The charge of the light, battle illustration

Military history

The Second Barons’ War: everything you wanted to know. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

A portrait of the Duke of Wellington at the battle of Waterloo (18 June 1815) during the Napoleonic Wars. Although Waterloo was "undeniably the most pivotal battle of this campaign", it was not the final battle against France, says Jem Duducu. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

7 things you (probably) didn’t know about the Napoleonic Wars

The taking of Jerusalem by the Crusader

The First Crusade: your ultimate guide

A fifteenth century manuscript illustration showing the Knights Templar being burned in the presence of King Philip IV of France.

Templars on trial: why were the Knights accused of such heinous crimes?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Robert the Bruce addresses his troops ahead of Bannockburn in a 20th-century engraving.

Why is the battle of Bannockburn remembered as Scotland’s greatest victory?

Second World War

Overwhelming odds and inevitable invasions: 3 myths surrounding the Battle of Britain

A relief on Trajan's Column shows Roman troops crossing the Danube during the war against the Dacians. Victory was the framework upon which Pax Romana was built (Photo by akg-images/Erich Lessing)

The Pax Romana: how the Romans maintained peace at the point of a sword. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Men of the 23rd US Infantry in France, 1918. The Western Front w ould not have even come into existence had the Schlieffen Plan been executed successfully. (Photo by: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

What if…The Schlieffen plan had been successful?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

What should we make of Ridley Scott’s Napoleon?

A c1943 photograph of USS Indianapolis. Built in New Jersey, the Portland-class heavy cruiser was launched in 1931 (Photo by US Navy/Interim Archives/Getty Images)

Into the jaws of hell: the WW2 sinking of USS Indianapolis

A view of the devastation caused by the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima in Japan on 6 August 1945, a bombed-out building in the foreground

Second World War

What happened to Hiroshima after it was bombed in 1945? How many people died?

J Robert Oppenheimer (left), and Cillian Murphy

Oppenheimer: the real history of the ‘father of the atomic bomb’

Oppenheimer: “destroyer of worlds”. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The city of Hiroshima, Japan, a few days after the first atom bomb is dropped in August 1945. This clearly demonstrated the apocalyptic potential of the new weapon (Photo by Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)

Second World War

The Manhattan Project: your guide to the building of the first atomic bomb

Napoleon Bonaparte depicted as emperor of France in c1804. By now he had his sights set on establishing a dynasty (Photo by Ann Ronan Pictures/Print Collector/Getty Images)

How Napoleon (almost) destroyed the French Revolution. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Queen Margaret of Anjou, seated besides King Henry VI of England, is presented a book in a contemporary illumination (Photo by Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty)

Margaret of Anjou: the 'she-wolf' queen who wouldn’t go quietly. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

The Franco-Prussian war: everything you wanted to know. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Illustration of Spartacus, the escaped gladiator who became a leader in the Third Servile War, and his comrades using vines to abseil down the slopes of Mount Vesuvius in preparation of a surprise attack.

The Servile Wars: Spartacus & the rebellions that threatened the Roman Republic

Japanese soldiers and sailors disembark at Vladivostok, 22 August 1918. Of all the foreign interventions into the Russian civil war, the one from Japan was by far the largest, growing to 70,000 troops. (Photo by Culture Club/Getty Images)

Britain’s Russian fiasco: Allied intervention in the Russian civil war. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Mathematician and Bletchley Park codebreaker Alan Turing played a key role in deciphering the Enigma code (Photo by Science History Images / Alamy Stock Photo)

What if...The Enigma code had not been cracked by Alan Turing and Bletchley Park?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Picture depicting the Battle of Worcester

The battle of Worcester: Cromwell’s last battle. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Roundheads and Cavaliers: where did the Civil War nicknames come from?

Painting depicting the Battle of Naseby

The battle of Naseby: what happened?

A 19th-century painting of Queen Henrietta Maria fleeing England as the Civil Wars turn against Charles I (Photo by The Print Collector/Print Collector/Getty Images)

From the home front to the front line: what were the roles of women in the Civil War?

In a 19th-century painting by Charles Landseer, Oliver Cromwell reads Charles I’s explosive correspondence captured at Naseby. It revealed the king was conspiring to gain Catholic support for his cause (Photo by ART Collection/Alamy Stock Photo)

10 key battles of the Civil War

A painting of the battle of Naseby

The New Model Army: how Oliver Cromwell’s radical fighting force won the Civil War

Fight like a man? Masculinity in WW2. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

Members of the Sealed Knot stage a re-enactment of the battle of Nantwich, fought during the Civil Wars in 1644 (Photo by OLI SCARFF/AFP via Getty Images)

Crown v Parliament: your guide to the Civil War of the 17th century. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.

An illustration of James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, fleeing from battle after attempting to unseat his Catholic uncle, King James II and VII, from the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland (Photo by De Luan/Alamy Stock Photo)

The Monmouth Rebellion of 1685: your guide to the a duke's failed bid to overthrow his uncle, James II and VI

Allied troops hide from enemy shelling during the battle of Caen. The town was finally captured after several weeks of intensive fighting. The white markings on their shoulders were later added to the photograph by a censor to hide the name of the battalion. (Photo by Hulton-Deutsch/Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis via Getty Images)

The battle for Normandy: what happened after D-Day?. This is a premium piece of content available to subscribed users.