Hugh Thomas, Baron Thomas of Swynnerton

Hugh Swynnerton Thomas, Baron Thomas of Swynnerton (21 October 1931 – 7 May 2017)^[1][2] was an English historian and writer, best known for his book The Spanish Civil War.^[3]

Early life

Thomas was born on 21 October 1931 in

Until 1974, Thomas was a member of the Labour Party.^[5] He was created a life peer as Baron Thomas of Swynnerton, of Notting Hill in Greater London by letters patent dated 16 June 1981, and sat as a Conservative, before he joined the Liberal Democrats in late 1997.^[6] He later sat as a crossbencher.

He wrote political works favouring European integration, such as Europe: the Radical Challenge (1973), as well as histories. He was also the author of three novels: The World's Game (1957), The Oxygen Age (1958), and Klara (1988). Thomas's 1961 book The Spanish Civil War won the Somerset Maugham Award for 1962. A significantly revised and enlarged third edition was published in 1977; further editions were published in 1999 and 2012. Cuba, or the Pursuit of Freedom (1971) is a book of over 1,500 pages tracing the history of Cuba from Spanish colonial rule until the Cuban Revolution. In 1985, he signed a petition against the Sandinista National Liberation Front of Nicaragua,^[7] in support of the Contras, an anti-Sandinista paramilitary group.

In 1990 he was one of the leading historians behind the setting up of the History Curriculum Association. The Association advocated a more knowledge-based history curriculum in schools. It expressed "profound disquiet" at the way history was being taught in the classroom and observed that the integrity of history was threatened.^[8]

Personal life

Thomas was married to Hon. Vanessa Jebb, a

• Disarmament – The Way Ahead Fabian Society (1957).
• The Spanish Civil War (1961); Penguin Books Ltd (1968); 2nd revised edition (1977); 4th revised edition (2003). A new revised edition in 2011^[11] commemorated the book's reaching 50 consecutive years in print; it was published in 15 languages. online
• Cuba or the Pursuit of Freedom (1971); revised editions (1998), (2002), (2010). online
• Europe: The Radical Challenge (1973).
• John Strachey (1973). online
• An Unfinished History of the World (1979); published in the United States as A History of the World, then as World History (1998); and under the original title in London (by Hamish Hamilton) in 1979, and with revised editions in 1981 and 1982. online edition
• The Revolution On Balance (1983), Washington, DC; Cuban American National Foundation 1983 (CANF pamphlet #5). online
• Armed Truce (1986). A history of the beginning of the Cold War. online
• Ever Closer Union (1991).
• The Conquest of Mexico (1993); published in the United States as Conquest: Montezuma, Cortés and the Fall of Old Mexico. online
• The Slave Trade: The History of the Atlantic Slave Trade 1440–1870 (1997); Simon & Schuster. online
• Who Is Who of the
  Conquistadors
  (2000). A study of those who fought for Cortés.
• Rivers of Gold (2003); the first book in a trilogy about the Spanish Empire. online
• ISBN 978-0-300-12103-2
  .
• Eduardo Barreiros and the Recovery of Spain (2009); a biography of Eduardo Barreiros.
• The Golden Age: The Spanish Empire of Charles V (2010); the second book in a trilogy about the Spanish Empire. Published in the United States as The Golden Empire: Spain, Charles V, and the Creation of America (2011).
• The World's Game; a novel (1957).
• The Oxygen Age; a novel (1958).
• Klara, a novel (1988).
• The Suez Affair (1966); an analysis of the Suez Crisis of 1956.
• World Without End: The Global Empire of Philip II (2014); the third volume in a trilogy about the Spanish Empire.