Dan Snow's History Hit

Sasha Swire joined me on the podcast to talk about her diary, written during the Cameron years. Her husband was an MP and junior minister at the time. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can...

In today's episode, I was joined by John Mullan, Lord Northcliffe Professor of Modern English Literature at University College London. He has published extensively on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century literature, and is a wealth of knowledge on all things Dickens. We discuss the man himself and his writings, and the unique Victorian context in which inspired the great novelist. Subscribe to Histo...

Kate Summerscale has written one of the Sunday Time books of the year exploring the world of poltergeists and ghosts in the build up to the Second World War. She came on the podcast to tell us all about Nandor Fodor – a Jewish-Hungarian refugee and chief ghost hunter for the International Institute for Psychical research in London. From New York to Croydon he used all the gadgets of modern technol...

Rachel Holmes joined me on the podcast to discuss the life of British suffragette and socialist Sylvia Pankhurst. Sylvia found her voice fighting militantly for votes for women. The vote was just the beginning of her lifelong defence of human rights, from her early warnings of the rise of fascism in Europe, to her campaigning against racism and championing of the liberation struggles in Africa and...

Tom Bower joined me on the podcast to discuss the history and legacy of the Nuremberg Trials. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, and exclusive subscriber only articles. It's...

Charles King joined me on the podcast to talk about a group of cultural anthropologist who fundamentally transformed conceptions of 'normality' in the early twentieth century. We talked in particular about the work of Margaret Mead. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra epis...

The former Prime Minister has faced a renewed controversy as people are calling for his statues to be removed due to his racist views. We are joined by Professor Richard Toye and Dr Warren Dockter to discuss where his personal views and political policies collide. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast fr...

Chris Bryant joined me on the podcast to tell the story of the gay British politicians who were among the very first to warn Britain about the danger of Hitler’s rise to power and the most vocal in demanding an end to the government’s policy of appeasement. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the...

Pompeii is back in the news. An extraordinary new, touching discovery, found during the Great Pompeii Project of Professor Massimo Osanna and his team. Roughly 700 metres northwest of Pompeii, in the remains of a suburban Roman villa, archaeologists have unearthed the incredibly-preserved remains of two men, victims of the infamous eruption of Mount Vesuvius that occurred almost 2,000 years ago in...

Dan talks to Helen Castor about her book on Elizabeth I and the way she governed. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, and exclusive subscriber only articles. It's the ultimat...

Sarah Churchwell and Kathryn Gray joined me on the podcast to discuss the first Thanksgiving of 1621. They critique mythologies of Thanksgiving that have arisen from 19th century ideologues, to Reagan, to the present day, and reframe settler colonial narratives. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from...

Sarah Lonsdale joined me on the podcast to tell the stories of radical women who challenged the status quo in the interwar years. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, and excl...

Pen Vogler joined me on the pod to discuss the origins of our eating habits and reveals how they are loaded with centuries of class prejudice. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win pri...

Paul Offit is on the US Food and Drug Administration's advisory panel on vaccines. He talked Dan through the history of massive public vaccination programmes in the US, starting with the unprecedented campaign against Polio in 1955. During that vaccination 200,000 children were a form of the vaccine in which the live polio virus had not been sufficiently inactivated and 40,000 of them got polio le...

Al Worden was an American astronaut and engineer who was the Command Module Pilot for the Apollo 15 lunar mission in 1971. He is one of only 24 people to have flown to the Moon. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got w...

Diarmaid Ferriter joined me on the podcast to talk about the events of Bloody Sunday on 21st November 1920, which marked a decisive turning-point in Irish history. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes...

Sidney Blumenthal joined me on the podcast to talk about the political life of Abraham Lincoln and what his legacy means today. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Chris Naunton joined me on the podcast to talk about the work of the many people who contributed to our understanding of ancient Egypt. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, an...

Lewis Dartnell joined me on the podcast to talk about a theory that links the outcome of the US election to geology. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where you can win prizes, and exclusive subscri...

Gwrych Castle dominates the road into North Wales. A sprawling Victorian ruin on land that belonged to the same family for over 500 years. It is now famous in the UK as the Covid convenient set for "I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here" which launched to huge audiences this weekend. But history fans will be more interested in the the remarkable story of the castle itself than the antics of the celeb...

June 1944: the SAS parachute deep into occupied France, to wreak havoc and bloody mayhem. In a country crawling with the enemy, their mission is to prevent Hitler from rushing his Panzer divisions to the D-Day beaches and driving the Allies back into the sea. Damien Lewis joined me on the podcast to tell the story of the SAS Band of Brothers. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundr...

David McGrory joined me on the podcast to discuss Coventry’s Blitz. On the night of 14 November 1940, a Luftwaffe air raid devastated the city of Coventry. Subscribe to History Hit and you'll get access to hundreds of history documentaries, as well as every single episode of this podcast from the beginning (400 extra episodes). We're running live podcasts on Zoom, we've got weekly quizzes where yo...

Pete Brown used to advertise lager for a living, until he realised that writing books about beer was even more fun, and entailed drinking even more beer. He appears regularly on television as a beer expert, writes on beer for a variety of publications and is the author of Man Walks into a Pub and the award-winning travel book Three Sheets to the Wind. In this fascinating episode, he discusses the...

James Rebanks joined me on the podcast to tell the history of his family farm in the Lake District hills. This was part of an ancient agricultural landscape: a patchwork of crops and meadows, of pastures grazed with livestock, and hedgerows teeming with wildlife. We talk about how it has transformed over time. If you want to get Christmas gifts for your history loving family, then we've got all so...

100 years ago today, the Unknown Warrior, a common soldier and an unidentified casualty of war, was buried in Westminster Abbey with all the pomp and ceremony of an empire at its zenith. King George V looked on as 100 Victoria Cross bearers formed a guard of honour and the unknown solider was laid to rest. Joining me this Armistice Day is author and historian Juliet Nicolson. Her research has expl...