Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War

War has been a central feature of human history and requires study by historians from many different vantage points - from economic history to cultural history, from international history to the history of science and technology.

In the 1960s the distinguished historian Sir Michael Howard had a vision for a new kind of history of war; it would be studied in all its complexity and seek also to examine how the history of war affected history in general. The Sir Michael Howard Centre promotes the scholarly history of war in all its dimensions, trains research students and hosts research projects and conferences. We explore the history of war from the ancient world to the recent past, dealing not just with the history of armed services but also all involved in warfare.

The contemporary policy relevance of historical sources, methods, and expertise is also reflected across the social sciences, in law and in other disciplines. The Centre foregrounds this applied dimension in its attention to the practicalities of documenting war as well as the analytical challenges of understanding it.

The Centre builds on existing strengths such as the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives, the Hobson Library and Archive at the UK Defence Academy and a number of successful research sub-groups, such as the Second World War Research Group. At its heart is a resident community of over fifty nationally and internationally recognised scholars. They are authorities in military, naval, imperial and international history and related fields based in the Departments of War Studies, Defence Studies, History and indeed many others, for example the English Department.

Members

Niall Barr

Head of Defence Studies Department and Dean of Academic Studies

Tim Benbow

Reader in Strategic Studies

John Bew

Professor in History and Foreign Policy

Carl Bridge

Emeritus Professor of Australian Studies

Anna Brinkman-Schwartz

Lecturer in Defence Studies

Peter Busch

Senior Lecturer

Rudra Chaudhuri

Senior Lecturer

Santanu Das

Visiting Professor

Huw Davies

Deputy Head, Online & Digital

Christopher Dillon

Senior Lecturer in Modern German History

Huw Dylan

Reader in Intelligence Studies and International Security

David Easter

War Studies Online Academic Director

David Edgerton

Hans Rausing Professor of the History of Science and Technology and Professor of Modern British History

Lara Feigel

Professor of Modern Literature and Culture

Jonathan Fennell

Reader in Modern History

Kiera Fitzgerald

History of War MA

William Fletcher

Lecturer

Robert Foley

Reader

Aimée Fox

Senior Lecturer in Defence Studies

Ian Gooderson

Deputy Head Staff Development & Wellbeing

Michael Goodman

Professor of Intelligence and International Affairs

Christina Goulter

Reader in Defence Studies

Bérénice Guyot-Réchard

Senior Lecturer in Twentieth-Century International History

Peter Heather

Professor of Medieval History

Geraint Hughes

Reader in Diplomatic and Military History

Michael Innes

Visiting Senior Research Fellow

Tony Insall

Senior Visiting Research Fellow

Frederic Ischebeck-Baum

Fellow of the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War

Ashley Jackson

Professor of Imperial and Military History

Alan James

Reader in International History

David Jordan

Co-Director of the Freeman Air and Space Institute

Saul Kelly

Reader at the Defence Studies Department

Greg Kennedy

Professor of Strategic Foreign Policy

Charlie Laderman

Senior Lecturer in International History

Andrew Lambert

Laughton Professor of Naval History

Nick Lloyd

Professor of Modern Warfare

Joe Maiolo

Professor of International History

Helen McCartney

Reader in Defence Studies

Simon Moody

Lecturer

David Morgan-Owen

Reader in the History of War

William Philpott

Professor of the History of Warfare

Jon Robb-Webb

Lecturer

Michael Rowe

Reader in European History

Maeve Ryan

Senior Lecturer in History and Grand Strategy

Christian Tripodi

Reader

Chris Tuck

Reader

Kate Utting

Deputy Dean of Academic Studies - Planning

Richard Vinen

Professor of History

Alex Wilson

Lecturer in Security Studies

Patrick Wright FBA

Emeritus Professor of Literature, History and Politics

Barbara Zanchetta

Senior Lecturer

Second World War Research Group Global seminar series

The Second World War Research Group brings you a seminar series exploring various histories of the war, bringing together new perspectives and research from scholars across the university and its international partners.

Visit the seminar series page

Annual Lecture - The metrics of war: Excess mortality and the politics of counting

Dr Erica Charters delivered a fascinating insight into the political and social implications of metrics of counting morality in war in early modern and modern warfare

Read the story here

Watch the recording

New Directions in the History of War and Violence

This series brings together a range of influential senior academics and promising young scholars, who will reflect on the current state of the art in the field, and also point to new and innovative ways of researching, writing, and discussing the history of war and violence.

Visit the event series page

Re-assessing the Franco-Prussian War - 150 years on

May 10 2021 marked the 150th anniversary of the Treaty of Frankfurt, which officially ended the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-71. Though largely forgotten in Britain today, this conflict ushered in transformative changes to the European geopolitical system, and had a profound impact on the development of the modern state. French and German nationalism were both significantly shaped by this event, which also brought about wider political and social changes in education, health policy, and, of course, the theories and practices of the conduct of war. This two-day conference, organized under the auspices of King’s College London’s Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War, in conjunction with the Embassy of France in the UK, seeks to interrogate the significance and legacies of some the key political, social, cultural, and military transformations brought about by this crucial turning point in both European and world history.

Conference Playlist

Previous events

Sir Michael Howard Memorial Service

SMHC Annual Lecture 2020: Sir Michael Howard and Clausewitz

SMHC Annual Lecture - Dec 2019

Mobilising resources for war, KCL/All Souls Conference - Dec 2019

NATO @ 70, Past and Present conference - Dec 2019

Armageddon: The Second World War in Comparative Perspective - June 2019

SMHC Annual Lecture - Dec 2018

Early Cold War: New Perspectives - Nov 18

Applied History The British Army and the Study of War - Jun 2018

The Peoples' Wars? - The Second World War In Socio-Political Perspective - Jun 2018

Members of the Centre have written prize winning and best selling books.

Richard Vinen’s National Service: Conscription in Britain, 1945-1963 (Allen Lane, 2014) won the 2015 Wolfson Prize for History
Andrew Stewart’s First Victory: The Second World War and the East Africa Campaign (Yale University Press, 2016) was runner up for the Templer Medal Book Prize.
Nick Lloyd’s Passchendaele: A New History (Penguin, 2017) was on the Sunday Times UK bestseller list.

Members of the Centre participate in national and international research projects.

Dr Jonathan Fennell and Prof Joe Maiolo have been awarded funding to launch the General Anders Research Fellowship in Anglo-Polish History, a three-year postdoctoral fellowship within the Sir Michael Howard Centre for the History of War.
Ashley Jackson and Jean Smith collaborate on a Leverhulme Trust funded project, ‘Empire in Motion: Conflict and Co-Operation during the Second World War’.
Helen McCartney works on an AHRC funded project, ‘Our Place in the First World War’; and Lara Feigel is involved with an ERC funded project, 'Beyond enemy lines literature and film in the British and American zones of occupied Germany, 1945-1949'.

Conflict Records Unit

The Conflict Records Unit will promote the development, use and understanding of conflict records.

The Conflict Records Unit

First World War Research Group

The First World War Research Group brings together a wealth of expertise on military, diplomatic, social, and cultural aspects of the conflict.

First World War Research Group

Laughton Naval Unit

The Laughton Unit educates and researches in the field of naval history and maritime strategy to support and shape the evolution of naval history as a tool across a broad spectrum of disciplines and debates in the world around us.

Laughton Naval Unit

Second World War Research Group

The Second World War Research Group aims to promote innovative research on the conflict and its global aspects and act as a forum for bringing together new perspectives as well as encouraging collaboration across the scholarly community through conferences, seminars and other events.

Second World War Research Group

Black and white image of soldiers on parade

Occupation Studies Research Network

The Occupation Studies Research Network promotes the exchange of ideas and sharing of information among the international community of scholars actively researching military occupation as a form of alien rule and as a dynamic power relationship between occupiers and occupied. The joint convenors of the Network are Dr Christopher Knowles, Visiting Research Fellow at King's College London and Dr Camilo Erlichman, Assistant Professor at Maastricht University in the Netherlands.

The Occupation Studies Research Network