New book highlights 50 fascinating stories from our past

The people and places of East Anglia's past are brought back to life in new book, A Place in History, by Peter Sargent.

'Look around you. Just about everywhere in our region is steeped in history,' said Peter.

His latest collection of fascinating facts and characters focuses on 50 places where history happened. It tells the stories of an Iron Age fort in north Norfolk, a Roman road seemingly leading to nowhere and villages visited by Christian saints.

A Place in History includes the legend of marshland giant Tom Hickathrift and wonders whether the Anglo-Saxon saga Beowulf was actually written in Suffolk.

'Imagine a couple of history fans mulling over the subject in the pub,' says Peter.

In 50 short stories he introduces kings, queens, revolutionaries and working class heroes; soldiers and sailors; entrepreneurs and philanthropists, clergymen and a raffish hell-raising boxer.

'So many people have their place in history. For some it is a large and well-known slot, familiar to millions of people in the present day. Others have a far more humble location, and are not so well-known,' said Peter. 'They all find their place in this book.'

Some of the people and places he picks are familiar, others are less well-known. He explores the Norwich street where a bloody duel was fought by some argumentative Elizabethans, visits the venerable Norwich hotel where the revolution was toasted by idealists in 1791, meets Old Grog Vernon of Ipswich, reveals an unrepentant Great Yarmouth Parliamentarian who was determined to cut off the King's head and paid the ultimate penalty and introduces early cricketing hero, Fuller Pilch of Holt.

The book is a sequel to Peter's A Moment in Time, 50 stories that bring East Anglian history to life.

'Once again there is a varied cast list; saints and sinners, scholars and sportsmen, rogues and writers, soldiers and sailors, queens and commoners, revolutionaries and reactionaries. They all have their place in history, as you'll discover in these pages,' said Peter, a history graduate, journalist and author.

A Place in History, by Peter Sargent, published by Paul Dickson Books on September 26, is priced £12 and is available in bookshops across the region.