The John Batchelor Show

R
Part 1: RRtPart 1: Cavalry Regiment Becomes Tank Unit
Cavalry Origins: In 1939, the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry begins World War II as a horse-mounted cavalry regiment within Britain's Territorial Army[2].
Palestine Deployment: Shipped to Palestine in January 1940, the regiment participates in one of the final sabers-drawn cavalry charges of the British Army against Arab insurrectionists[3][5].
Transition to Artillery and Armor: Stripped of their horses in July 1940, they serve as an artillery unit in Crete and Tobruk before converting to an armored tank regiment in late 1941[6].
Key Figures: Stockbroker Stanley Christopherson joins the unit, becoming one of the rare officers to serve continuously from Palestine to the war's conclusion[6].
First Tank Actions: The regiment experiences its baptism of armored combat at Alam Halfa in August 1942 before receiving American Sherman tanks for the Second Battle of El Alamein

Cavalry Origins: In 1939, the Sherwood Rangers Yeomanry begins World War II as a horse-mounted cavalry regiment within Britain's Territorial Army[2].
Palestine Deployment: Shipped to Palestine in January 1940, the regiment participates in one of the final sabers-drawn cavalry charges of the British Army against Arab insurrectionists[3][5].
Transition to Artillery and Armor: Stripped of their horses in July 1940, they serve as an artillery unit in Crete and Tobruk before converting to an armored tank regiment in late 1941[6].
Key Figures: Stockbroker Stanley Christopherson joins the unit, becoming one of the rare officers to serve continuously from Palestine to the war's conclusion[6].
First Tank Actions: The regiment experiences its baptism of armored combat at Alam Halfa in August 1942 before receiving American Sherman tanks for the Second Battle of El Alamein

1753
Mistakes Inside Logan’s Frontier Speech — Part One
Professor Robert G. Parkinson, author of Heart of American Darkness: Bewilderment and Horror on the Early Frontier, explains how Logan’s lament, printed in the Pennsylvania Journal in 1775, wrongly blamed Colonel Cresapfor the 1774 Yellow Creek murder of his family. He describes how border confusion between Pennsylvania and Maryland fueled violent land rivalries, while the diplomat Shikellamy and James Logan shaped early colonial-Indigenous land deals like the Walking Purchase. (1)

19666
Psychological Trauma and National Amnesia
Tania Branigan, author of Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution, explores psychological trauma with mental health professionals in Shanghai, addressing Maoist hysteria and the coping concept of “eating bitterness.” She shows how state censorship and fractured personal memory combine to create national amnesia, even as Xi Jinpingrevives centralized leader worship. (8)

1966
ragic Matricide of Zhang Hongbing
Tania Branigan, author of Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution, recounts how Zhang Hongbing, at sixteen, denounced his mother, Fang Zhongmou, for criticizing Mao Zedong in 1970, leading to her execution. Decades later, consumed by guilt, Zhang fights to protect her endangered grave at a construction site and seeks historical atonement. (7)

1969
Lin Biao and Youth Memories
Tania Branigan, author of Red Memory: The Afterlives of China’s Cultural Revolution, discusses Lin Biao’s rise as Mao’s sycophantic successor, his mysterious 1971 plane crash, and how his demise shattered ideological faith. She also examines reunions of the “educated youth” who, despite harsh rural banishment, express nostalgic camaraderie for their lost youth. (6)