The Inaugural Meeting of the Feldon Valley Military and Naval History Society is on Wednesday November 13th at the Hall at 7.30 pm

If you have an interest in history, whether you are a history buff or have a casual interest, you may wish to meet up at The Hall on Wednesday November 13th at 7.30 and, over a convivial glass of wine, find out if this society is for you.

The Society is the idea of Peter Stoddart, who is himself a history buff, and he will be addressing the event.

For information on how Peter intends this meeting to progress please read his piece below.

For further information you can contact Peter here

In Peter’s words, these are his plans for this first meeting:

‘I imagine that those who attend will embrace the military history buffs at one end of the spectrum including a few with a  professional connection with the army (either current or former) and those who are no more than intrigued and turn up just to see what it is all about and whether what is on offer really is their cup of tea.  

The point is, it is going to be very hard to gauge what is on offer until the event itself.  This is how I plan it is going to be.  

There will be introductory wine and a few nibbles to welcome all and sundry, followed by by a talk from me for about 30 to 40 minutes embracing a huge variety of topics and themes in précis format to show just how broad and narrow the subject really can be. It will include inter alia: 

• who has comprised the British Army from general personnel to the few truly great commanders this country has produced over the centuries; 
• those who have captured warfare by the skill of the artist’s brush stroke from Hillingford and Crofts to the doyenne of them all, Elizabeth Thompson (Lady Butler);  
• the many foreign historians who have written works of powerful scholarship about British military history and the female historians who have done likewise; 
• the fascinating subject of historiography (the study of the writing of history) with one potent example being given; 
• the development of weapons (again with one example);  
• the change in methods of fighting to the linear formation and the combination of all arms warfare (e.g. Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden);  
• our naval history – we are an island nation and we need ships to transport soldiers and a battle fleet to protect those ships, and therefore the design of ships and the impact of the invention of the gun on ship design and how it benefited those countries in western Europe along the Atlantic seaboard all come into the frame; 
• naval warfare and the concept of “the command of the sea”, Drake to Nelson, formalism and melee in the eighteenth century; 
• those with the courage to fight behind the enemy lines from Nicholas Trant in the peninsular war to the SAS of today; 
• war and literature – the Great War poets and people such as Remarque and Robert Graves;  
• the brutal concept of total war with civilians being deemed legitimate targets and the balancing of this by examples of heroism and acts of simple human kindness from one man or woman to another;
• women in war (possibly deserving a society all to themselves;  
• reform in both the army and the navy at the beginning of the twentieth century (Haldane and Fisher); 
• the regimental system in the British army and how its organisation evolved, e.g. how did the Green Howards get their name?

The list could go on!

At the end and subject to any questions, the meeting will adjourn for more wine and with people invited to express their interest by putting their names, addresses and email addresses on a pad with a note of what interests them and whether they would host and lead a meeting on a favoured topic. 

We would go forward from there.  (If one goes beyond this and the question of future guest speakers is raised then payment of travelling expenses becomes an issue, which in turn leads to membership fees, a treasurer, bank accounts, AGMs and so on – a different ball game in other words).

The meeting on 13 November is to test the water.’

Peter Stoddart

If you are interested in coming along please contact Peter at petercstoddart@gmail.com