A sweeping, brilliantly vivid history of the sudden end of the British empire and the moment when America became a world superpower—published on the 60th anniversary of Britain’s withdrawal from Palestine

“I have not become the King's First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire.” Winston Churchill's famous statement in November 1942, just as the tide of the Second World War was beginning to turn, pugnaciously affirmed his loyalty to the world-wide institution that he had served for most of his life. Britain fought and sacrificed on a worldwide scale to defeat Hitler and his allies—and won. Yet less than five years after Churchill's defiant speech, the British Empire effectively ended with Indian Independence in August 1947 and the end of the British Mandate in Palestine in May 1948. As the sun set on Britain’s Empire, the age of America as world superpower dawned.

How did this rapid change of fortune come about? Peter Clarke's book is the first to analyze the abrupt transition from Rule Britannia to Pax Americana. His swift-paced narrative makes superb use of letters and diaries to provide vivid portraits of the figures around whom history pivoted: Churchill, Gandhi, Roosevelt, Stalin, Truman, and a host of lesser-known figures though whom Clarke brilliantly shows the human dimension of epochal events.

Clarke traces the intimate andconflicted nature of the “special relationship,” showing how Roosevelt and his successors were determined that Britain must be sustained both during the war and after, but that the British Empire must not; and reveals how the tension between Allied war aims, suppressed while the fighting was going on, became rapidly apparent when it ended. The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire is a captivating work of popular history that shows how the events that followed the war reshaped the world as profoundly as the conflict itself.

Peter Clarke was Professor of Modern History and Master of Trinity Hall at Cambridge. His many books include the acclaimed final volume of the Penguin History of Britain, Hope and Glory, Britain 1900-2000, and A Question of Leadership: Gladstone to Blair. He lives in Suffolk, England, and Pender Island, British Columbia.

Praise for The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire:

“Clarke has created a brilliant popular history ... he tells [the story] with such wit, verve, and scholarly insight that one seems to encounter a brave new world.” – Piers Brendon, Sunday
Telegraph

“Clarke is an academic, but he hasn't allowed academic scruples to inhibit his talent for storytelling. He has a talent for pithily summing up characters.” – Mark Tully, The Times

“A bold and thought-provoking work, as well as a hugely enjoyable read.” – Stephen Howe, Independent