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. Michael Howard founded the Department of War Studies at King’s College London and went on to become Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford and Robert A Lovett Professor of Military and Naval History at Yale University. Inspired by Howard’s ambitious agenda, the study of the history of war has flourished at King’s College London. It now has more historians studying war than any other comparable institution.
The Centre promotes the scholarly history of war in all its dimensions, trains research students and hosts research projects and conferences. We promote the study of 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. 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.
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.
SMHC Annual Lecture 2021
This years lecture will be held on the 8 December with guest speaker Erica Charters on 'The metrics of war: Excess mortality and the politics of counting'.
Full information/sign up here
Call for Papers
Documenting War Conference
We invite original contributions from early-career and established scholars working in any field of study, but especially those exploring the intersection between points noted above and issues of foreign policy, defence, intelligence, grand strategy, irregular warfare, core international crimes, public health, new technology developments, security and development, and histories of state and empire. See here for full details and contact information