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1942: Britain at the Brink

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About this listen

 'Taylor Downing vividly brings to life a terrible year' Max Hastings, Sunday Times

'Taylor Downing is a wonderful historian and a wonderful history communicator.' Dan Snow, History Hit
Eighty years ago, Britain stood at the brink of defeat. In 1942, a string of military disasters engulfed Britain in rapid succession : the collapse in Malaya; the biggest surrender in British history at Singapore; the passing of three large German warships through the Straits of Dover in broad daylight; the longest ever retreat through Burma to the gates of India; serious losses to Rommel's forces in North Africa; the siege of Malta and the surrender at Tobruk. All of this occurred against the backdrop of catastrophic sinkings in the Atlantic and the Arctic convoys. People began to claim that Churchill was not up to the job and his leadership was failing badly. Public morale reached a new low. 1942 Britain At the Brink explores the story of frustration and despair in that year prompting the Prime Minister to demand of his army chief 'Have you not got a single general who can win battles?' Using new archival material, historian Taylor Downing shows just how unpopular Churchill became in 1942 with two votes attacking his leadership in the Commons and the emergence of a serious political rival.

Most people think that Britain's worst moment of the war was in 1940 when the nation stood up against the threat of German invasion. In 1942 Britain at the Brink, Taylor Downing describes in nail-biting detail what was really Britain's darkest hour .©2022 Taylor Downing Europe Great Britain Military Winston Churchill War England Africa Imperialism Submarine United Kingdom Royalty Western Europe Middle East British Empire Interwar Period

Critic reviews

Taylor Downing vividly brings to life a terrible year (Max Hastings)
Taylor Downing is a wonderful historian and a wonderful history communicator. (Dan Snow)
A revealing study... Downing sheds intriguing light on just how close Churchill was to losing his grip on power
All stars
Most relevant
excellent production, but the narrator giving Monty a Scottish accent was a spoiler but fun!

Not bad

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Although the narrator had a beautiful voice giving an enjoyable listen, I found his attempts to quote speeches with his impression of how Germans,South Africans Australians, New Zelanders,Americans and Brits from his impression of how the working class and toff spoke was demeaning to me . He sounded like a Dad reading to his children. Although I should imagine that very few children under 10 would want to listen to such a book about the second world war. Apart from that, the books content has cleared up a lot of loose ends around that period of the war.

informative

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Taylor Downing has given a clear account of the history of the period. The narrative is given in a clear way so that the people we have all heard about are depicted in their part in that part of history. Taylor's way of describing history follows on from the hundreds of hours of TV history documentaries he was involved in. making .

An Excellent accurate history of 1942

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Although the individual episodes of 1942- like the fall of Singapore and Tobruk- are well known, the author has put them together and drawn some interesting, and to me, new conclusions.
On the other hand the reader’s general tone and particularly use of accents I found to be irritating and even offensive. East Enders, Northerners, Russians, and citizens of the Home Counties were all patronised equally.

Liked the story but hated the reading

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