100 Letters that Changed the World

The Spartans respond to a letter from Philip II of Macedon 14 Caesar’s murderers correspond to work out their next move 16 St. Paul guides the principles of Christianity through his letters 18 Tablets reveal details of life at the edge of the Roman Empire 20 Pliny the Younger describes the eruption at Pompeii to Tacitus 22 Romano-Britons plead for help from Rome as the empire falls 24 English barons try to flex their legal muscle after Magna Carta 26 Joan of Arc tells Henry VI she has God on her side 28 Leonardo da Vinci sets out his skills to the Duke of Milan 30 Henry VII writes to English nobles asking for their support 32 Columbus explains his discoveries to the king of Spain 34 Martin Luther tells his friend, ‘Let your sins be strong’ 36 Henry VIII writes a love letter to Anne Boleyn 38 De las Casas exposes Spain’s atrocities in the New World 40 Elizabeth I writes to Bloody Mary, begging for her life 42 Babington’s plot is revealed in coded letters to Mary, Queen of Scots 44 Philip II of Spain insists the Armada press on and attack England 46 Lord Monteagle gets a carefully worded warning … 48 Galileo explains the first sighting of the moons of Jupiter 50 Charles II reassures Parliament that they will be in control 52 The English nobility make Prince William of Orange an offer 54 Ben Franklin’s stolen mail reveals a political scandal 56 Abigail Adams tells husband John to ‘Remember the Ladies’ 58 George Washington employs his first spy in the Revolutionary War 60 Jefferson advises his nephew to question the existence of God 62 Mozart writes to his wife as he struggles to finish Requiem 64 Maria Reynolds tells Alexander Hamilton her husband has found out 66 Thomas Jefferson wants a French botanist to explore the northwest 68 After murdering Marat in his bath, Charlotte Corday writes in despair 70 On the eve of battle, Lord Nelson sends a message to his fleet 72 Napoleon informs Alexander I that France and Russia are at war 74 As machines replace farm labour, Captain Swing issues a threat 76 Charles Darwin gets an offer to become the naturalist on a surveying ship 78 The first postage stamp transforms the sending of letters 80 Friedrich ‘Fred’ Engels begins a lifelong correspondence with Karl ‘Moor’ Marx 82 Baudelaire writes a suicide letter to his mistress … and lives 84 Major Robert Anderson reports he has surrendered Fort Sumter 86 On the eve of battle, Sullivan Ballou writes to his wife, Sarah 88 Abraham Lincoln sends GeneralMcClellan an ultimatum 90 Abraham Lincoln spells out his Civil War priorities to Horace Greeley 92 William Banting wants the world to know how he lost weight 94 General Sherman reminds the citizens of Atlanta that war is hell 96 Vincent van Gogh writes an emotional letter to his brother, Theo 98 A Chicago Methodist training school launches a moneymaker 100 George Washington Williams sends a furious open letter to King Leopold II of Belgium 102 Alexander Graham Bell writes to Helen Keller’s teacher Anne Sullivan 104 Beatrix Potter illustrates a letter to cheer up five-year-old Noel Moore 106 Pierre Curie sends Marie a letter begging her to come back and study 108 Oscar Wilde writes a letter to Lord Alfred Douglas from Reading Gaol 110 Writer Émile Zola accuses the French army of an anti-Semitic conspiracy 112 Orville and Wilbur Wright send news to their father, Bishop Milton Wright 114 John Muir lobbies Teddy Roosevelt about incursions into Yosemite 116 Lewis Wickes Hine reports to the National Child Labor Committee 118 Captain Scott: ‘We have been to the Pole and we shall die like gentlemen’ 120 The very final letter from the Titanic that was never sent 122 Zimmermann offers Mexico the return of Texas, Arizona and New Mexico 124 Lord Stamfordham suggests a new name for the British royal family 126 Siegfried Sassoon sends an open letter to The Times 128 Adof Hitler’s first anti-Semitic writing, a letter sent to Adolf Gemlich 130 Master spy Guy Burgess gets a reference to join the BBC 132 Eleanor Roosevelt takes a stand against the Daughters of the American Revolution 134 Albert Einstein and Leo Szilárd warn President Franklin D. Roosevelt 136 Mussolini congratulates Hitler on his pact with Russia 138 Winston Churchill pens a blunt response to his private secretary 140 Roosevelt sends Churchill the poem that moved Abraham Lincoln 142 Virginia Woolf writes a final letter to her husband Leonard 144 Winston Churchill gets an urgent request from the codebreakers 146 Telegram reports that Pearl Harbor is under attack 148 General Nye sends General Alexander a misleading letter … by submarine 150 Oppenheimer gets the go-ahead to research an atomic bomb 152 J. Edgar Hoover receives ‘The Anonymous Letter’ 154 The shipwrecked JFK sends a vital message with two Solomon Islanders 156 Marshal Tito warns Stalin to stop sending assassination squads 158 Lillian Hellman sends a letter and a message to Senator McCarthy 160 William Borden identifies J. Robert Oppenheimer as a Soviet spy 162 Jackie Robinson tells Eisenhower his people are tired of waiting 164 Wallace Stegner composes as paean to the American wilderness 166 Nelson Mandela sends the South African prime minister an ultimatum 168 Decca sends a rejection letter to Beatles manager Brian Epstein 170 On the brink of war, Khrushchev sends a conciliatory letter to Kennedy 172 Kennedy replies to Khrushchev as tensions ease 174 Martin Luther King, Jr. sends a letter from Birmingham City Jail 176 Profumo’s resignation puts an end to British politics’ biggest sex scandal 178 Che Guevara tells Fidel Castro he wants to continue the fight 180 James McCord writes to Judge John Sirica after the Watergate trial 182 Ronald Wayne sells his 10 percent share in Apple for $800 184 Bill Gates writes an open letter to computer hobbyists who are ripping off his software 186 Michael Schumacher crosses out ‘the’ and becomes World Champion 188 Boris Yeltsin admits running Russia was tougher than he expected 190 Sharron Watkins sends a letter criticizing Enron’s dubious accounting 192 Dr. David Kelly admits he was the source for critical BBC report 194 Bobby Henderson asks Kansas to acknowledge the Spaghetti Monster 196 Chelsea Manning writes to Wikileaks with a data dump 198 Astronauts lament America’s lack of a space delivery system 200 Pussy Riot singer trades philosophies with Slavoj Zizek 202 Edward Snowden has a shocking revelation for the German press 204 The whistleblowers appeal to future whistleblowers 206 Letters – the next investment boom to follow art? 208 Women in the entertainment industry demand change 210 Greta Thunberg reads a letter to the Indian prime minister 212 Addendum: Helen Keller writes to Alexander Graham Bell 214 Index 221