Bøger af Kate Colquhoun

The pre-eminent Victorian was Joseph Paxton who bestrode the worlds of horticulture, urban planning, and architecture like a colossus. He was a self-taught polymath who had a solution to every large-scale logistical problem, the genius Charles Dickens dubbed "The Busiest Man in England."Rising quickly from humble beginnings, Paxton, at age 23, became head gardener and architect at Chatsworth, the estate of the sixth Duke of Devonshire. Under Paxton's direction, Chatsworth was transformed into the greatest garden in England, a paradise of magnificent greenhouses, gravity-defying fountains, and innovative waterworks. Queen Victoria herself came to marvel; here was Britain's answer to the hanging gardens of Babylon. But it was the Crystal Palace, home of the Great Exhibition of 1851, that secured Paxton's fame. Two thousand men worked for eight months to complete this unprecedented temporary structure of iron and glass. It was six times the size of St. Paul's Cathedral, and entertained six million visitors. In the wake of its spectacular success, Paxton was in constant demand to design public buildings and propose ways to ease congestion in London, then the world's most populous city. Author Kate Colquhoun tells the compelling story of a man who embodied the Victorian ideals of self-improvement, industry, and civic service, and paints a touching portrait of a remarkably down-to-earth visionary.

A brilliantly conceived biography of Joseph Paxton, horticulturist to the Duke & Duchess of Devonshire at Chatsworth, architect of the Crystal Palace at the Great Exhibition of 1851 and one of the greatest unsung heroes of the Victorian Age In the nineteenth century, which witnessed a revolution in horticulture and urban planning and architecture, Joseph Paxton, a man with no formal education, strode like a colossus. Head gardener at Chatsworth by the age of twenty-three, and encouraged by the sixth Duke of Devonshire whose patronage soon flourished into the defining friendship of his life, Paxton set about transforming this Derbyshire estate into the greatest garden in England. Visitors there were astonished by the enormous glasshouses and ambitious waterworks he built, the collection of orchids, the largest in all England, the dwarf bananas and the gargantuan lily, the trees and plants brought back from all over the world. Queen Victoria came to marvel and, increasingly, with the development of the railway in which Paxton was also involved, daytrippers from all over the country. It was the Crystal Palace, home of the Great Exhibition in 1851, that secured Paxton's fame. His design, initially doodled on a piece of blotting paper, was the architectural triumph of its time. Two thousand men worked for eight months to complete it. It was six times the size of St Paul's Cathedral, enclosed a space of 18 acres, and entertained six million visitors. By the time of his death fourteen years later, 'the busiest man in England' according to Dickens, was friends with Brunel and Stevenson and in constant demand to design public parks and gardens. His last, seemingly most eccentric project was for a Great Boulevard under glass, a crystal arcade that would connect all the main railway termini in London. Drawing on exclusive access to Paxton's personal letters, Kate Colquhouns's remarkable biography is a compelling story of a man who typifies the Victorian ideal of self-improvement and a touching portrait of one of that era's great heroes.

In the summer of 1889, young Southern belle Florence Maybrick stood trial for the alleged arsenic poisoning of her much older husband, Liverpool cotton merchant James Maybrick. 'The Maybrick Mystery' had all the makings of a sensation: a pretty, flirtatious young girl; resentful, gossiping servants; rumours of gambling and debt; and torrid mutual infidelity. The case cracked the varnish of Victorian respectability, shocking and exciting the public in equal measure as they clambered to read the latest revelations of Florence's past and glimpse her likeness in Madame Tussaud's. Florence's fate was fiercely debated in the courtroom, on the front pages of the newspapers and in parlours and backyards across the country. Did she poison her husband? Was her previous infidelity proof of murderous intentions? Was James' own habit of self-medicating to blame for his demise? Historian Kate Colquhoun recounts an utterly absorbing tale of addiction, deception and adultery that keeps you asking to the very last page, did she kill him?

In July 1864, Thomas Briggs was travelling home after visiting his niece and her husband for dinner. He entered a First Class carriage on the 9.45pm Hackney service of the North London railway. At Hackney, two bank clerks entered the carriage and discovered blood in the seat cushions; also on the floor, windows and sides of the carriage. A bloodstained hat was found on the seat along with a broken link from a watch chain. The race to identify the killer and catch him as he flees on a boat to America was eagerly followed by citizens both sides of the Atlantic. Kate Colquhoun tells a gripping tale of a crime that shocked the nation.