Chalke Talk

The podcast from the Chalke Valley History Festival
Released every Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings

Chalke Talks for CVHFYEAR: 2014


  • 26. D-DAY: BY THOSE WHO WERE THERE
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    In this moving event to mark the 70th Anniversary of D-Day, two veterans of that campaign talk about their experiences with Stuart Tootal, former commander of 3 Para in Afghanistan. Fred Glover (1926-2020) was the only British infantryman known to have fought with the French Resistance while David Render (1925-1917) served with the Sherwood Rangers […]

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  • 34. THE DREYFUS AFFAIR
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    In this talk, best-selling author Robert Harris turns to one of the key scandals in French history, the Dreyfus Affair. Discussing this infamous miscarriage of justice that rocked France in the years before the First World War, he brings new insights to this world of secret service dealings, cover-ups and betrayal…

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  • 35. TEN CITIES THAT MADE AN EMPIRE
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    Historian, broadcaster and former Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt takes a new approach towards the history and decline of the British Empire. By examining the stories and defining ideas of ten of the most important cities, he shows how they transformed the culture, economy and identity of the British Isles for good.

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  • 76. THE LONG SHADOW: THE GREAT WAR AND THE TWENTIETH CENTURY
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    Has history distilled the 1914-18 Great War to a national myth of personal tragedies? Critically acclaimed historian and broadcaster Professor David Reynolds seeks to redress the balance by exploring the true impact of that war on the twentieth century. He shows how subsequent world-wide events shape and reshape our attitudes to a conflict Britain is […]

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  • 94. WHEN BRITAIN BURNED THE WHITE HOUSE: THE 1814 INVASION OF WASHINGTON
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    In August 1814, the United States’ army was defeated in battle by a British invading force just outside Washington DC. In his compelling style, broadcaster and journalist Peter Snow recounts this unparalleled moment in American history, its far-reaching consequences for both sides and Britain’s and America’s decision never again to fight each other. 

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  • 117. EMPRESS DOWAGER CIXI
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    Best-selling author of Wild Swans, Jung Chang gives a panoramic depiction of the birth of modern China and an intimate portrait of the most important woman in Chinese history. One of the Emperor’s concubines, she launched a palace coup to become the Empress Dowager Cixi, the absolute ruler of a third of the world’s population […]

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  • 134. CATASTROPHE: EUROPE GOES TO WAR, 1914
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    Journalist, editor and acclaimed author Sir Max Hastings tells the story of how Europe went to war in 1914 precipitating the first of the twentieth century’s great tragedies. He challenges the view of some modern historians that British participation was unnecessary and concludes with the Christmas truces when the struggle had lapsed into the stalemate […]

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  • 141. THE WIPERS TIMES
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    The Wipers Times was a newspaper for the troops that was written, edited and printed under extraordinary circumstances by a small group of British soldiers during the First World War. Wry, irreverent and topical, it was, in many ways, a precursor to Private Eye, of which Ian has been editor for many years. Here he discusses this brilliant […]

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  • 146. DISRAELI
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    Benjamin Disraeli was the most gifted parliamentarian of the nineteenth century. He twice rose to become Prime Minister, dazzling many with his famous epigrams along the way. Politician Douglas Hurd and political speechwriter Edward Young strip away the myths which surround his career, explore the paradoxes at the centre of his “two lives” and bring […]

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  • 160. A SPY AMONG FRIENDS: KIM PHILBY AND THE GREAT BETRAYAL
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    With access to newly released MI5 files, Ben Macintyre unlocks perhaps the last great secret of the Cold War. A story of intimate duplicity, loyalty, trust and treachery about the most notorious British defector and mole in history, Kim Philby is revealed as agent, double agent, traitor and enigma, and betrayer of secret Allied operations […]

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  • 184. THE COLLECTOR EARLS OF PEMBROKE: WILTON’S HISTORY TOLD THROUGH ITS ART COLLECTION
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    Every picture tells a story and nowhere more so than in a private collection, still hanging in the house for which it was bought. The collection at Wilton is one of the oldest in Britain, dating back to the seventeenth century, when the Earl of Pembroke was among Van Dyck’s earliest English patrons. Art historian […]

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