Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 05/10/2026I'm so happy to have started a PhD with the University of Leicester and Imperial War Museums, funded through an AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Partnership. I'm exploring Luftwaffe objects in British military museums, and the human stories they could tell. #PhDSky #AcademicSky 2180
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 20/03/2026So glad it’s done mate!! Rest and recuperate and I’m looking forward to your next book’s publication day. 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 26/07/2025Had a great first day on Mull. I wasn’t allowed in the distillery though 😔 030
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 22/07/2025Farewell Ozzy. A huge loss to Metal and to music. ❤️ 031
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 20/07/2025Often when consumed by anxiety and feeling awful in the head, I calm myself by following disused railway lines on maps, and imagine the layouts I might build based on them. For The Observer, I've written about engines big and small, masculinity and mental health: observer.co.uk/news/first-p...observer.co.uk‘Model trains are my meditation' | The ObserverModel railways offer a ticket to a safe world – no wonder it's good for hobbyists' mental health 136411
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 15/07/2025You don’t get that on the Norwich to London Liverpool Street line 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 13/07/2025Sounds very interesting. My grandfather was a Protestant and was confirmed a catholic in order to marry my grandmother. It’s a funny old mix! There’s a magisterial beauty in the crossing of the old world and the emerging liberalism of the new. 020
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 13/07/2025Surely theology and Victorian history is still essential to understanding the Second World War!?! That generation is a direct product 😀 120
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 13/07/2025As legends like you Maureen doesn’t need to be concerned with who is speaking!! 😉 120
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 13/07/2025Hi James, that’s very reassuring!! It’s my first boat so I’m a little (a lot) nervous. Hopefully it’s all good! 120
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 12/07/2025Well this is a bloody lovely way to start the weekend! 1141
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 12/07/2025Ah well this is lovely to see! 011
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 11/07/2025I’ve spent the majority of the week in Perth. Beautiful weather and beautiful place. Equally wonderful was the @museumbw and the staff there. Super helpful and knowledgeable. I got a lot of great material for my book. 030
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 11/07/2025Some great recognition over at the other place @luketurner.bsky.social. Much deserved! 130
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 25/05/2025Things is, it’s close enough to a Telegraph story to make you think. Anything by Allister Heath is akin to this level of madness. 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 25/05/2025Several exceptional historians have released books recently. On the one hand it’s inspiring and on the other it reminds how far I’ve got to go. I need to up my writing output!! 010
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonAlex Churchill @alexchurchill.bsky.social · 17/05/2025One thing that never occurred to me before writing Ring of Fire - when men were mobilised in 1914, there was no one left to collect the rubbish in Paris. The city began to stink. Here’s one journalist’s account: 511714
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonClare Mulley @claremulley.bsky.social · 14/05/2025I’m thrilled that #AgentZo has been awarded silver in the #MilitaryHistoryMatters magazine #BookOfTheYear2025 awards. Wonderful to get this recognition for her story, especially among such an impressive shortlist! 🧵1/3 1384
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonWW2TV Paul Woodadge @ww2tv.bsky.social · 15/05/2025My thoughts on Facebook earlier 2023628
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 11/05/2025In the early hours, #OTD in 1940, 2/Lt Alan Orr Ewing of 1st Btn Black Watch, led a patrol in the woods east of Remeling in NE France. There was a firefight with German troops. No British casualties were reported. TNA 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 01/05/2025On this day in 1940, the entirety of 51st Highland Division relieved the French at the Hombourg-Budange section of the Maginot line. Including the recently arrived 7 Norfolks. 51HD War Diary, TNA 040
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 20/04/2025In one account of the fighting in the Saar, May 1940, an officer 2/Lt Alan Orr Ewing describes using a Beretta. In the context it’s likely more than a pistol. Does anyone know if it’s simply slang or whether it was privately purchased by Orr Ewing? 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 19/04/2025On this day in 1940, the remainder of 51st Highland Division arrived at the Maginot line, north of Metz. They were there to gain combat experience under French Command. It was the start of a fateful journey. IWM 030
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonWesley Livesay @historyofthesecondworldwar.com · 18/04/2025Now even book publishers are starting to ask if I am going to do another podcast on Post-SWW topics! 131
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 18/04/2025I found this episode of Archive On 4 very moving: Kenneth Williams reading Bible stories in full and fine voice (his Satan is particularly good), and the programme weaves these into his own life story and complicated Christian faith, much of which feels familiar. www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...bbc.co.ukArchive on 4 - Kenneth Williams: Said the Actor to the Bishop - BBC SoundsKenneth Williams recorded excerpts from the Bible. They've not been broadcast until now. 211834
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 09/04/2025Had a great time at Kent Battle of Britain Museum this morning. The museum makes the connection between the machines and the pilots’ stories in an incredibly effective way. It was a very moving experience. 020
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 08/04/2025Few days away with the family, walked along the beach at Dungeness this morning. Lovely day for it! 030
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 06/04/2025Any fellow IC members visiting Normandy between 4th -7th June? 000
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 04/04/2025Happy publication day+1 to @joedunthorne.bsky.social for a fantastic book about his journey into a family history that wasn’t as it seemed - radioactive toothpaste invented by his great-grandfather in the 1920s was the surface of a far more sinister narrative. Read it like a thriller in two goes A* 4194
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonJack Bowsher - Thunder Run @historybowsh.bsky.social · 04/04/2025🚨Forgotten Armour: Tank Warfare in Burma is coming out in paperback!🚨 Get your copy from Sunday 13 April, what better way to celebrate the 81st anniversary of the Battle of Nunshigum - the epic battle by tanks of the 3rd Carabiniers on the mountains above Imphal. #tanks #ww2 #history #author 1103
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 04/04/2025@historialchats.bsky.social listening to your chat with @historypegg.bsky.social. Great by the way. Some parallels with my journey so really interesting. I was struck by your comments on “proper” historians. Their attitude is part of the reason I decided not to pursue a PhD in my early twenties. 131
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonLuke Turner @luketurner.bsky.social · 01/04/2025This is an extremely thoughtful article about men, masculinity and literature which airs some uncomfortable truths that need saying 2159
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 29/03/2025I suspect it’s a need to control their lives which drives this behaviour. This need often stems from lacking a sense of control as a child, e.g. attachment difficulties and/or trauma. 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 25/03/2025I’ll take a look. I guess the lack of an air defence system in France made intercepting German air raids pot luck. I’ve been focusing on the battle at Abbeville on 4th June recently. It’s the definition of how not to conduct a combined arms attack. 010
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025I’m trying to incorporate the RAF in my writing. They’re hard to pin down in early 1940. 100
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025That’s horrible. I can’t fathom what those young guys went through. The perennial question that keeps me coming back, how on earth did they cope. 010
Reposted by Euan Williamsondrrichardduckett.bsky.social @drrichardduckett.bsky.social · 24/03/2025He was a Rigger, so ground crew. Blenheims. Joined up as an apprentice age 16 in 1935. He watched the Lancastria disaster from the shore. It haunted him. 211
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025The certainly are! Love that. Was he flying from England? 100
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonThe Forgotten War Pod: Burma Campaign WW2 @forgottenwarpod.bsky.social · 24/03/2025 Cheers Euan, formal planning for series 2 starts in April 👍 021
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025Agreed. Although my uni experience was a few years ago now so I’m not sure about recent years. I think we focused on European theatre, Spanish civil war, Weimar etc. But the importance of the far east is vastly underrated. Not least because of its impact on geopolitics today. 330
Reposted by Euan Williamsondrrichardduckett.bsky.social @drrichardduckett.bsky.social · 24/03/2025In connection with the latest episode, you might want to check out my website: www.soeinburma.comsoeinburma.comThe Special Operations Executive in Burma 1941-1945Secret Agents & Guerrilla Armies in the Second World War 153
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025Tough one. My experience at college and uni was that the far east was barely mentioned. Percival surrendering Singapore, POWs etc. I remember hearing an episode on WHW about the admin box and it opening a new world. Probably says a lot about my limited curiosity!! 120
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025This is the seaside town of Ault on the French Picardy coast. Maj Lorne Campbell and two companies from 8th Btn Argyll & Sutherlands were dug in around the lighthouse on 5th June 1940. Surrounded by Germans, Campbell led his men on two night marches back to British lines along the Bresle River. 020
Reposted by Euan WilliamsonSlightly out of focus @normandy661944.bsky.social · 24/03/2025The headstone in Reichswald Forest War Cemetery of Maj.Gen. Tom Rennie CB, DSO, MBE, killed on 24 March 1945 after crossing the Rhine during during Operation Plunder. (My pic.) 1111
Euan Williamson @euanjwilliamson.co.uk · 24/03/2025Tom Rennie was an extraordinary character. Taken prisoner as a junior officer at St Valery with 51HD in June 1940. Escaped and made it home via Spain. Commanded 3rd Division on D-Day. Liberated St Valery with 51HD. 010
![One thing that never occurred to me before writing Ring of Fire - when men were mobilised in 1914, there was no one left to collect the rubbish in Paris. The city began to stink. Here’s one journalist’s account:
'Strolling through the main streets of my neighbourhood, I realize that some public services are completely disorganized by the mobilization which deprives them of any manpower. Refuse, foul smelling, sits on the edge of the pavement, abandoned? In the August heat, the smell was nauseating. Then he saw a lorry with four men on it. The driver was a teenager, two others were well over forty. They appeared to be collecting rubbish, and so Delecraz asked the boy if they might swing past his street. ""Address yourself to the colonel," he replied, pointing out to me a man in an English cap walking alongside. I walk forward to meet him. "Are you the colonel, sir?" I examine him on the sly. Tall, straight, slim. The elderly man had a pronounced regal bearing, and an imperious white moustache:
I am indeed a retired colonel... I have two officer sons. Too old to return to the fire, at the age of seventy, I'm trying to be useful. You see, I am running temporary rubbish collec-tion, while waiting for the business to be reorganized. You have to serve as best you can, at such a time...' And when he opens his jacket to take a note [of my street]... I see the rosette of an officer of the Légion d'Honneur.
Photo from Musée Albert Kahn](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:zwjijm4ikcfklhckhncabbxz/bafkreiaxwdspxpuart63sv5n4hofyefh6by7wfhioeueiqokwr7fkckgoi)
