Richard Overy (born 23 December 1947) is a British historian who has published extensively on the history of World War II and the Third Reich. In 2007 as The Times editor of Complete History of the World he chose the 50 key dates of world history.

After being educated at Caius College, Cambridge and awarded a research fellowship at Churchill College, Overy taught history at Cambridge from 1972 to 1979, as a fellow of Queens' College and from 1976 as a university assistant lecturer. In 1980 he moved to King's College London, where he became professor of modern history in 1994. He was appointed to a professorship in Exeter University in 2004.

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, PC, DL, FRS, Hon. RA (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British Conservative politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. Widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century, he served as Prime Minister twice (1940–45 and 1951–55). A noted statesman and orator, Churchill was also an officer in the British Army, a historian, a writer, and an artist. He is the only British prime minister to have received the Nobel Prize in Literature, and was the first person to be made an Honorary Citizen of the United States.

Churchill was born into the aristocratic family of the Dukes of Marlborough. His father, Lord Randolph Churchill, was a charismatic politician who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer; his mother, Jenny Jerome, was an American socialite. As a young army officer, he saw action in British India, the Sudan, and the Second Boer War. He gained fame as a war correspondent and wrote books about his campaigns.

Castruccio Castracani degli Antelminelli (1281 – September 3, 1328) was an Italian condottiero and duke of Lucca.

Castruccio was born in Lucca, a member of the noble family of Antelminelli, of the Ghibelline party. In 1300 he was exiled with his parents and others of their faction by the Guelphs "Black" party, then in the ascendant. At nineteen he became orphaned, and subsequently served as a condottiero under Philip IV of France in Flanders, then with the Visconti in Lombardy, and in 1313 under the Ghibelline chief, Uguccione della Faggiuola, lord of Pisa, in central Italy.

He assisted Uguccione in many enterprises, including the capture of Lucca (1314) and the Battle of Montecatini (1315), in which he was the main protagonist of the victory over the Guelph League led by the Florentines. However, due to his growing popularity, Uguccione had him jailed and condemned to death. An insurrection of the Lucchesi having led to the expulsion of Uguccione and his party, Castruccio regained his freedom and his position, and the Ghibelline triumph was presently assured.

Luke Haines (born 7 October 1967) is an English musician, songwriter and author, who has recorded music under various names and with various bands, including The Auteurs, Baader Meinhof and Black Box Recorder.

Haines formed numerous bands when he was at school. At college he joined The Servants who recorded two commercially unsuccessful albums. It was only when Haines formed The Auteurs with his girlfriend Alice Readman (who had also been drafted into The Servants from time to time) and Glenn Collins in 1990 that he began to achieve some success.

Regular gigging in the London area and an NME sponsored gig brought them to the attention of Hut Records. They released their first single, "Showgirl" in 1992, and their debut album New Wave a month later. Haines was later to claim that this was the album that started Britpop, though he later showed disdain towards the movement, stating in a 2003 interview that Britpop consisted of "a bunch of bands who weren't good enough to exist in their own right, like music's equivalent of the Bloomsbury Group." Certainly it was ahead of its time in turning back from the acid house then popular to more traditional songwriting in the vein of The Kinks or The Small Faces. It is arguable that more commercially successful bands (such as Suede) owed much to Haines' vision. In any case, the album sold only 12,000 copies but was nominated for a Mercury Prize although the eventual winners were Suede