. was discontented with the progress of the Nazi regime and they felt that the ‘socialism’ element of National Socialism was being neglected. Their big mistake though was that they also wanted to become the core of a new German army. Hitler, using the tried and tested ‘divide and rule’ principle, fostered political infighting among his subordinates, with Hermann Göring, Joseph Goebbels, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich on one side and Ernst Röhm, the leader of the S.A., on the other. At this time, the S.A. was the only remaining viable threat to Hitler’s power. Goering and Himmler asked Heydrich to assemble a dossier of manufactured evidence to suggest that Röhm had been paid 12 million marks by France to overthrow Hitler. Hitler decided to act. Alfred Rosenberg’s diary provides an account of what happened next: "With an SS escort detachment the Führer … knocked softly on Röhm’s door: "Message from Munich," he said with disguised voice. "Well come in," Röhm called to the supposed messenger, "the door is open." Hitler tore open the door, fell on Röhm as he lay in bed, seized him by the throat and screamed, "You are under arrest, you swine." Then he turned the traitor over to the SS. At first Röhm refused to get dressed. The SS then threw his clothes in the Chief of Staff’s face until he bestirred himself to put them on. In the room next door, they found young men engaged in homosexual activity. "And these are the kind who want to be leaders in Germany," the Führer said trembling." Official records tally the dead at 77, although some 400 are believed to have been murdered - most were simply shot out of hand. When you come to think about it, there is a lot to be said for parliamentary democracy.

Dog Shows 28 June

On this day the 28th of June 1859 the first inklings that the world had gone completely off its collective chunk surfaced to the delight of some and the perpetual amazement of others. The first ever dog show was held in Newcastle-on-Tyne. Even the concept of what a dog show entails beggars belief. In a dog show, judges who are familiar with specific dog breeds (of which there are over 800) evaluate individual dogs for how well they conform to published breed standards, so a better way to describe a dog show is a conformation show. A dog show is not exactly a comparison of one dog to another, it is a comparison of each dog to a judge’s concept of the ideal specimen of the breed standard; based on this, one dog is placed ahead of another. There are, apparently, all-breed judges. So one person can retain a vast knowledge of the confirmation points of over 800 breeds of dog? What, for example, entails a "full coat" or a "cheerful attitude"? How do you quantify "quantity of wrinkles" or "colour of nose"? These details are, by all accounts, the bread and butter of your all-breed judge. Why would 120,000 people in the UK alone want to get involved in this? Is it the dogs they like or is it something else? Politics in the pure-bred dog world can be vicious I’m told; there have been charges at various times of favouritism, nepotism, bribery and even drugging of competitors’ animals. There is a lot to be said for a goldfish in a bowl.

Ralph Austin Bard 27 June

Ralph Austin Bard was a Chicago financier who served as Assistant Secretary of the Navy, 1941-1945, and as Under Secretary, 1944-1945. He was one of eight members of the Interim Committee appointed to advise President Harry S. Truman on the use of the atomic bomb. Although opinions varied, on June 1, 1945, the Committee: "agreed… that the bomb should be used against Japan as soon as possible; that it be used on a war plant surrounded by workers’ homes; and that it be used without prior warning." However, on this day, June 27, 1945, Bard, had second thoughts and sent a memo to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson suggesting that the Japanese government be given some warning before the use of the atomic bomb. "The position of the United States as a great humanitarian nation and the fair play attitude of our people generally is responsible in the main for this feeling," he wrote, adding "that the Japanese government may be searching for some opportunity which they could use as a medium of surrender." On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese City of Hiroshima without the warning. "Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of worlds." as J. Robert Oppenheimer and Bhagavad Gita put it.

Invasion of the Soviet Union 22 June

On this day 22 June in 1941 Adolf Hitler, announcing (conveniently) that the 1939 non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union was a "stain on Germany’s record" and that it was time to have a pop at the ‘untermensch’, sent three million men, supported by more than 3,000 tanks, 7,000 guns and nearly 3,000 aircraft across Nazi Germany’s border into the Soviet Union. The Soviet leader, Joseph Stalin, was, by all accounts, astonished - he had not been expecting any German visitors until 1942 and had not even ironed a tablecloth in preparation. The Germans, of course, quickly over-ran the border posts enabling Herr ‘Noballs’ Goebels to announce a great victory on national radio the "greatest the world has ever seen". Dear old Winston had a handle on things, of course, he told parliament that Hitler was a "bloodthirsty guttersnipe" and announced "The Russian danger is our danger, and the danger of the United States, just as the cause of any Russian fighting for his hearth and home is the cause of free men and free peoples in every quarter of the globe", which wasn’t bad for a man who only days before had been expressing his own outspoken opposition to communism in no uncertain terms "A communist" he said "is like a crocodile: when it opens its mouth you cannot tell whether it is trying to smile or preparing to eat you up". Operation Barbarossa - anyone for crocodiles?

Magna Carta 15 June

King John appended his Royal Seal to Magna Carta on this day in 1215 at Runnymeade. Unfortunately, King John, obviously somewhat less than impressed, utterly repudiated the charter as soon as the barons left London a few days later. Pope Innocent III also immediately annulled the "shameful and demeaning agreement’, saying it impaired King John’s dignity. (Dignity of a man who murdered his own brother, Arthur, in order to grab the throne? - nice one Pope.) Widely considered to be the first step in a long historical process leading to the rule of constitutional law, Magna Carta, was above all else a statement that the monarch was subject to law and a statement of the rights of free men. The only problem, of course, was that in 1215 almost no one was free. Nevertheless, the idea stuck and Magna Carta was amended and re-issued by John’s descendants, the final version being issued by Edward I’s Parliament on 12 October 1297 as part of a statute known as Confirmatio cartarum. The version of Magna Carta from 1297 is still part of English law, although only parts remain in force and most of it has been repealed or superseded. The articles currently in force are articles one, nine and twenty-nine of the 1297 version.

The Falklands Conflict 14 June

Carl Phillip Gottlieb von Clausewitz famously wrote, in his book ‘Vom Kriege’ (On War), first published in 1832: "War is merely the continuation of policy by other means,". This statement is considered to have had a strong influence on military thinking in many subsequent wars including WWI, WWII, and all post Vietnam US military operations. However, Clausewitz didn’t have it completely correct - sometimes a lack of policy has more to do with it. Take, for example the Falklands War which illustrates what a lack of policy, a splash of political miscalculation and murmur of miscommunication can do to create a shooting war. In the period before the war, both sides had political eyes fixed firmly on domestic issues - Argentina on maintaining the position of its military government in the face of rising public hostility and Britain, as usual, on cutting costs and, at that time, biffing the unions. Consequently both sides seriously underestimated the importance of the Falkland Islands to the other. Whatever the reasons. this ‘mere continuation of policy’ cost the UK 255 good men, six ships (10 others were very badly damaged), thirty-four aircraft, and more than 1.6 billion pounds. Old Carl Phillip didn’t say too much about chance in his book, but it is not too difficult to envisage that the war could have ended in an Argentine victory. What if, for example, one of the Exocets had hit one of our two aircraft carriers, or what if the frequent unexploded bombs had actually detonated when they hit some of our ships (staggeringly, even with useless bombs, 75% of the British task force was damaged or sunk)? What if Argentina had decided to attack the British artillery, using the three paratroop regiments already deployed at Comodoro Rivadavia? What if the Argentines had made better preparations to hold the islands? But then, who would expect that the British to attempt to carry out a war 7500 miles from home? But, as it turned out, chance was with the British and on June 14 1982 the commander of the Argentine garrison in Port Stanley, Mario Menendez, surrendered to Major General JJ Moore of the Royal Marines.

Alfred the Great 9 June

The 9 June 878 is a day that changed forever the balance of power in England in favour of the Saxon king Alfred the Great. Before you all chime in with a hearty "so what" you will, of course recall that our Royal Navy hold Alfred the Great to be the founder of the naval tradition. Alfred, as everyone knows, had fought a long war with the Vikings, who had settled into eastern England and were moving ever westward into the remaining Saxon territories - most notably Wessex (which is a concatenation of West Saxon). Guthrum, alias Gorm den Gamle was King of the Danish Vikings in East Anglia and Yorkshire and, by 878, he stood on the brink of a final conquest of Wessex but was decisively defeated by Alfred, (who had, you will recall, spent the winter lurking in a swamp and strolling around the place setting fire to old widow’s cakes), at the Battle of Edington, in Wiltshire. Good show Alfred. The really clever bit however was that Alfred, instead of putting all to the sword, as was the custom, persuaded Guthrum, and twenty-nine of his chief men to submit to Christian baptism and on 9 June 878 Alfred became Gorm den Gamle’s godfather. As a result, England became split into two, the south-western half kept by the Saxons and the north-eastern half becoming known as the Danelaw. This is known as the peace of Wedmore. This peace allowed Alfred to turn his attention develop the royal navy to repress the ravages of the Northumbrian and East Anglian Danes on the coasts of Wessex and to prevent the landing of fresh hordes. This move more or less maintained the status quo until 1066. Alfred the Great - rotten at cookery but a good egg

First Viking Raids 8 June

June 8 is a great day in the sagas of Vikings. For a start, on this day in 793 the first recorded Viking raid on Britain took place at Lindisfarne. This event was, by the account in the Anglo Saxon Chronicle, a bit upsetting: "…dreadful fore-warnings over the land of the Northumbrians, terrifying the people most woefully: these were immense sheets of light rushing through the air, and whirlwinds, and fiery, dragons flying across the firmament. These tremendous tokens were soon followed by a great famine: and not long after the harrowing inroads of heathen men made lamentable havoc in the church of God in Holy-island, by rapine and slaughter." - altogether a pretty duff year! There followed a succession of raids by Norse pirates which eventually led to the establishment of a Danish kingdom in England (the Danegeld). This was still going strong in 1042 when, on June 8 Hardeknut, (Canute the Hardy) who was a Dane died and passed the reign of England, for a while, back to a Saxon king, Edward the Confessor. Edward the Confessor was only a half brother to Hardeknut and the Norman Kings descended from Hrolf Ganger - Rollo of Normandy - had a claim to the throne also and, after some other skulduggery, this was taken up in 1066 when William the Conqueror (as the English know him) or William the Bastard (as the Vikings know him) decided to take what was his from Harold and invaded England at Hastings and accepting the surrender of the Saxon nobles at Berkhamsted. Our Glorious Queen is a direct descendant of William the Bastard, although it is doubtful if She ever wears a helm with horns, sails long ships into other peoples creeks or drinks ale from the skulls of her vanquished foe