Robert Alexander Clarke Parker (15 June 1927 - 23 April 2001) was a British historian who specialised in Britain's

appeasement Appeasement in an international context is a diplomatic policy of making political, material, or territorial concessions to an aggressive power in order to avoid conflict. The term is most often applied to the foreign policy of the UK governm ...

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

and the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. Fellow historian

Kenneth O. Morgan Kenneth Owen Morgan, Baron Morgan, (born 16 May 1934) is a Welsh historian and author, known especially for his writings on modern British history and politics and on Welsh history. He is a regular reviewer and broadcaster on radio and televisi ...

called him "perhaps the leading authority on the international crises of the 1930s, appeasement and the coming of war".Kenneth O. Morgan,
Alastair Parker
, ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' (25 April 2001), retrieved 12 January 2020.

Early life

He was born in

Barnsley Barnsley () is a market town in South Yorkshire, England. As the main settlement of the Metropolitan Borough of Barnsley and the fourth largest settlement in South Yorkshire. In Barnsley, the population was 96,888 while the wider Borough has ...

Yorkshire Yorkshire ( ; abbreviated Yorks), formally known as the County of York, is a Historic counties of England, historic county in northern England and by far the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its large area in comparison with other Eng ...

to a family with a Scottish roots, which Parker was proud of; he changed his first name to Alastair. He served in the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...

during the

and after the war's end he won a scholarship to

Christ Church, Oxford Christ Church ( la, Ædes Christi, the temple or house, '' ædēs'', of Christ, and thus sometimes known as "The House") is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, the college is uniqu ...

. He studied modern history, for which he gained a First. For his doctoral thesis, Parker studied

Coke of Norfolk Thomas William Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester (6 May 175430 June 1842), known as Coke of Norfolk or Coke of Holkham, was a British politician and agricultural reformer. Born to Wenman Coke, Member of Parliament (MP) for Derby, and his wife Elizab ...

and the

British Agricultural Revolution The British Agricultural Revolution, or Second Agricultural Revolution, was an unprecedented increase in agricultural production in Britain arising from increases in labour and land productivity between the mid-17th and late 19th centuries. Agric ...

. This was eventually published in 1975.

Academic career

In 1952

Lewis Namier Sir Lewis Bernstein Namier (; 27 June 1888 – 19 August 1960) was a British historian of Polish-Jewish background. His best-known works were ''The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III'' (1929), ''England in the Age of the Ameri ...

appointed Parker to a lectureship in history at

Manchester University , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

, a post he held until 1957. From 1957 until his retirement in 1997, he was a Fellow and tutor at

The Queen's College, Oxford The Queen's College is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford, England. The college was founded in 1341 by Robert de Eglesfield in honour of Philippa of Hainault. It is distinguished by its pred ...

. His main area of historical study was

Neville Chamberlain Arthur Neville Chamberlain (; 18 March 18699 November 1940) was a British politician of the Conservative Party who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from May 1937 to May 1940. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasemen ...

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...

and the

of Germany. He taught a special subject on the origins of the Second World War at The Queen's College. In his 1997 work, ''Chamberlain and Appeasement'', Parker argued that Chamberlain did not pursue appeasement in order to buy time, as some of his defenders claimed. He added that Churchill's alternative strategy of an Anglo-French alliance was a realistic and more honourable course. In his last book, ''Churchill and Appeasement'' (2000), Parker noted what he considered to be Churchill's misjudgments over India and the Spanish Civil War but said Churchill was completely right on the threat from

. Churchill's proposal of an Anglo-Soviet alliance may well have deterred

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

if it had been adopted, Parker claimed. He edited a collection of essays on Churchill which were published in 1995. Parker held

Old Labour The British Labour Party grew out of the trade union movement of the late 19th century and surpassed the Liberal Party as the main opposition to the Conservatives in the early 1920s. In the 1930s and 1940s, it stressed national planning, using ...

political views and canvassed for the Labour Party at elections.

Works

*''Europe: 1918-1945'' (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1969; first published in 1967 in German as part of the well-known ''Fischer Weltgeschichte''). * (re-titled ''The Second World War'' in 1997 for paperback) *''Chamberlain and Appeasement'' (Palgrave Macmillan, 1993). *''Churchill and Appeasement: Could Churchill have prevented the Second World War?'' (Macmillan, 2000).

Notes

1927 births 2001 deaths Fellows of The Queen's College, Oxford Academics of the University of Manchester People from Barnsley 20th-century British historians {{UK-historian-stub