War & the Military

Featured military leaders

Oliver Cromwell
After leading the army to victory in the English Civil War, Cromwell ran the country as Lord Protector.

Charles I
King Charles started the English Civil War, lost to Oliver Cromwell, and was executed on a scaffold in 1649.

British military timeline

43 AD Emperor Claudius invades England · 60 Queen Boadicea ransacks the city · 407 The last Roman troops leave London · 865 Invasion by the Danes · 878 King Alfred defeats the Danes · 919 Raegnald establishes a Norse kingdom in York · 937 King Athelstan defeats the Norse · 991 Treaty between England and Denmark · 1003 Danish invasion by King Swein · 1066 Norman invasion by William the Conqueror · 1106 Henry I takes Normandy · 1139 Civil war in England · 1153 Henry of Anjou (Henry II) invades England · 1169 Henry II begins the conquest of Ireland · 1190 Richard II goes on the Crusade · 1276 First Welsh War · 1282 Edward I conquers Wales · 1294 War with France. Scotland aligns with France · 1296 Edward I invades Scotland · 1297 Edward I seizes the Stone of Scone and places it in Westminster Abbey · 1306 Robert the Bruce rebels against the English · 1314 Scottish victory at the Battle of Bannockburn · 1321 Civil war in England · 1337 Start of the Hundred Years War · 1347 England captures Calais · 1415 Battle of Agincourt · 1419 England conquers Normandy · 1455 Henry VI was captured by Richard of York, and the War of the Roses began · 1512 War with France and Scotland · 1522 War with France · 1528 War with Spain · 1543 War with France · 1557 War with France · 1585 War with Spain · 1588 Victory over the Spanish Armada · 1609 James I starts filling Ulster with English and Scottish Protestants · 1624 War with Spain · 1626 War with France · 1642 Civil war in England · 1649 Execution of Charles I. Oliver Cromwell conquers Ireland · 1650 Oliver Cromwell conquers Scotland · 1652 First Dutch War · 1655 War with Spain · 1665 Second Dutch War · 1672 Third Dutch War · 1688 William of Orange (William III) invades England · 1690 Battle of the Boyne · 1704 Battle of Blenheim. Britain captures Gibraltar from Spain · 1739 Anglo-Spanish naval war · 1746 Battle of Culloden · 1756 The Seven Years War · 1759 British capture Quebec · 1776 Declaration of American Independence · 1793 War with France · 1801 Union with Ireland · 1803 War with France · 1805 Battle of Trafalgar · 1815 Battle of Waterloo · 1854 Crimean War · 1857 Opium War opens China to European trade · 1879 Zulu War · 1880 First Boer War · 1899 Second Boer War · 1907 Anglo-Russian Entente · 1914 First World War · 1916 Easter rising in Dublin. Battle of the Somme · 1919 Treaty of Versailles. The Cenotaph is erected in Whitehall · 1920 The Imperial War Museum opens for business · 1939 Second World War · 1940 Battle of Britain · 1941 The Blitz · 1942 Montgomery’s victory at el Alamein · 1949 NATO founded · 1956 Suez crisis · 1971 HMS Belfast is moored off Tooley Street · 1982 Falkland’s War · 1991 First Gulf War · 1998 The Good Friday Agreement

Featured battles

IRA bombings
The IRA carried out a concerted bombing campaign on the mainland all the way up to the 1990s.

Norman Conquest (1066)
The last successful conquest of England was William the Conqueror’s Norman invasion of 1066.

War and military books

Military events in London

>>  Upcoming military events in London

“War and Medicine” exhibition, at the Wellcome Collection

• 22nd November – 15th February 2009
• The Wellcome Collection's new exhibition is called "War and Medicine", exploring the advances in battlefield medicine from the Crimean right up until the modern-day war in Afghanistan. It takes in everything from Florence Nightingale to the field hospitals of Viet Nam.

Catch the “Last Post”, at the Cabinet War rooms

• 6th November – 28th February 2009
• The "Last Post: Remembering the First World War" exhibition in the Cabinet War Rooms looks at the important role the Post Office played during the First World War, delivering letters to the front line. Exhibits include the letter that Winston Churchill sent home to his wife Clementine -- to be opened in the event of his death.

Remembering the Great War, at the Imperial War Museum

• 30th September 2008 – 6th September 2009
• The Imperial War Museum is marking the 90th anniversary of the World War I armistace with a special exhibition called "Remembering the Great War". It brings together the stores, medals and personal letters of ninety military personnel.

“Faces of Battle” - at the National Army Museum

• 1st May – 31st December 2008
• The National Army Museum's "Faces of Battle" exhibition is full of harrowing images of soldiers faces, disfigured during World War I. It also tells the story of pioneering surgeon Harold Gillies, and his work with facial casualties.