by Jo Hodgkin | Apr 17, 2024 | Amateurs in Eden
Where did troops stationed in North Africa during the Second World War go for rest and recuperation? They went to a place praised as an ideal holiday destination, recommended for its ‘sunny Mediterranean atmosphere, its smart modern towns, its abundance of gay night...
by Jo Hodgkin | Jul 7, 2023 | A Good(ish) Man in Burma
Not many people can claim to have one grandfather who was gaoler to the other. Harold Fielding Hall had that distinction, though understandably he didn’t trumpet this widely. In 1828 Hilkiah Hall, was imprisoned for debt in Durham Gaol. Harold’s other...
by Jo Hodgkin | Jun 9, 2023 | Quakers in Love
Gossip gets a bad press – unfairly, in my opinion. It’s one of the things I miss from my years of living in a small rural community. And if we want to enter the lives of people who lived in the past, we need to listen in on their gossip when we can. Nihil...
by Jo Hodgkin | Mar 30, 2023 | A Good(ish) Man in Burma
Advice for invaders: when planning to take over a sovereign state, it’s a good idea to frame it as a ‘rescue mission’. At the height of the imperial era, the British knew this well. By 1885, when they were getting ready to take over Upper Burma, a...
by Jo Hodgkin | Mar 14, 2023 | A Good(ish) Man in Burma
The day Harold Fielding Hall died was not short on drama. Just hours before drawing his final breath, he wrote, or dictated, a new will which left everything to the four year old daughter of his cousin. His wife and children were to receive nothing. It’s a bit of a...
