The History Network

By The History Network

Society & Culture History

What's The History Network about?

A fortnightly military history podcast looking at all aspect of war throughout the ages.

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The History Network episodes:

04.14.2024
3506 One Against Seven: Eddie Rickenbacker Proves Himself (Again)
By the time of America's entry into WWI in April 1917, Eddie Rickenbacker was already famous. Always obsessed with engines, he had become a mechanic to Lee Frayer in the 1906 Vanderbilt Cup at the age of only 15. In...
03.31.2024
3505 A Ruse Gone Wrong: The Battle of the Milvian Bridge
In late October AD 312, the fate of the future of the Roman world was decided near the Pons Milvius, the Milvian Bridge (the modern Ponte Milvio, Italy), crossing the River Tiber some 5 kilometres north of Rome on the...
03.17.2024
3504 Multiple firsts at the First Battle of Ypres, 1914
The First Battle of Ypres came at the end of the strategic 'race to the sea' which occurred following the First Battle of the Marne in September 1914, when allied forces halted the initial Axis advance made since the outbreak...
03.03.2024
3503 The Luck of Li Guang: A Cavalryman’s Charge Through the Han-Xiongnu War
This episode was written by Scott Forbes Crawford. An author based in Asia, he writes about ancient and medieval history in novels and nonfiction alike. A newly published history book, The Han-Xiongnu War, 133 BC – 89 AD, explores a...
02.04.2024
3502 William Johnstone - Part 2
During the Baltic campaign of the Crimean War, in August 1854, Lieutenant John Bythesea together with Stoker William Johnstone of Her Majesty's ship HMS Arrogant performed an audacious act of bravery. This would lead to both men being awarded the...
01.21.2024
3501 William Johnstone - Part 1
During the Baltic campaign of the Crimean War, in August 1854, Lieutenant John Bythesea together with Stoker William Johnstone of Her Majesty's ship HMS Arrogant performed an audacious act of bravery. This would lead to both men being awarded the...
12.17.2023
3410 Eyewitness to war: Ammianus Marcellinus and the Siege of Amida AD 359 - Part 2
The legions of Magnentius and Decentius in Amida had been raised by the former usurper Magnentius (a general who usurped against Constantius in Gaul between 350 and 353) in his name and that of his brother. They were therefore a...
12.03.2023
3409 Eyewitness to war: Ammianus Marcellinus and the Siege of Amida AD 359 - Part 1
In the summer of AD 359, the armies of the Sasanian Persian Shahanshah ("King of Kings"), Shapur II (r. 309-379), invaded the Roman east. This invasion was the long-cherished revenge for a humiliating peace imposed on the Persians by the...
11.19.2023
3408 What’s in a name? The Battle of Megiddo from Thutmose III to World War One - Part 2
Our best source for Thutmose's battle of Megiddo are the Annals of Thutmose, an account kept by his scribe Tjaneni and then, almost twenty years later, inscribed into the interior walls of the sanctuary of the temple to Amun-Re at...
10.15.2023
3407 What’s in a name? The Battle of Megiddo from Thutmose III to World War One - Part 1
The Battle of Megiddo, fought during the latter stages of the First World War over a week in late September 1918 against the Ottoman Turks, was so-named quite deliberately by the victorious British general, Edmund Allenby. Allenby was entirely conscious...
10.01.2023
3406 Tackling the Takao – bravery beneath the waves of Singapore harbour
On July 31st, 1945, the Japanese cruiser Takao sat at anchor in Singapore dockyard. Little did her crew know that beneath the surface of the water, Royal Navy divers prepared to place magnetic mines which would take her out of...
09.17.2023
3405 Iron Valour
Only one man has ever been awarded both the Victoria Cross and the Iron Cross - Surgeon General William Manley. In 1864 he was awarded a VC for his actions during the siege of Gate Pa during the New Zealand...
09.03.2023
3404 Bushmen against the Boers – Australians in the Boer War
When the Second Boer War was declared on October 11th, 1899, governments of colonies from around the British Empire offered to send troops to contribute to the British war effort. This included the governments of the six colonies of Australia...
08.06.2023
3403 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 3
Benedict Arnold chose treason. In a shocking turn of events, one of the most talented American generals had turned traitor. The news sent shockwaves throughout the rebellious states. Arnold became the most wanted man in America as General George Washington...
07.23.2023
3402 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 2
Benedict Arnold spent years becoming a respectable merchant in Connecticut and the coming of the American War of Independence presented him with an opportunity to increase his standing even further. His bravery in battle was unquestioned, but his desire for...
07.09.2023
3401 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 1
Benedict Arnold, a name in the American lexicon that is synonymous with treason. History remembers Arnold solely for his attempted betrayal and his subsequent return to the American War of Independence as a British general, this was only the sudden...
05.21.2023
3310 King of the Few - Adolph 'Sailor' Malan
On a clear day in 1960, a conversation took place between the pilot of a South African Airways passenger aircraft and Heathrow Airport's ground control. The pilot had a special request. He wanted to do a low-level circuit in London....
04.30.2023
3309 - Bloodshed on the Blackwater - the Battle of Maldon
The entry for the year AD 991 in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that Olaf Tryggvason (later king of Norway) sailed with a fleet of ninety-three ships and raided the English coast. He began in Kent raiding Folkestone and then Sandwich,...
04.09.2023
3308 Fix Bayonets! An heroic old-fashioned charge in the Korean War
1951 had begun disastrously for the United Nations forces in Korea. On December 31st, 1950, the Chinese 13th Army breached UN defences below the 38th parallel as part of the Third Phase Campaign and, on January 3rd, Seoul was evacuated...
03.26.2023
3307 The Aitape-Wewak Campaign
On their seemingly inexorable advance south in 1942, the Japanese had occupied Aitape in northern New Guinea on their advance south. Allied offensives to halt the Japanese advance began in 1943 and in April 1944 units of the United States...
03.12.2023
3306 Heroism in the Hundred Days Offensive
On 27 September 1918, Captain Frisby and Lance Corporal Jackson led the assault against enemy machine-gun positions during the battle of the Canal du Nord, Nord-pas-de-Calais region of Northern France. Following the successes of the German Spring Offensive in March...
02.19.2023
3305 The Battle of Montgisard
The battle of Montgisard (fought near Ramla in central Israel) saw the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem unexpectedly defeat the forces of Saladin. The Latins were vastly outnumbered and fought thinking that they faced certain defeat. Their victory put an end...
02.05.2023
3304 Epaminondas of Thebes - Part 2
Epaminondas' victory at Leuctra created the Theban Hegemony, a brief period where Thebes dominated Greek politics. There has always been criticism that when Thebes defeated Sparta at the battle of Leuctra they had no real plan to replace the Spartan...
01.22.2023
3303 Epaminondas of Thebes - Part 1
Epaminondas of Thebes is one of the greatest and most revolutionary commanders in military history, destroying the might of Sparta in a single day at the Battle of Leuctra in 371 BC. At that battle, Epaminondas led the outnumbered Theban...
01.08.2023
3302 The Battle of Alcazar
By mid-afternoon on the 4th of August 1578, three monarchs lay dead on the battlefield of Alcazar in Morocco: two Sultans and King Sebastian I of Portugal. The consequences of their deaths would resonate for decades throughout Europe and North...
12.04.2022
3301 Charles Upham VC
Just before his 31st birthday in September 1939, Charles Upham volunteered as a private in the Second New Zealand Expeditionary Force (2NZEF). He had been in the Territorials but refused to join at any higher rank. He was soon singled...
07.31.2022
3210 The White Death: Finnish marksman Simo Häyhä
Simo Häyhä tormented Soviet forces invading his native Finland between December 1939 and March 1940, killing 542 enemy soldiers in only 98 days. In the hostile, minus forty degree conditions of the Finnish winter of 1939-40, a man clad all...
07.17.2022
3209 The Castilian Civil War 1350-1369
A bitter war between legitimate and illegitimate heirs was fought for the throne of fourteenth century Castile. The ensuing conflict pulled in many powers, large and small, including both the kingdoms of England and France. Dur: 17mins File: .mp3
07.03.2022
3208 The Battle of Issus
At the battle of Issus, fought in early November 333 BC, Alexander faced the Persian King Darius in person for the first time. Massively outnumbered, the Macedonian army faced the numberless might of the Persian military machine. The outcome would...
06.19.2022
3207 The Northwest Indian War - Part 2
The Legion of the United States was America's first attempt to establish a permanent military capable of defending its new borders, from hostile Native Americans, as a reaction to the defeats of the hastily raised regular and militia units during...
06.05.2022
3206 The Northwest Indian War - Part 1
In late 1791, during the Battle of the Wabash, also known as St. Clair's Defeat, saw the largest defeat of the American military at the hands of the Native Americans. Out of a force of about 1,000 men, the American...
05.15.2022
3205 Saladin
On 4 July 1187, the Sultan of Egypt and Syria, An-Nasir Yusuf Salah ad-Din ibn Ayyub - better known to us as Saladin - won a tremendous victory, one of the most famous of the Middle Ages. Beneath the Horns...
05.01.2022
3204 Ross Lewis Mangles and William Fraser McDonell at the Siege of Arrah
We saw in Season 31 Episode 4 and Season 30 Episode 7 that due to the remarkable actions of several civilians who took up arms under military orders during the Indian Mutiny in 1857 and 1858 that the newly instituted...
04.10.2022
3203 The Battle of Poitiers
On the death of King Charles IV of France in 1328, Edward III of England was his closest male heir and therefore the legitimate successor to the throne of the childless Charles. This was due to the ancient Salian (or...
03.20.2022
3202 The Gothic Genius of Fritigern - Part 2
In the year AD 378, the Eastern Roman Emperor Valens left Antioch to return via Constantinople to deal with the Gothic threat which had been ravaging Thrace and the surrounding provinces since 376. He also sought help from his nephew...
03.06.2022
3201 The Gothic Genius of Fritigern - Part 1
The Gothic leader Fritigern (possibly based on the Gothic Frithugairns) is, perhaps, one of the most under-appreciated commanders in the ancient world. At the head of a complex confederation of Gothic tribes, he imposed a devastating defeat on the forces...
02.06.2022
3110 D-Day: The American Airborne Landings
The Allied landings at Normandy on June 6, 1944 were the largest amphibious operation ever undertaken in military history. Across five separate beaches, over 150,000 men made up the landing forces from the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada. To...
01.16.2022
3109 Lord Dunmore's War
At the end of the Seven Years War, the Proclamation of 1763 was issued by the British, which granted any lands west of the Appalachian Mountains in the Ohio Valley of North America to the Native Americans. American colonists could...
01.02.2022
3108 The Armenian Massacre - Part 2
In his 1944 book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, Raphael Lemkin says that "genocide is composite and manifold, and that it signifies a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of the essential foundations of life of a...
12.19.2021
3107 The Armenian Massacre - Part1
Agitation from the Armenian community for political reform and autonomy, brewing since the 1870s, was further intensified by large-scale massacres that occurred across the empire in 1894–1897 and in Cilicia in 1909; additionally, the more seemingly benign expressions of oppression...
12.05.2021
3106 The Battle of Königgrätz 1866
The battle of Königgrätz (also known as the battle of Sadowa or the battle of Chlum) was the most decisive clash between the armies of Prussia and those of Austria and her allies during the short, seven-week long, Austro-Prussian War...
11.14.2021
3105 War in the Philippines
At the end of the 19th century tensions had been high between the United States and Spain - the point of friction being Spanish colonial rule specifically in Cuba. When the USS Maine mysteriously exploded in Havana harbour, it pushed...
10.24.2021
3104 Thomas Henry Kavanagh – The 'First' Civilian Victoria Cross
When the Indian Mutiny broke out in May 1857, members of the Honourable East India Company became involved. Soon, several outstandingly brave deeds by them and other volunteer civilians were reported back in England but there was no official way...
10.10.2021
3103 Interwar Naval Treaties and Battleship Development
At the end of the First World War France and Italy had wanted the German High Seas Fleet divided between them, Britain and the USA wanted it scuttled, which Germany did anyway without permission. The resulting Treaty of Versailles imposed...
09.26.2021
3102 The Battle of Marathon - Part 2
The Athenian army moved into position for the coming struggle. The right wing was commanded by Callimachus – for it was the regular practice at that time in Athens that the polemarch should lead the right wing; then followed the...
09.12.2021
3101 The Battle of Marathon - Part 1
On September 10th 490 BC, hoplites from the Greek city of Athens faced an invasion force sent from the enormous and powerful Persian Empire to the east on the field at Marathon, a bay 26.2 miles (42.195 kilometres) northeast of...
07.04.2021
3010 Artemisia of Halicarnassus
In his account of Xerxes' invasion of Greece, the historian Herodotus goes out of his way to give an account of Artemisia, female tyrant of Halicarnassus, before, during and in the aftermath of the battle Salamis in 480 BC. This...
06.20.2021
3009 The Battle of Landguard Fort
England and the Netherlands were natural allies when they both became Protestant, which finally happened in England in 1558 when Elizabeth I was crowned queen. In 1585 the queen sent Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester with 5,000 to 6,000 troops...
06.06.2021
3008 The Rise of Naval Aviation and the Aircraft Carrier
For centuries naval warfare consisted of vessels in relative close proximity to one, another fighting it out. This combat might take the form of ships in the ancient world ramming, or with the development of gunpowder vessels would launch broadsides...
05.21.2021
3007 Days of Valour Part2
The Residency complex at Lucknow was under siege. It had been since late June 1857. It was now October. A small relief force had broken through from Cawnpore but it was then too weak to enable the combined garrison to...

What's The History Network about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

The History Network episodes:

3506 One Against Seven: Eddie Rickenbacker Proves Himself (Again)

3505 A Ruse Gone Wrong: The Battle of the Milvian Bridge

3504 Multiple firsts at the First Battle of Ypres, 1914

3503 The Luck of Li Guang: A Cavalryman’s Charge Through the Han-Xiongnu War

3502 William Johnstone - Part 2

3501 William Johnstone - Part 1

3410 Eyewitness to war: Ammianus Marcellinus and the Siege of Amida AD 359 - Part 2

3409 Eyewitness to war: Ammianus Marcellinus and the Siege of Amida AD 359 - Part 1

3408 What’s in a name? The Battle of Megiddo from Thutmose III to World War One - Part 2

3407 What’s in a name? The Battle of Megiddo from Thutmose III to World War One - Part 1

3406 Tackling the Takao – bravery beneath the waves of Singapore harbour

3405 Iron Valour

3404 Bushmen against the Boers – Australians in the Boer War

3403 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 3

3402 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 2

3401 The Treason of Benedict Arnold - Part 1

3310 King of the Few - Adolph 'Sailor' Malan

3309 - Bloodshed on the Blackwater - the Battle of Maldon

3308 Fix Bayonets! An heroic old-fashioned charge in the Korean War

3307 The Aitape-Wewak Campaign

3306 Heroism in the Hundred Days Offensive

3305 The Battle of Montgisard

3304 Epaminondas of Thebes - Part 2

3303 Epaminondas of Thebes - Part 1

3302 The Battle of Alcazar

3301 Charles Upham VC

3210 The White Death: Finnish marksman Simo Häyhä

3209 The Castilian Civil War 1350-1369

3208 The Battle of Issus

3207 The Northwest Indian War - Part 2

3206 The Northwest Indian War - Part 1

3205 Saladin

3204 Ross Lewis Mangles and William Fraser McDonell at the Siege of Arrah

3203 The Battle of Poitiers

3202 The Gothic Genius of Fritigern - Part 2

3201 The Gothic Genius of Fritigern - Part 1

3110 D-Day: The American Airborne Landings

3109 Lord Dunmore's War

3108 The Armenian Massacre - Part 2

3107 The Armenian Massacre - Part1

3106 The Battle of Königgrätz 1866

3105 War in the Philippines

3104 Thomas Henry Kavanagh – The 'First' Civilian Victoria Cross

3103 Interwar Naval Treaties and Battleship Development

3102 The Battle of Marathon - Part 2

3101 The Battle of Marathon - Part 1

3010 Artemisia of Halicarnassus

3009 The Battle of Landguard Fort

3008 The Rise of Naval Aviation and the Aircraft Carrier

3007 Days of Valour Part2