For he’s a jolly good Fellow

Ever since I started ruffling feathers by writing ‘Kruger, Kommandos and Kak’, my books have been frantically dismissed by a certain type of South African ‘academic’. Not only did I dare to challenge their cosy, self-serving myths, but I continue do so from outside the restrictive, group-think, ‘Emperor’s New Clothes’ confines of South African academia; an academia which (with a couple of honourable exceptions) seems resolutely determined to maintain Apartheid-era fables at all costs.  

I can thus only begin to imagine the rage my entertaining little gaggle of detractors will experience when they learn that, in recognition of my myth-busting histories of the Boer War (and my recently-released Military Atlas of that conflict), I have been elected as a Fellow of both the Royal Geographical Society, and the Royal Historical Society.

It would seem that, away from the History Department echo-chambers of certain low-brow South African Universities, work to challenge Apartheid-regime propaganda and self-pitying Old Wives’ Tales is very well received, and I am proud to officially now be Christopher D R Ash BSc FRGS FRHistS.
Goodness me, what a mouthful… as the actress said to the bishop.