Situated within the South Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Dartmouth is a popular tourist destination on the River Dart. As Ginny Campbell's beautifully illustrated pages show, it has an abundance of history. Its port was the sailing point for the Crusades of 1147 and 1190, and the Pilgrim Fathers visited in 1620 to repair the Speedwell. The area boasts many picturesque medieval and Elizabethan buildings, including the Butterwalk, where Charles II once dined, and Dartmouth Castle, which has guarded the mouth of the river for over 600 years. The admiralty began officer training on the...

Inverness, known as the capital of the Highlands, was designated a Millennium city in 2000. This Royal and Ancient Burgh is recorded going back thousands of years, but it doesn't look like an old town because it was sacked and burned so many times that little remains of its long history. There are exceptions, including a house which dates from 1592 and Dunbar's Hospital of 1688. Also nearby is the site of the Battle of Culloden, the last battle fought on British soil. Situated at the head of the Moray Firth and the mouth of the Great Glen, Inverness is a terminus and starting point for travel...

Herne Bay rose to prominence in the 1830s when a group of London investors recognised its potential and built a pleasure pier and promenade here, making it one of the UK's earliest seaside resorts. Its popularity increased when the railway reached this part of Kent and continued to do so throughout the Victorian era. However, like many other seaside resorts, its popularity as a holiday destination steadily declined after the Second World War when there was an increasing preference for overseas travel. Following extensive seafront regeneration in the 1990s, a jetty was built to create a small...

Richmond upon Thames was the first borough to be known as the 'Queen of the Suburbs', before Ealing or Surbiton were known by this sobriquet. With around 100 parks and green spaces, including Kew Gardens and Richmond Park, as well as fine examples of Tudor, Regency, Georgian and Victorian architecture, Richmond remains a desirable place to live, with a long and interesting history. In Richmond upon Thames Through Time, author Paul Howard Lang hopes to show how Richmond, to a great extent, has retained the 'Queen of the Suburbs' title. Telling the story of Richmond and its environs through a...

In ancient times Clapham was a secluded Surrey village, clustered round a manor house and church. By the seventeenth century, the wealthy of London were building houses here as rural retreats and, by 1800, their mansions in extensive grounds surrounded Clapham Common, which was becoming a place of recreation. The development of the railways in the nineteenth century meant that families who could afford large houses moved further out to the countryside, selling off their ground to developers who built the terraced houses which cover the area today. Around forty years ago, after a period of...

With a proud history of industry and creativity, Manchester is one of the world's greatest cities. In 2015 it was designated 'The Northern Powerhouse' but, of course, being the home of the Industrial Revolution, it always was. Manchester gave the world technological innovation as well as manufacturing strength. By the second half of the nineteenth century Manchester was home to more than 100 mills and well over 1,000 warehouses. It was in Manchester that Whitworth devised a standard for screw threads in 1841. Here John Dalton developed modern atomic theory, Rutherford split the atom and Alan...

The Somerset & Dorset Railway, known as the S&D (said to also stand for 'Slow and Dirty' or 'Serene and Delightful'), ran from Bath across the Mendip hills to Bournemouth on the south coast. Never a high-speed line, the main traffic for the Somerset & Dorset during the winter months was freight and local passenger traffic. In the summer, however, there was heavy traffic as Saturday holiday services from the northern industrial towns passed along the line. In 1962, John Betjeman travelled along the Somerset & Dorset from Evercreech Junction to Highbridge and Burnham-on-Sea, making a BBC...

Neuk is the Scots word for nook or corner, and the delightful East Neuk, with its string of picturesque fishing and farming villages, is one of the most attractive parts of the country to investigate. Few regions present a greater number of attractions than the East Neuk with its sandy beaches, wild and precipitous cliffs, remarkable caves, celebrated golf links, notable churches, historic castles and historical associations. These villages, running from from Crail to Largo, are quite distinct from those of any other part of Scotland and have stood almost unchanged for centuries and thus...

Barrow-in-Furness is a small post-industrial town at the end of a long peninsula in the north of England. Its isolated location has produced a stalwart and close population. It started life as a small hamlet and grew to become an industrial leader, first in iron and steel and later in ship-building and engineering, drawing a workforce from all over the country. The ship-building industry continues to be a major employer but today there is less diversity than in Barrow's heyday. Although the town is known for its industry, it sits in one of the most beautiful areas of Cumbria. It boasts a rich...

Having been granted city status during the Golden Jubilee celebrations in 2002, Stirling is Scotland's smallest city. Despite this, it has an enthralling wealth of architectural and historic heritage that would be the envy of much larger places in the country. Stirling's origins can be dated to the thirteenth century, when it was granted a royal charter and became a significant medieval settlement. Its strategic importance as the 'Gateway to the Highlands' also made it the much fought-over 'Cockpit of Scotland', making it witness to many of the most significant battles in Scottish history....