Dan Snow

Dan Snow was born and raised in London, and he remembers spending every weekend of his childhood being taken to castles, battlefields, country houses and churches. He developed a great love of history which he went on to pursue at Oxford University.

While there he also rowed in the Boat Race three times. He left with a double first in history and started presenting military history programmes with his father, Peter Snow. Their series, ‘Battlefield Britain’, won a BAFTA award. It told the story of 8 of the decisive clashes in British history from Boudicca to the Battle of Britain. The follow up series was transmitted in the summer of 2007. It featured 8 of the key military encounters of the 20th century including battles such as Stalingrad and the Tet Offensive in Vietnam.

He has worked on numerous public occasions for BBC Events such as the 200th Anniversary of Battle of Trafalgar, the 90th anniversary of the RAF and the commemorations to mark the 90th anniversary of the end of World War One. Dan Snow has a regular slot on ‘The One Show’ on BBC1 where he explores great stories from British history.

He made a documentary on China’s First Emperor and his Terracotta Army for BBC2 in 2007 and the follow up on the Emperor Hadrian was on BBC2 the following year. In June 2008 Dan also explored the islands of St Kilda for ‘Britain’s Lost World’ on BBC1. His series ‘Empire of the Seas: How the Royal Navy Made the Modern World’ was broadcast in early 2010.

During the course of his work he has flown World War Two aircraft, been gassed, shovelled muck in a sewer under London for a day, contracted hypothermia and been trained as a sniper. Dan’s first solo book ‘Death or Victory’ was published in September 2009. It is an account of the fall of Quebec in 1759. An accompanying television programme was broadcast by BBC2 in March 2010, produced by Dan’s production company, Ballista.