What historical event do you think would have changed history if it had turned out differently?

[MaryQueenofKnots]

Here's mine:
What if Edward VI had lived?
What if JFK hadn't been shot?
What if Edward VIII hadn't abdicated?

If Margaret Thatcher hasn't introduced RTB.

Or if she'd given him a BJ instead...ahem! 😳

If Henry VIII hadn’t left the catholic church we’d likely still
be a catholic country.
And 9/11

You know I was thinking about this the other day - how the hell did we manage to get anywhere? Booking a flight was a major task involving a trip to a travel agent, them pulling out this massive printed book about 8 inches thick , making some calls and hand writing a ticket for you. This was 1974 - it's mental.

In an interview for Women’s Own in September 1987, Margaret Thatcher said:
"Who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then also to help look after our neighbour and life is a reciprocal business …"

Why 'there's no such thing as society' should not be regarded with moral revulsion (theconversation.com)

If Margaret Beaufort hadn’t given birth to a son at the age of 13 (Henry VII) - and they both survived - who then founded the Tudor dynasty and all subsequent monarchs are descended from him. I often ponder the unlikely set of events that led to his birth (and also feel so sorry for Margaret, imagine what she must have gone through as a child herself).

Yes, this. I'm really not a fan of Thatcher, but the point she was making here is the exact opposite to the one people think when they take the line about society in isolation. She's arguing that everyone has a duty to help others and that cannot simply be delegated to the government.

I have learned something really important. Didn’t know Thatcher’s quote in context.

If my dad hadn't offered my mum his seat I'd not be here and therefore none of this would exist.

Alternatively, imagine if they were the original Adam and Eve...or if Eve was Steve.

History is a rolling stone, it gathers moss and flings it wherever. Every event is preceded so every moment from the big bang (and of course what preceded that) has determined right now...and right now determines the course of the next forever.

i think your view on MT depends on where you were in the UK. Absolutely revolutionised the area in which I grew up in for the better, but I appreciate if you grew up in a mining town, your viewpoint would be very different.

for me personally, I think the impact of growing up with the PM and the head of state both being women cannot be underestimated on the aspirations of young women in the UK. Whatever your politics, finally having a woman in charge did seem revolutionary at the time.

It’s unfathomable. I always wonder at the lifelong birth injuries she must’ve had. Married twice more after Edmund Tudor died, but no further children. Imagine being a widowed mother at 13. I believe Margaret asked to be buried next to Edmund Tudor so she likely viewed him as her true husband despite their brief marriage. I guess as the father of her beloved son, she revered him.

If humans had never learnt to make fire.

If some of our earlier ancestors hadn't died out and coexisted with us. How would that feed into the hierarchy of how we treat other species, even those similar to our own?

If humans had never evolved opposable thumbs.

If Edward 4 hadn’t died so suddenly aged 40. No princes in tower, no Tudors-his son would’ve succeeded him and Richard 3 would’ve been a footnote rather than one of our great villains. Also, if Harold had won Battle of Hastings-women had more rights in Saxon society, unlike the feudal Normans. No harrying if the North which left thousands dead through famine. Or if Henry 1’s so. Hadn’t drowned in the White Ship-no civil war which devastated the country.

@LoobyDop I stand corrected. Thanks! Every day is a school day.

We live that show. They put so much thought into the new series historical updates

I think the war would look completely different if Austria-Hungary didn't declare it because of the Sarajevo incident. It may have been someone else who would start off because of the existing political tensions and that could lead to some different alliances and results.
Lots of what ifs of course.

But if he hadn't have abdicated, he may well have married for duty and sired an heir. The implications in real terms for anyone beyond Elizabeth and her kids, I don't know

Another Tudor one, if Henry VIII had children with Katherine Howard. He apparently was saddened by her death more than for any other of his wives. She was young, although he was likely impotent, and so arguably could have had his child by hook or by crook. It makes me so sad to think of her, as Mary Wolsey puts it 'an abused child' rather than the Scarlett woman she's been portrayed as. Passed around court like a piece of meat and then murdered for it.

If the Spanish Armada had succeeded…

@MrsJellybee you can visit Pembroke castle where she gave birth and there's a lot of information about her in there.

It's not a single event, but our language would have been very different if the Romans hadn't got this far.
1066 also resulted in changes to the language.

Something I’ve never understood about Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon’s failure to produce a male heir- why didn’t they just cheat? It wouldn’t have been that difficult to pretend that one of her miscarriages never happened, find some unfortunate pregnant waif, and keep her confined with Catherine until the baby was born.

@LoobyDop they wanted to carry on their bloodline. It was all about their respective dynasties. Henry had plenty of illegitimate children, it would have made more sense to have used one of them but illegitimacy was a big deal. They needed it to be their child.