In 1938, Britain prepared for war, and to spread the word about what should be done in the event of attack, and to distribute the gas masks that would become universal, a body of men and women were called to public service - the Air Raid Precautions, or 'ARP'. Armed initially with only a badge of appointment, they became the object of public scorn. From the declaration through to early 1940, the volunteer services honed their skills in the face of public criticism. The ARP services - now a well-oiled machine with, among other specialists, wardens, rescue workers, first aiders and...

May 1941: over 43,000 civilians had been killed, and over a million houses destroyed following endless nights of bombing raids. Yet London and other cities that had been targeted survived, their spirit undaunted, their people resilient.

Revisionist historians have sought to dampen the notion of the 'Blitz spirit', but the writings and surviving records all point to a resilience that would remain unbroken, despite the death toll rising to almost 52,000 from bombing alone. Illustrated with archive photographs and other materials, and illuminated by first-hand recollections of the...

Overshadowed in the public eye by the events of the Second World War - and of the impacts of recent wars at the transition of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries - the period of National Service is sometimes portrayed as a long-running and monumental waste of time, a period of 'bull' and 'blanco' of 'jankers' and 'whitewashing'. Yet, emerging from the harsh reality of a truly world war and into the new dawn of the Cold War, it was clear that Britain would have to face new threats from old allies, and to meet considerable overseas obligations from its vestiges of Empire. The...