History Magazine
The Forty Elephants Gang
In the crime-ridden underworld of Victorian London, a group of working-class women rose to notoriety. This was the all-female gang of ‘hoisters’ known as the Forty Elephants (or Forty Thieves), whose speciality was shoplifting from high end department stores. For them, life was a rollercoaster of thieving, lavish spending and prison…
Inspirations Behind Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights is the story of the doomed love between Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw, a tale of passion and violence. First published in December 1847 under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, it was astonishing to discover that the novel was actually written by a parson’s daughter, who lived on the edge of the wild and remote Yorkshire Moors.
Bedford Level Experiment – Flat-Earthers in the Fens
In January 1870, a challenge was issued: a man called John Hampden bet any scientist £500 that they couldn’t prove the Earth was round. The challenge was accepted by the naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace – and so it began…
