In late April 1945, a squad of German troops encircled a farm on the Dutch island of Texel, briefly stopped to catch their breath, and then set about their gruesome work. First they set fire to the farmhouse, and then they waited for their quarry to emerge. They shot those who made the break for safety, and when others took refuge in a nearby pig shed, they set that ablaze too.
However, two men did manage to elude the Germans, taking temporary shelter in the farm’s cellar, and later slipping away under cover of darkness. Exhausted, they hid in a nearby ditch. The following morning, a farmer found them asleep and alerted the marauding troops. They quickly arrived on the scene and put the fugitives to death. It was a grisly scene. And it was made all the more darkly bizarre by the fact that both the victims and those doing the shooting, were wearing German uniforms.
So why would Wehrmacht troops inflict such brutalities on so-called ‘comrades’? And why were they doing so during the death throes of the Third Reich – at a time when, across Europe, thousands of their compatriots were laying down their arms and surrendering?
The answer lies in the identity of the men they hunted down and killed. These victims may have worn German uniforms but they had no loyalty to the Wehrmacht. They were, in fact, former prisoners of war – Red Army men from Soviet Georgia who had switched sides. And the rebellion they had launched against German forces on Texel would trigger the final battle of Europe’s Second World War.
A stark dilemma
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The Long Road Back - The Election Was Tough for the Conservatives but the Past Holds Clues on How Parties Can Return From the Brink
Itâs election night 1997, and Jeremy Paxman is grilling Tory grandee Cecil Parkinson. âYouâre the chairman of a fertiliser firm,â the famously pugnacious broadcaster asked Parkinson. âHow deep is the mess youâre in?â Twenty-seven years later, as the Conservative party comes to terms with another landslide defeat, itâs worth applying the same question to the present day. How does this result compare with previous devastating losses â not only those suffered by the Tories themselves, but also those experienced by the other major parties? And what can history teach us about the tools that politicians use to dig themselves out of the dung heap and set themselves back on the road to power?
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What a summer itâs been so far, with an astonishing election result. There has been much talk of national renewal, and in due course weâll see what that means. But it felt like a watershed. The new prime ministerâs dad was a toolmaker, his mum a nurse; the cabinet is majority comprehensive-educated, with more alumni of Parrs Wood High School than of Eton. Among commentators â not just on the left â thereâs been a growing feeling that 14 years of Tory rule, compounded by Brexit, have undermined what the great medieval historian Ibn Khaldun called asabiyyah: group feeling â the glue that makes societies work. And watching TV on election night, I found myself wondering whether, like sediment settling in a glass, the time has finally arrived for a new national narrative
Parthian Chicken - Eleanor Barnett recreates an ancient Roman dish that borrowed flavours from a rival neighbouring empire in the Middle East
According to ancient Roman natural philosopher Pliny the Elder, Apicius was âthe most gluttonous gorger of all spendthriftsâ. The cookbook attributed to him, known simply as Apicius or as De Re Coquinaria (On the Art of Cooking), is one of the oldest collections of recipes surviving from antiquity. Its author may have been Marcus Gavius Apicius, a Roman gourmet of the first century AD who reputedly travelled all the way from Campania to Libya on the hunt for the largest, juiciest prawns.
Eastern Promises- Lured by rich trading prospects, from the 17th to the 19th centuries Britain attempted to cultivate relations with China
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Henryâs wary nature is typically attributed to his shaky claim to the throne. The first Tudor monarch was unable to escape the taunt that he was a usurper with no right to call himself king. In fact, his renowned paranoia was the inevitable consequence of a traumatic youth â a trait ingrained long before he harboured ambitions to wear a crown. If we delve deeper into Henryâs background, we can draw a fuller picture of one of our most circumspect of monarchs â one that might elicit sympathy for a long misunderstood king.
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Examining the reconnaissance photos, Behrendt was convinced that the Allies werenât in any hurry. They were constructing some kind of pipeline towards the southern end of their line, probably to carry water, which was barely halfway completed. There were supply dumps appearing in the south as well â always a telltale clue about where an attack would come. True, a large number of trucks were parked at the northern end of the line, about 25 miles back from the front, but they hadnât moved for weeks.
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ALICE LOXTON talks to Danny Bird about her book on 18 individuals who left an indelible mark on British history before they were out of their teens
A Pole apart
ROGER MOORHOUSE is absorbed by a little-known but politically significant Polish princess whose life encompassed the major events of the later 18th and 19th centuries
Medieval England's p olitical miracle
From Magna Carta to parliament, taxation to the law courts, the 13th and 14th centuries laid the foundations for the modern British state
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Ãthelstan is one of the greatest of all Anglo-Saxon monarchs. So why, asks Michael Wood, does the first king of the English remain so fiendishly elusive?
