On 11 April 1809 Thomas Cochrane, RN, made one of the most famous assaults in British naval history. At the Battle of Basque Roads – at which he destroyed much of the French Atlantic Fleet – he detonated an explosion vessel so powerful that it is still being spoken about today.

This is a special and different episode of Travels Through Time. In it Peter Moore narrates the opening to his new book, A Dangerous Game: Thomas Cochrane's Life on the Edge. This illustrated excerpt features on the audiobook from Penguin, which is narrated by Ric Jerrom.

Find out more and download A Dangerous Game on Audible.

And read more about Thomas Cochrane on Unseen Histories.

Scene: 11 April 1809, Basque Roads Anchorage, France.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Egmont by Ludwig van Beethoven.

This week the critic, writer and guide Caroline Hopkinson-Woolley takes us back to 1926 to consider a mysterious event. This was the perplexing disappearance of the best-selling author Agatha Christie.

Christie's disappearance happened at a moment of great tension both in her own life and in British history. That May the General Strike had upended society in a way that was both unprecedented and terrifying for the establishment. Christie, meanwhile, was simultaneously experiencing commercial success and private turmoil as her mother died and her marriage faltered.

All these forces can be glimpsed in the strange disappearance of Christie shortly before Christmas that year. It is an event that has long puzzled historians and here Hopkinson-Woolley weighs the evidence.

Enjoyed this? Find out more about Hopkinson-Woolley's tour of 'Literary Oxford: The Worlds of Tolkien & Lewis', departing next June.

Scene One: May 1926. The General Strike 

Scene Two: June 1926. Publication of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.

Scene Three: December 1926. Agatha Christie's disappearance.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Caroline Hopkinson-Woolley

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

This week the award winning biographer Andrea Wulf takes us aboard Captain Cook's HMS Resolution to meet one of the most compelling of the ship's company: George Forster.

When he embarked with Cook Forster was still a teenager. But fiercely clever, kind and sensitive, he would go on to distinguish himself as one of the most intriguing figures of the high Enlightenment. In this episode Wulf explains how 1772 was the year in which his life transformed.

George Forster is the subject of Andrea Wulf's newly released biography. The Traveller: The Revolutionary Life of George Forster and His Search For Humanity.

Scene One: January 1772, 2 Somerset Stable Yard, Strand, London. George Forster in London, publication of his translation of Bougainville’s Voyage round the World. 

Scene Two: 11 July 1772, Plymouth harbour, George Forster’s first night on Resolution.

Scene Three: 10 December 1772, Latitude: 51° 37’ S, Longitude: 25°28’E. 

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Andrea Wulf

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In this episode we explore one of the most infamous episodes in the history of art. Writer and guide Marie-Anne Mancio takes us back to the year when the Italian painter Caravaggio killed the pimp Ranuccio Tomassoni in a sword fight or organised duel on a tennis court in Rome.

Caravaggio was a sublime artist. He was celebrated in his lifetime for his masterful use of light, the powerful narrative force of his paintings and his tender depictions of the human form. But as a person he was erratic. After his spectacular rise to fame around the year 1600 he was frequently in trouble with the authorities in Rome, as well as with his landlady.

Marie-Anne Mancio has written extensively about Caravaggio and she leads tours to locations associated with him and his art. In this episode she ponders what really happened in that fateful, mysterious year 1606. It was a year that started auspiciously but ended with him as a fugitive. 

Find out more about Marie-Anne's upcoming tour, 'Caravaggio in Italy', here.

Scene One: Rome, 28 May 1606. Caravaggio kills pimp Ranuccio Tomassoni in a sword fight/organised duel on a tennis court.

Scene Two: Easter 1606. Caravaggio completes his painting, Madonna and St Anne.

Scene Three: Caravaggio is a fugitive in the Alban hills. While there, he likely paints the 2nd version of The Supper at Emmaus.

Memento: 

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Marie-Anne Mancio

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In the dramatic story of the fall of the Roman Republic, the Battle of Actium is a moment of the utmost significance. A naval action, fought off the western coast of Greece, today's guest, Ellen Jones, explains how Octavian defeated his rival Mark Antony in sensational style.

The tangled story of these two political rivals was complicated by the additional presence of Cleopatra, Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt. In 31 BCS she was the consort of Mark Antony and her dramatic retreat mid-battle remains one of the enigmatic moments in the history of the times.

Ellen Jones is an Egyptologist, a classics teacher and a tour guide for ACE Cultural Tours. You can read more about her upcoming tour, 'Ancient Treasures of Cairo', here.

Scene One: 32 BCE when Octavian reads Marc Antony’s will in front of the Senate.

Scene Two: 2nd September 31 BCE – the Battle of Actium.

Scene Three: 12th August 30 BCE – the aftermath of Cleopatra’s (and Antony’s) suicides.

Memento: Mark Antony's battle plans.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Ellen Jones

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In this episode we venture into the Scottish mountains with the author Ed Douglas. After seeing the Battle of Falkirk Muir, we follow Bonnie Prince Charlie on his flight towards Skye after Culloden. We end our travels with a view of Lord Lovat – the most infamous of the Jacobite rebels – before his execution in London.

Our guest, Ed Douglas, is an author and a climber who has spent much of his career writing about mountains. His last book, Himalaya: A Human History – was called ‘magnificent’ by the Telegraph – and was shortlisted for the Duff Cooper Prize.

In this episode Ed tells us about his new book. Upland: The Strange History and Vital Future of Britain’s Mountains is out this week and it covers the deep and cultural history of Britain's mountains from Ice Ages to the Romantics and on into the future.

Find out more about Upland here.

Scene One: 17 January 1746. Duncan Ban MacIntyre and the Battle of Falkirk Muir.

Scene Two: Summer 1746. Bonnie Prince Charlie's escape after Culloden.

Scene Three: Later in 1746. William Hogarth draws Lord Lovat before his execution.

Memento: An OS Map.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Ed Douglas

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

May 1940 is one of the critical months in British history. As the Nazis tore across Europe and Winston Churchill became Prime Minister, our guest Sinclair McKay explains that this was also the month in which the Home Guard was founded.

Originally known as the Local Defence Volunteers (LDV) and affectionately recalled in the BBC sitcom as 'Dad's Army', the Home Guard was a colourful military force that was compounded by individuals from the local community.

In this episode McKay takes us back to the first year of this colourful organisation's existence. He describes how Churchill was involved in the development of the Home Guard's identity and how an inspiring woman, Edith Summerskill, sought to shape it.

Find out more about Sinclair McKay's Dad's Army: The Glorious True Story of the Home Guard. 

Scene One: May 1940 – Anthony Eden’s radio announcement calling for Local Defence Volunteers, as across the Channel, France falls.

Scene Two: July 1940 Churchill renames it the Home Guard as – on the south downs – JB Priestley espies the true poetry of the moment.

Scene Three: November 1940 Dr Edith Summerskill (MP for Fulham) begins her long campaign to have women join the Home Guard.

Memento: A dummy grenade.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Sinclair McKay

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

On today's episode Don Hollway takes us back to see 'the Viking's Viking', King Olaf I, in the year when his dramatic story reached its mysterious climax.

Olaf is a heavyweight figure in Norse history. Rising out of obscurity, he travelled widely before experiencing a profound Christian rebirth on the Isles of Scilly. From thereon one of his central motives in life was the conversion of the Norse people to the Christian faith.

There were many battles, of course, along the way. In this episode Hollway looks at the fateful one that took place late in the year 1000. It was at the Battle of Svolder that Olaf vanished, presumed dead. 

Find out more about Don Hollway's Hammer of the Gods: King Olaf's Viking Conquest. Read his article about Olaf at Unseen Histories.

Scene One: Early 1000. Olaf marries his third wife.

Scene Two: 1000. The building of Olaf's great dragon ship, the Long Serpent.

Scene Three: 1000. The Battle of Svolder.

Memento: The Long Serpent.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Don Hollway

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

Ranking only behind Churchill in the pantheon of Britain's WW2 heroes is Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery or 'Monty'. In this episode the biographer Gary Mead takes us back to 1914 to catch a glimpse of Monty as a young soldier at the start of his first war.

Montgomery, Mead explains, was a complicated character. While admired by his men and celebrated for his great victory at El Alamein in 1942, he was nonetheless loathed by many of those who worked with him. In later years he went to great efforts to distort his personal story, often restorting to brazen falsehoods. Why he did this, Mead elaborates, remains a mystery.

One constant throughout his life was Monty's love of a battle. After a childhood spent in British public schools and distant parts of the Empire, in 1914 his chance for some fighting arrived. Like many in that fateful summer of 1914, he dashed across the Channel to confront the Germans.

Find out more about Gary Mead's Montgomery: Unbeatable, Unbearable.

Scene One: August 1914. Great Scotland Yard Recruiting Office, London.

Scene Two: 23 August 1914. The Battle of Mons.

Scene Three: Christmas Day 1914. The Truce at Neuve Chapelle.

Memento: A brass button from a German uniform.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Gary Mead

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.

In this episode we head back to the Anglo Saxon Age with Edoardo Albert to meet the 'Father of English History' – the Venerable Bede.

Bede is a beguiling character. He lived just a few generations after the arrival of Christianity in Britain in remote Northumbria, a place that Pope Gregory regarded as being on the very edge of the known world.

But from these outer limits, Bede redefined the world in which he lived. 'It has ever been my delight', he wrote, 'to learn and teach and write'. Throughout his life he produced a steady stream of books on subjects from history to natural philosophy.

Edoardo Albert takes us back to see Bede at the peak of his powers, in the monastery at Jarrow in the year 716. This, as Albert explains, was a pivotal year for Bede as the quiet world in which he lived was disturbed by the departure of a beloved elder.

Find out more about Edoardo Albert's Bede: The Man Who Invented England.

Scene One: 4 June 716. A walk around St Paul's Monastery at Jarrow.

Scene Two: 4 June 716. Abbot Ceolfrith, Bede's friend and mentor, sets off for Rome.

Scene Three: 4 June 716. Bede at work in his cell.

Memento: A copy of the Rule of the monastery at St Paul along with a recording of the monks singing.

Presenter: Peter Moore 

Guest: Edoardo Albert

Producer: Maria Nolan

Theme music: Firelight by Minka

Partner: ACE Cultural Tours.