On Monday 2 October 2017, I am publishing Peter Sargent's A Moment in Time - 50 stories that bring East Anglian history to life. I used to be an avid reader of Pete's history columns in the Eastern Daily Press and now I am very pleased to be working with him to publish a first collection of these columns.
Here's an introduction to the book:
It
only takes a moment to change the world. Our past is littered with
these moments; from the grandest in the land – a Queen claiming her
crown at a Suffolk castle – to the humblest – a workman
whitewashing religious pictures in a church.
These
moments in time helped create our history in East Anglia. In this
book, former journalist Peter Sargent takes us on a journey in time,
from the mysterious ancient figure of the Green Man in Norwich
Cathedral, via the day King Charles II rode a winner at Newmarket’s
racetrack on to Second World War soldiers preparing for the D-Day
landings in woods on the Norfolk-Suffolk border.
In
this series of short stories, many of which first appeared in the
Eastern Daily Press newspaper, you will encounter famous figures who
made their mark. Here is Oliver Cromwell raising an army in his own
backyard, Queen Elizabeth I on a Royal Progress, while highwayman
Dick Turpin goes about his nefarious business.
You’ll
also meet less familiar figures and veer well off the beaten track.
Here are tales of a Cambridgeshire Iron Age ‘hill fort’,
Norfolk’s raffish 19th Century bare knuckle boxers and the sailors
who fought a huge, but barely remembered, 17th century sea battle off
the Suffolk coast.
Peter
Sargent’s interest in history was sparked when he studied the
subject at the University of East Anglia, Norwich, during the 1980s.
After working in Peterborough and Cambridge, via spells in Malta and
Hong Kong, he later returned to Norfolk to work as a journalist on
newspapers and magazines. From 2004-11 he wrote weekly articles on
local history which appeared in The Eastern Daily Press, and was
production editor on Let’s Talk magazine for six years. He lives in
Norwich. This is his first published book.
A Moment in Time, price £12 can be ordered here at allthingsnorfolk.com
ISBN Paperback: 9780995618718, 160 pages + 8 pages colour illustrations.
