In time of crisis, so the legend goes, Sir Francis Drake will come to our aid again, as once he did against the Spanish Armada.
Drake’s Drum is a snare drum painted with the arms of Sir Francis Drake, which went with him on his historic voyage around the world in 1577-80. It is said that before his death, he instructed his heirs to keep it safe at Buckland Abbey, his family home in Devon, and promised that if ever England were under threat the people should beat the drum, and he would return. The drum survives to this day.
A year into his reign as Emperor of France, Napoleon Bonaparte had much of Europe under his government but the United Kingdom still eluded him.
Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned Emperor of the French on December 2nd, 1804. He dreamt of a European empire, and as Jawaharlal Nehru recalls here on land none could resist him. On the seas, however, it was another story. Barely a year into his imperial reign Napoleon was forced to accept two facts: he would never command the seas, and he would never conquer Britain.
The Russians had checked it in the East, but in the West the expansion of Napoleon Bonaparte’s empire was far from over.
In 1804, Napoleon Bonaparte wrapped up the short-lived French Republic, crowned himself Emperor of the French, and set about conquering Europe. However, failure to invade Moscow in 1812 was the first sign of vulnerability, and on June 18, 1815, his dream was ended by allied forces commanded by the Duke of Wellington.
In a Christmas broadcast in 1940, actor Leslie Howard explained why British sovereignty was worth fighting for.
In a radio broadcast just before Christmas in 1940, British actor Leslie Howard spoke movingly of the remarkable and indeed unique character of his country, built on individual liberty and democratic government, and contrasted it with the ‘new European order’.