A Short History of Britain Also available from Bloomsbury by Jeremy Black Avoiding Armageddon Contesting History Crisis of Empire Culture in Eighteenth-Century England New Century War Rethinking World War Two The Great War and the Making of the Modern World The Hanoverians The War of 1812 Using History War: A Short History War and the New Disorder in the 21st Century A Short History of Britain Second Edition JEREMY BLACK Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc Bloomsbury Academic An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square 1385 Broadway London New York WC1B 3DP NY 10018 UK USA www.bloomsbury.com BLOOMSBURY and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First edition published by the Social Affairs Unit 2007 Second edition published by Bloomsbury 2015 © Jeremy Black, 2015 Jeremy Black has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be accepted by Bloomsbury or the author. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN: HB: 978-1-4725-8665-0 PB: 978-1-4725-8666-7 ePDF: 978-1-4725-8667-4 ePub: 978-1-4725-8668-1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Black, Jeremy, 1955- A short history of Britain / Jeremy Black. -- Second edition. pages cm First edition published: 2007. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Great Britain--History. I. Title. DA30.B623 2015 941--dc23 2014030519 Typeset by Fakenham Prepress Solutions, Fakenham, Norfolk NR21 8NN For Jeannie Forbes CONTENTS Preface viii 1 Telling the story 1 2 The history to 1400 11 3 1400–1750 49 4 Britain becomes the world power, 1750–1900 91 5 From 1900 to the present 129 6 Conclusions 165 Note 173 Selected further reading 175 Index 179 PREFACE A key player in world history, Britain has a history that touches, directly or indirectly, that of other countries around the world. Moreover, it is a history that repeatedly repays fresh examination, both because the present changes so frequently and because new perspectives emerge on the past. Writing in 2013–14, I face the possibility of the very dissolution of the British state, as Scotland may vote for independence in a referendum due in September 2014. Whether or not that happens, the very possibility of such an outcome reflects a markedly different present-day background to the past to that which would have been the case only 20 years ago. Indeed, the Scottish Parliament that helped make this refer- endum an issue was only established after a referendum following the Labour victory in the 1997 British general election, with the first elections for this Parliament held in 1999. In the event, independence was rejected by the voters. I am very much aware of changing perspectives, not least because this process of change explains why it is necessary to have new histories, and also why individual historians need to reassess their own views and present their own work anew. There is a particular need for this in the case of national history; for, without any under- standing of our past, we cannot appreciate our present or consider our future. History provides and explains identity, which is at once a key aspect of individuality and the cement of society; while collective memory is also a crucial focus of public education. This is because history is process as well as event: it is not simply a number of events in the past, but it is also an understanding today of how they were linked, and why, how and with what results, change occurred. In understanding the past, it is therefore possible to see history – change through time – as a process that encompasses us. Moreover, reference to the past is a significant way of providing points of guidance as well as validation. Thus, the English barons PREFACE ix drawing up demands on King John in 1215 used as their basis the coronation charter of Henry I (1100) which had promised to renounce the alleged abuses of his predecessor, William II, William Rufus (r. 1087–1100). In turn, Magna Carta, the name later given for the agreement John was obliged to accept in 1215, served in the early seventeenth century as the basis for constitutional opposition to claims and actions on behalf of the royal prerogative under James I (r. 1603–25) and Charles I (r. 1625–49). References continued. Charles, 11th Duke of Norfolk (1746–1815), a firm Whig, sought to commemorate the 600th anniversary of Magna Carta by building an octagonal Great Hall at his seat of Arundel Castle, a hall dedicated to ‘Liberty asserted by the Barons in the reign of John’. History therefore is about time; time as an enfolding context and change through time. This relationship is generally simplified in terms of structure and conjuncture or, phrased differently, circum- stances and events. This is a dichotomy that does not do justice to the complexity of the dynamic of change, but one that has to stand, as a product of the extent to which we both express ourselves through language and are constrained by it. In the case of Britain’s history, the key structural elements are in part geographical and integral. The former are, most obviously, island status off the shore of a nearby continent, as well as the proximity of most of the country to the sea and to ports. There has also been, throughout human history in Britain, a generally benign climate, with plentiful rainfall and with only a limited period annually below freezing point. This situation has allowed agriculture without the organisational constraints of irrigation, as well as all-year-round fishing and shipping. There are, moreover, plentiful construction and power sources in terms of readily worked timber, stone, brick and coal. The structural elements in British history are also a product of the development of a particular society and political culture. This development is complex and in part controversial, not least because discussion of it relates to issues of quality and approval, as well as the question of national exceptionalism or uniqueness. Nevertheless, the characteristic nature and role of law, property rights, family structure and political liberty are all crucial to British society and political culture. So also is a quest for freedom, however conditional it might in practice have been.