The British colonialist associated with southern Africa and Rhodesia is often quoted about his idea of forming a secret society with the goal of furthering British interests and expanding the British Empire:

Why should we not form a secret society with but one object, the furtherance of the British Empire and the bringing of the whole world under British rule, for the recovery of the United States, for making the Anglo Saxon race but one Empire? What a dream, but yet it is probable; it is possible.

Is there any evidence this secret society was ever brought into existence? I can't imagine it was very successful if it was, since the British Empire has long since fallen (and to my knowledge there was no attempt at recovery of the USA during Rhodes' lifetime) . I don't know much about this subject, my searches just lead to conspiracy theory nonsense so if anybody could point me in the direction of a decent book on the subject it'd be much appreciated.

What incentive did these rural immigrants have to start speaking English? How did this linguistic-cultural shift happen?

My ancestors made their way out west before the Civil War, but plenty of them lived way out on the frontier in Virginia, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, and the Carolinas from the earliest days, before courthouses and even wagon roads. Are there some good sources about frontier isolation, clans/kinship groups, frontier justice, religion, and so on?

I am not afraid of primary sources neither, presuming they are accessible.

Thanks!

EDIT: By "poor" I don't mean destitute; I mean I'm not looking for information about plantation life, just ordinary frontier homesteaders.

I know various British members of the royal family participated in World War 2, but I am interested how the royal families of other countries, such as Norway or Denmark, may have participated.

Ignoring dishes with New World ingredients, do we know how conservative food traditions are in Europe? Would a 12th century Earl of Huntingdon have eaten anything similar to an English person in the 20th century?

Was continental cuisine significantly different from English food? If so, was it appreciated in England as it would be in modern times? Was there a significant North African influence on northern Spanish cooking?

Marking the 70th year since the amphibious allied landing on the beaches of Normandy. Any questions regarding it can be posted and answered here!

My questions are: how real of a threat did the germans consider an amphibious landing on the coasts of France?

With the amount of air and naval support the allies had did the German defences ever really stand a chance at holding the beach heads?

Did the allies have a back up plan, in case D-Day failed, and if so what was it?

Where they treated badly, or just allowed to get on with life as much as possible?

I understand this is a broad question but I always hear girls saying that they wanna be treated like one. My guess is that kings were not the best gentleman to their queens and princesses.

Assuming that Germany knew there was going to be an invasion, why didn't they deploy more naval assets such as U boats to pick off troop ships as they crossed the channel? I hear stories of how there were attacks on the eastern sea board but it would seem a better use would have been to patrol the channel.

From what little I know about the planning of D-Day they did not expect it to succeed. If this is true, then why did they proceed? Was it the least of bad options?

I was wondering what exactly affected which families were more powerful than others in a nation like medieval England - Was status determined by sheer amount of land holdings, or were some areas worth more than others due to the economy of the time? For example, in war time (like the 100 years war), did areas with mines and forests prosper due to increased demand for building ships and weapons? Or was it more static?

Any information would be welcomed, I'm curious. Also, if there are any "dumbed-down" texts that you could recommend, it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

how did this come into existance, i mean, i dont imagine a king saying "you guys are from now on my vassals and we have feudal laws". The greek had democracy, romans had an oligarchy/aristrocracy (forgot) so why didnt this just stay the same?

also, when was this actually created?

It seems like black culture in America and African culture have nothing in common. Are there any traces left?

For example, I see a lot of praise going out to people such as Genghis Khan, for saving the environment or whatnot (by intentionally killing 20 million people). However, people regularly bash British or other colonial empires even though these empires never did anything to the same level as this.

Was it just dumb luck? Did they know what to look for?

As its the anniversairy of the D-Day landings, I've been wondering about the size of the operation - and how well the Allied forces managed to keep their plans a secret.

How much intelligence did the Axis have? What are the predictions for the operations success if they had known all about it?

I understand that during the Middle Ages, if a king changed his religion the peasants had to as well. If a king converted to a circumcising religion, did that mean that there were then lines of men forced to get circumcised? I have a hard time believing that peasants would passively just agree to this without a revolt. I know plenty of kings converted to Islam and I believe one converted to Judaism as well.

I hope this isn't a stupid question, I was just thinking about this the other day.