At the beginning of the 17th century, pirates infested the Caribbean waters, harassing the major European powers, but they were eventually driven from the region. Some pirates took refuge in Madagascar, where they attempted to capture the lucrative cargo carried by vessels on the shipping route of the European East India Companies. At the end of the 18th century, in order to weaken British influence in the Indian Ocean, France hired privateers to attack commercial ships of the British East India Company. This was an alternative to open warfare, and heralded the privateers' era. Denis Piat recounts the history of the pirates and privateers in the Indian Ocean, especially in Mauritius, from the pirates' arrival in the region to the wrecked ships still to be found today in deep water, and provides portraits of the most famous privateers among them.
This is the engrossing story of Mauritius, the exotic Indian Ocean island port of call at the heart of the fabled "Spice Route". Although first discovered and visited by the Arabs and the Portuguese, and subsequently colonised by the Dutch, the French and the English, it is the French influence that is most keenly felt in Mauritius today, thanks to France's nearly century-long rule over Mauritius from 1715 to 1810. Combining rich historical detail, rare archival documents, antique lithographs paintings, and portraits, and fascinating stories of well-known figures of the period - like the founder of the colony Governor Mahé de La Bourdonnais, the explorer and botanist Pierre Poivre, and the celebrated explorer Jean- François de Lapérouse - Mauritius on the Spice Route is an invitation to step back in time and discover the fascinating history of this exotic paradise.
This is the engrossing story of Mauritius, the exotic Indian Ocean island port of call at the heart of the fabled "Spice Route". Although first discovered and visited by the Arabs and the Portuguese, and subsequently colonised by the Dutch, the French and the English, it is the French influence that is most keenly felt in Mauritius today, thanks to France's nearly century-long rule over Mauritius from 1715 to 1810. Combining rich historical detail, rare archival documents, antique lithographs paintings, and portraits, and fascinating stories of well-known figures of the period - like the founder of the colony Governor Mahé de La Bourdonnais, the explorer and botanist Pierre Poivre, and the celebrated explorer Jean- François de Lapérouse - Mauritius on the Spice Route is an invitation to step back in time and discover the fascinating history of this exotic paradise.
At the beginning of the 17th century, pirates infested the Caribbean waters, harassing the major European powers, but they were eventually driven from the region. Some pirates took refuge in Madagascar, where they attempted to capture the lucrative cargo carried by vessels on the shipping route of the European East India Companies. At the end of the 18th century, in order to weaken British influence in the Indian Ocean, France hired privateers to attack commercial ships of the British East India Company. This was an alternative to open warfare, and heralded the privateers' era. Denis Piat recounts the history of the pirates and privateers in the Indian Ocean, especially in Mauritius, from the pirates' arrival in the region to the wrecked ships still to be found today in deep water, and provides portraits of the most famous privateers among them.
Although strictly forbidden to keep diaries, Denis Edwards managed to record his experiences throughout nearly all his time in Europe in 1944-45. He brilliantly conveys what it was like to be facing death, day after day, night after night, with never a bed to sleep in nor a hot meal to go home to. This is warfare in the raw ' brutal, yet humorous, immensely tragic, but sadly, all true.
During the Second World War, Britain's top secret Special Operations Executive plotted to assassinate Hitler. A small department of SOE known as Section X had the tantalisingly complex task of investigating how, when and where their plan could be executed. The section also plotted the killing of Goebbels, Himmler and other selected members of Hitler's inner circle. Only Section X and a handful of other SOE staff had any knowledge of these projects, codenamed Operation Foxley and Operation Little Foxleys. As history has shown, these schemes turned out to be pipe dreams. Even so, Section X, renamed the German Directorate in 1944, made a huge contribution to the Allied war effort through their organised sabotage and clandestine distribution of black propaganda. Denis Rigden describes Section X's efforts to discover as much as possible about the intended assassination targets, and questions whether a successful Operation Foxley would have helped or hindered the Allied cause. Based on top secret documents and private sources and illustrated with archive photographs, 'Kill the Fuhrer' is an intriguing insight into the shadowy world of Britain's wartime secret services.
The period from Stalin’s death in 1953 to the end of the 1960s marked a crucial epoch in Soviet history. Though not overtly revolutionary, this era produced significant shifts in policies, ideas, language, artistic practices, daily behaviours, and material life. It was also during this time that social, cultural, and intellectual processes in the USSR began to parallel those in the West (and particularly in Europe) as never before. This volume examines in fascinating detail the various facets of Soviet life during the 1950s and 1960s, a period termed the ‘Thaw.’ Featuring innovative research by historical, literary, and film scholars from across the world, this book helps to answer fundamental questions about the nature and ultimate fortune of the Soviet order – both in its internal dynamics and in its long-term and global perspectives.
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