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The oldest known survivor of the Nazi Holocaust, Alice Herz-Sommer, has died in London at the age of 110. Born into a Jewish family in Prague in 1903, Ms Herz-Sommer spent two years in a Nazi concentration camp in Terezin. She was an accomplished pianist and music teacher and taught at the...

Ray Ellis, the last survivor of the 1942 Battle of Knightsbridge, who was also the last soldier to fire on advancing German troops in the battle, has died in Nottingham aged 94. The battle - one of the most celebrated acts of bravery in the Royal Artillery’s history - saw the 107th Regiment of...

Scotland's footballers have today been drawn against new boys Gibraltar and next door neighbours Republic of Ireland in the qualifiers for Euro 2016. It is the first time Gibraltar are to play in the qualifiers of any major tournament. Last year the tiny British territory, which borders Spain...

The MoD has confirmed that the Queen will officially name one of the Royal Navy's new 65,000-tonne Queen Elizabeth-class aircraft carriers HMS Queen Elizabeth at a ceremony on Friday 4th July. The event will be held at Rosyth dockyard in Fife where work to assemble the vessel is being...

A woman who died almost 4,000 years ago was suffering from toothache. The Bronze Age woman was found by archaeologists from Glasgow-based Guard Archaeology after a cist – a stone burial chest – was inadvertently disturbed by construction workers during landscaping of an access track through...

A good thing that WWI did was enrich the already rich English language. The conflict gave rise to British English expressions and slang such as "Blighty" ("Britain"), "cushy" ("undemanding", "easy", "secure", "comfortable") and "Boche" ("German"), but only some are still used, says Kate Wild...

An ancient forest has emerged after the recent storms. The 5,000 year old tree stumps, from the Bronze Age, emerged when the peat which once covered and preserved them was washed away by torrential rain and strong waves. Now they cover a whole beach near the village of Borth, Ceredigion, on...

Football's first professional black player is to be commemorated with a statue in South Yorkshire. Arthur Wharton is to be honoured outside Rotherham United's New York Stadium. Born in 1865 in Jamestown, in the British Gold Coast, in what is now Ghana, Wharton played for Rotherham Town - the...

They are two of history’s most captivating figures, their romance-turned-tragedy known the world over. But what was the true nature of the relationship between Henry VIII and his second wife Anne Boleyn, and how did Anne come to lose her head? In a new two-part series for Britain's Channel 5...

As part of the Natural History Season on the brilliant BBC Four (one of the best TV channels there is, it is renowned for its brilliant science and history documentaries), Dr Michael Mosley, a medical doctor and former City banker, turns his body into a living laboratory by infecting himself...

Did you know that John Quincy Adams had a pet alligator?; that President Jackson had a foul-mouthed parrot?; that Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's second wife, had a confused-looking lapdog who died after falling from a great height?; and that Lord Byron probably had more pets than Dr Doolittle? Well...

A 7ft tall hedgehog has arrived in London. But, thankfully for the denizens of that great metropolis, it isn't real. The prickly Erinaceinae has been unveiled to mark the launch of Sir David Attenborough's new TV wildlife series. The beast emerged from two months of hibernation at a workshop...

Experts in the legend of Robin Hood have dismissed a ballad that claims the famous outlaw had another love interest before Maid Marian. While the ballad insinuates a romance between Hood and the Queen, historian Ralph Needham points out that it would have been written a long time after the...

Four suspect packages delivered to army careers offices bear "the hallmarks of Northern Ireland-related terrorism", Downing Street has said. Packages were sent to armed forces recruitment centres in St Giles, Oxford; the Queensmere Shopping Centre in Slough; St Peter's Street in Canterbury...

UKIP once again showing they are becoming the Tory Party of the North of England by doing well in yet another Northern English election, leading to their leader Nigel Farage saying that the Conservatives were a "dying brand" in northern cities and UKIP was now the "main opposition" to Labour in...

Take 24 hours of Valentine's Day and 64 years between 1837 and 1901. Give them a good mix together and pop them in the oven for an hour. Once baked, what do you get? Ten bizarre, but true, Victorian love stories.... 10 bizarre Victorian love stories 14 February 2014 BBC By Jeremy...

These are the mugshots of Victorian child offenders - some of whom were as young as ten when they were arrested for petty crime. The black and white photographs, which originate from Dorset County Gaol - later to be known as Dorchester Prison - date to the mid-19th century when the concept of...

An 11-month-old baby girl was killed by an "American pit bull-type" dog while asleep upstairs in bed, police said. Ava-Jayne Marie Corless was taken to hospital from Emily Street, Blackburn, Lancashire at 23:00 GMT on Monday where she died. The baby's mother Chloe King, 20, and her boyfriend...

Queen have made UK chart history by becoming the first act to sell six million copies of an individual album. Their first Greatest Hits collection, which includes the hits We Will Rock You and Bohemian Rhapsody, has extended its lead after being Britain's highest-selling album for several...

Two future kings have made a plea to end the illegal wildlife trade. Prince Charles, 65, and his eldest son Prince William, 31, made an appeal, to be broadcast later, calling on people to act now to save endangered animals like rhinos, elephants and tigers. The joint plea comes at the start...