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THE EDWARDIANS AND LIFE IN EDWARDIAN BRITAIN

1901 - 1918

Empire Day -  24th May
The words "Empire Day" summon up an image of a motherly Queen Victoria presiding over an Empire which spanned almost a quarter of the entire globe. However it was not until after the death of Queen Victoria, who died on 22 January 1901, that Empire Day was first celebrated.

The Battle of the Somme 1916
July 1st 1916 - the bloodiest day in the history of the British Army, or The Battle of the Somme – The Lost Generation. Ninety years ago on 1st July 1916 at around 7.30 in the morning, whistles were blown to signal the start of what would be the bloodiest day in the history of the British Army.

The Barnbow Lasses
It is often said that wars are either won at sea, in the air, or in the trenches; however this story relates to a ‘war of production’ – a war that was fought in the factories of Leeds by a brave band of Yorkshire women known as the The Barnbow Lasses. The story also records the worst tragedy in the history of the City of Leeds - in terms of people killed – a story however that never made the news headlines of the day. It recalls a dreadful explosion that killed 35 Yorkshire women and girls at the Barnbow Munitions factory at Crossgates during the First World War....

The Lost Sandringhams - the Vanished Battalion
What happened to the Sandringhams during the disastrous Dardanelles campaign in the middle of their very first battle, on the afternoon of August 12, 1915? One minute the men were charging bravely against the Turkish enemy. The next they had disappeared. Their bodies were never found. There were no survivors. They did not turn up as prisoners of war. They had simply vanished......

The Thankful Villages
Millions of families throughout the UK suffered the loss of close family relatives in the Great War of 1914 -18.  It appears that barely a family or community across the UK escaped World War I untouched, except that is for the “Thankful Villages”......

Lloyd George  Some have called him ‘the most famous Welshman ever born in Manchester’, however it was David Lloyd George’s Welshness that so steered his career and establish him one of the most influential British politicians of modern history....

Lawrence of Arabia  Thomas Edward (T.E) Lawrence, more popularly known as Lawrence of Arabia, was born at Tremadoc in North Wales....