I'm working on a big project studying Atlantic tobacco trade between a shop in Virginia and Glasgow, Scotland (John Glassford & Co.) from around 1758 to the revolution. I'm hoping to study a particular ship, coming from an archaeological perspective, and though I have a list of ships I can't find many records pertaining to the ships themselves. Does anybody know a good resource for late 18th century shipping records, either for the Virginia area or Scotland? Or any other tips?

EDIT: Also, would this question be ok to post as a regular submission? Not sure if it is better off staying in this Friday Free-for-All.

What do y'all do when you have two diametrically opposed but equally appealing interests and are not sure where to go?

Anyone know any good books on medieval weaponry? A question earlier this week went unanswered, and now I'm curious as well.

I've finally gotten around to continuing delving into the memoirs of Robin Olds entitled Fighter Pilot. I would put this in the reading and research thread, but it's more for entertainment purposes and out of sheer wonder at Olds's career.

One of the interesting stories he tells is a prank he pulled on his intelligence officer while stationed in Britain in WW2. He convinced the officer to come up with him in a (unbeknownst to the officer) armed P38 Lightning, on the premise that he was going to show the officer Northern England, and how much it resembled Holland. As soon as they pulled up above the low cloud cover, Olds did some maneuvering, and altered their course eastward, towards Holland, while the officer remained convinced they were still in England.

After crossing the water, and diving back down below the clouds, the officer kept remarking how similar the surroundings looked to Holland, and that it was amazing such windmills and dykes existed in England too. Then the fun began. Olds spotted a train convoy, told the officer "here's an example of how we strafe", and then proceeded to unload on the train, causing an explosion and subsequent fires to break out. As flak erupted around the plane, the officer began yelling and chastising Olds, until eventually as they were pulling back towards England, the officer figured it out. The rest of the flight was spent in silence, but neither the officer nor Olds ever gave up the incident to their comrades.

I think I've asked this before, but I can't recall seeing an answer: can anyone recommend a book on either Polish or Irish Protestants? Or, more generally, on religion in either of those countries?

One of my dreams is to write a book about Protestant minorities in majority-Catholic countries, especially Poland and Ireland. I need to teach myself Polish (and potentially Russian) to access the source material for the latter, but I think it's a really interesting story to tell. If no one's told it before, then I guess that's good because it leaves it open for me, but it also means that learning about the basics will be harder.

I read that after the red army won the battle of stalingrad. Every regiment that took part in the fight was elevated to "Guards" status as a reward. Were there any tangible benefits to this in the WWII red army?

Are there any good books about the Second Punic War that are fairly accessible to people not studying history? I've inadvertently piqued someone's interest in Hannibal's crossing of the Alps.

Where did the idea of a conspiracy theory come from? Stuff like "The Illuminati/Knights Templar/Bilderberg Group/Lizardmen are secretly running the world" type of stuff come from? Is it a modern idea, or does it stretch farther back in history?

Two questions on my mind recently:

Why didn't steppe people invade from the west steppe eastward?

Did the people of India think of themselves as a civilization/culture prior to the arrival of the Mughals?

EDIT: no "to"

Hi, I'm fairly newbie in relation to reddit, and a senior history major. I have a paper that I'll be presenting at a Phi Alpha Theta regional conference tomorrow, and I was wondering if anyone would be interested in reading it and giving me general feedback? I have no idea how I would get it to you other than simply emailing you a copy, so I am assuming this would be on an as-you-ask/reply basis. For those interested, the paper is centered around the NAACP's investigations of the Tennessee Valley Authority in the 1930s.

I don't post here often, but i really have to give a shout out to /u/findwyer's podcats in the last few weeks, they have simply been amazing and I've been rather touched by them.

I promised a couple people things for this thread, but real life got in the way, I apologize for not posting the promised write ups.

I plan on ordering a few books sometime next week about POW life and treatment in the First World War. I've got some lined up but I don't know the integrity of the authors in the historical community so just posting them here to see if there's any red flags from our local WWI experts.

Violence against Prisoners of War in the First World War: Britain, France and Germany, 1914-1920 by Heather Jones

Behind the Wire: Prisoners of War 1914-18 by Robert Jackson

Barbed Wire Disease: British and German Prisoners of War 1914-1919 by John Yarnall

POWs and the Great War: Captivity on the Eastern Front (Legacy of the Great War) by Alon Rachamimov

Also hoping that said WWI experts might have some recommendations as well!

Can anyone good movies about The Thirty Years War? If they could be in English or have an English dub version, that'd be much appreciated

So, I just finished reading a couple of books on germs/disease that I thought I'd toss out one of them as a rec. (I hope this is allowed and doesn't break the rules).

Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War: Really an interesting book about biological warfare focusing on both the Cold War and biological terrorism. It is a book that knows how to offer gripping anecdotal stories without losing the larger narrative or becoming sensationalist. I'd highly recommend it if you have any interest in learning about the less well known arms race of the Cold War.

EDIT: More appropriate for Sat. I guess, but I'll leave it here.

I think I'm a little late to the game, but I'll try anyway. Can anyone recommend a good book/good books, specifically about the latter part of WWII for the Soviets, when they pushed back the German forces, and their campaign to Berlin? (Perhaps after the Siege of Leningrad came to an end?)

Can anyone recommend good books about the Viking and Germanic Iron Age written in one of the Scandinavian languages (Icelandic, Danish/Norwegian, Swedish)? It's mostly a personal preference but I feel like something is lost in translation when the era is written about in English.