Few battles resound down the centuries as loudly as the Boyne. The defeat of James II by William III in 1690 is commemorated every July, when the Protestant marching season begins in Northern Ireland.

Richard Holmes walks beside the beautiful river where the two kings clashed and shows how the battle was almost over before it was fought - if a Jacobite gunner had been a little luckier, William would have been killed while inspecting enemy positions along the banks. Show less