If It Had Happened Otherwise

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If It Had Happened Otherwise (ISBN 028397821X) is a 1931 collection of essays edited by J. C. Squire and published by Longmans, Green. Each essay in the collection could be considered an alternate history or counterfactual history, a few written by leading historians of the period and one by Winston Churchill. The original edition included the following essays:[1]

  • If the Moors in Spain had Won by Philip Guedalla: Islamic Granada survives as a separate political entity, weakening Spain from the late fifteenth century onward, but resulting in a liberal humanist brand of Islam, the adoption of constitutional monarchy, and Spanish participation on the Central Powers side during World War I against Granada and the Allies.
  • If the General Strike had Succeeded by Ronald Knox: In this 1931, a facsimile Times discloses the outcome as Great Britain under communist rule.
  • If the Emperor Frederick had not had Cancer by Emil Ludwig: German Emperor Frederick III survives, and with his wife, Princess Victoria, rules a liberal humanist Germany where their son never succumbs to militarism, due to the long-term benign effects of this scenario. Therefore, World War I never happens in this world.
  • If Louis XVI had an Atom of Firmness by AndrĂ© Maurois: As with Hillaire Belloc's essay above, this posits Louis XVI as retaining the French throne and averting the French Revolution. However, in this version of French history, he makes necessary financial and constitutional reforms beforehand that prevent the circumstances that led to the revolution, and result in the survival of France as a constitutional monarchy into the twentieth century.
  • If Byron had Become King of Greece by Harold Nicolson
  • If It Had Been Discovered in 1930 that Bacon Really Did Write Shakespeare by J. C. Squire
  • If Booth had Missed Lincoln by Milton Waldman: In this world, Lincoln is charged with mismanaging the recently concluded Civil War, and there is repeated friction between Lincoln and a hostile US federal Congress. Before Congress can impeach him in 1867, however, Lincoln dies, discredited and castigated as a spendthrift warmonger.

A revised edition with the alternate title If: or, History Rewritten was also released by the American publisher Viking in 1931, deleting Ronald Knox's essay and adding one new essay along with reprints of two older ones:

  • If: A Jacobite Fantasy by Charles Petrie (1926): In this universe, Charles Edward Stuart ("Bonnie Prince Charlie") won the battle of Culloden in 1745, resulting in Hanoverian flight back to their home German province. James Francis Edward Stuart (son of James II of England, or the "Old Pretender") is restored to the British throne as "James III", but proves conciliatory in terms of religion and government. When "Bonnie Prince Charlie" succeeds his father as Charles III in 1766, his adroit diplomatic skills prevent the American Revolution through sharing his own dislike for the House of Commons with his American counterparts. Henry Benedict Stuart succeeds his childless brother in 1788, as "Henry IX". In this world, he never entered the clergy and was able to father surviving children, so the Stuart dynasty effectively displaces that of the Hanoverians from that point on.
  • If Napoleon had Won the Battle of Waterloo by G. M. Trevelyan (1907): In this world, Great Britain becomes a reactionary dictatorship wracked with political instability in the early nineteenth century, dealing with the trauma of defeat and reparations, resulting in the censorship of much of English Romanticism. France governs much of Europe, and Napoleon eventually dies of old age.

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