Radical History Blog

Pasquale Paoli isn't a household name, but he was one of the greatest revolutionaries in European history Long before he became a famous general and declared himself Emperor of France, Napoleon Bonaparte thought of himself as a popular revolutionary.

Robert Frost may not have been a radical person, but his poetry is nevertheless part of radical history "I’d like to get away from earth awhile And then come back to it and begin over." Words have a funny and often mischievous place in radical history.

A shopworker from Somerset was radicalised to join a Labour governmentMargaret Bondfield in 1919 "I had no vocation for wifehood or motherhood, but an urge to serve the Union." Margaret ‘Maggie’ Bondfield was the first woman to become a cabinet minister in British history.

The Spanish Revolution of 1820 sought to re-establish an earlier radical liberal democratic experiment Francisco Goya's El Tres de Mayo commemorating the Spanish resistance to Napoleon Revolutions rarely move in a straight line.

He jumped on a café table and called his fellow Parisians to arms in the name of the 'Third Estate' - the French peopleAbove: H.

Claudia Jones, born 109 years ago today, was deported by the US and left her mark on Britain insteadClaudia Jones blue plaque in Notting Hill, London. Credit: The Notting Hill Carnival was founded by a communist.

Oppenheimer's star rose and fell with the fortunes of left-wing politics in the US between the 1930s and 50sFellow physicists Einstein and Oppenheimer in around 1950 Today marks 57 years since J. Robert Oppenheimer passed away.

Another Radical tried and deported by the British state for advocating democracy, George Mealmaker was born on 10th February 1768 "Our armour shall be reason and truth… Our whole aim is to secure Annual Parliaments and Universal Suffrage.

Abd El-Krim, who died on 6th February in 1963, made it to the cover of Time magazine and showed that European empires weren't invincible The world-renowned Abd el-Krim on the cover of Time magazine in 1925 Abd el-Krim was the Che Guevara of the 1920s – and Che Guevara knew it.

Born January 30th in 1919, Fred Korematsu took a stand against the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII "I would like to see the government admit that they were wrong and do something about it so this will never happen again to any American citizen of any race, creed, or color." - Fred Korematsu War tends to bring out the worst in government and society.