Our Island Story: A History of Britain for Boys and Girls from the Romans to Queen Victoria - Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall

...for Boys and Girls (1906), Our Empire Story (1908), History of France (1912), History of Germany (1913) , The Story of the United States (1919, though in 1917 published in the US as This Country of Ours) and Kings and Things (1937). Each of these unabashedly mixed legend, magic, and historical fact to weave positive portraits displaying great pride for the history and achievements of these nations.It does not gloss over misdeeds either, painting ...
...ancient peoples who dwelt on our shores. She saw the people of history as just that, people, and their stories have come alive for her and fired her imagination as surely as any fairytale ever did, but burning with an intensity that cannot be quenched for contained within is the element of truth. No more are the Kings and Queens and Caesars just names that run together. She knows their avarice, their determination, their triumphs, and their setbacks. ... more

This book was featured in the not too distant past by the UK's Guardian newspaper who not only reviewed it, but ran special offers on copies of it. Likewise, the Economist, the Telegraph, and several other major newspapers in Britain have all also raved about it and participated in getting this book back into a steady print run and striving for a copy in every school in Britain. Not needing the book at the time, I passed on the Guardian offer, and waited for cheaper copies of this public domain work to appear on Amazon. I knew they would, as it is a staple of many home education curriculums, and the interest from the newspaper articles would no doubt see interest peak for the book in general. This year, however, we did purchase a copy of the book. It was on the agenda last year for my daughter as well as this year (1 chapter a fortnight, so the book covers a 2 school years when used as part of a curriculum), but being budget minded, we used the free online edition over at the Baldwin Project, alternated with recordings of the chapters offered for free by the Librivox website. Nothing quite substitutes for a real paper book though, so the price down to reasonable levels, and nothing else pressing for funds, we bought this edition.

So what it is, you ask? Well, it is a history book of sorts. I say of sorts, for it is more a collection of myths, fables, and history woven together. It pretty much is a group of stories to introduce children to British history. From King Neptune and Albion, to Brutus, to the Romans and beyond all the way to Queen Victoria, what we have here is an unashamed collection of tales told in chronological order that paints a history of Britain that is patriotic without being denigrating. It was written in 1905 by Scottish educator H. E. Marshall (the H stands for Henrietta), and was the first of her history books. All her books were written in a similar vein, forsaking dry renderings of history with mere timelines and dates of battles for the stories of the places themselves, and detailing the people and battles as stories. The other history works include Scotland's Story: A History of Scotland for Boys and Girls (1906), Our Empire Story (1908), History of France (1912), History of Germany (1913) , The Story of the United States (1919, though in 1917 published in the US as This Country of Ours) and Kings and Things (1937). Each of these unabashedly mixed legend, magic, and historical fact to weave positive portraits displaying great pride for the history and achievements of these nations.It does not gloss over misdeeds either, painting fully the wrongness of treachery and other misdeeds, yet apportioning the blame rightly to those who made the decisions, and not upon the people as a whole.

As the sole tome of history, this book would admittedly be inadequate, but as an introduction to knowledge about Britain, this is an absolute treasure rove. From visiting historical sites my daughter has encountered information about the Romans before, and garnered a bit more from CBBC educational programmes (we are dual national). This book, however, did ever so much more. It gave her a sense of excitement and discovery, putting the bits of knowledge she had from before into perspective. Hearing of Albion, she suddenly grasped lines of poetry she had heard before, and learned the power of legend and belief that went on to inspire the ancient peoples who dwelt on our shores. She saw the people of history as just that, people, and their stories have come alive for her and fired her imagination as surely as any fairytale ever did, but burning with an intensity that cannot be quenched for contained within is the element of truth. No more are the Kings and Queens and Caesars just names that run together. She knows their avarice, their determination, their triumphs, and their setbacks. This is living history that can be read as bedtime stories, or as stories to be read and enjoyed in the quiet of rainy winter afternoons.

While the tales are told with words that paint vivid pictures in the imagination, the illustrations serve to add even more interest. This edition contains beautiful illustrations from the Palace of Westminster printed on glossy paper and placed in two lots, the first being about 1/3 of the way through and the second lot 2/3 the way through. Each illustration has a caption explaining what it depicts and gives the page number of the related story in the book. The paperback edition we have is quite sturdy with a nice heavy duty cover and quality acid free stock for its pages, which I was most relieved about as I had been second guessing my ordering the paperback edition versus the hardback as I knew it would be extensively handled by my two young children. Handle it they have, with my seven year old commenting on how nice it was that they did not do the small print thing as she hates editions aimed at children that have very small print. Indeed, her only quibble has been that it could have done with more pictures to help break the print up, which the online edition in the US from 1953 has (it is not public domain here yet so that edition which goes all the way to WWI and its illustrations were not free to reprint yet), so we have printed off the extra four chapters and the missing illustrations, as well as Googled up more paintings related to the stories and put them together as a further resources sort of thing. She is seven and very visually oriented so this mattered to her a great deal, while my five year old son, being a more active sort of kid, has not been bothered, being far more interested in imaging himself in the story, swinging imaginary swords and what have you as required.

Be aware that being enthralled with these stories will have possible consequences. They include:

Your children and their friends using buckets as helmets and making cardboard swords, and raiding your blue eye shadow and eyeliner for woad , then going into the front garden to play at being Queen Bodicea and her army versus the Romans.

Your child piping up, during a program or conversation that mentions King Arthur to say, "I know him. His daddy was called Uthur Pendragon " and then proceed to tell the legend of Merlin, Uther Pendragon, The King of Ireland and the Saxons, Stonehenge, and the Giants Dance to the bemusement of all concerned.

Going to garden centres and upon seeing roses, suddenly having to come up with an answer as to what pink and yellow roses mean, followed by having to hear about the two royal houses and the poor Princes in the Tower.

All very minor, and relatively reassuring as to how much the book impresses the young minds who get to read it (or hear it read), and utterly fascinating from my own point of view. As an American, I had to study English history in high school as part of World History, but it is admittedly a blur thanks to the dry manner it was taught. This brings it alive for me as much as it does my children, adding excitement to the historical places we have visited or plan to see in Britain. I hope to locate copies of the rest of her history works, or at least, read them online, as this has brought much interest in the past to us all. Highly recommended. 

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