In January 1936, as King George V lay ill and dying, among his last words was a question: “How is the Empire?” His secretary is then quoted as answering, "All is well, Sir, with the Empire."

Before the Second World War the British Empire was the largest empire in human history, with over 450 million subjects. Despite the immense cost, Great Britain emerged from the War with an influence, prestige, and reputation as good as it had ever been. Few people then might have understood that less than thirty years later the Empire would be disintegrated and overshadowed by the United States and the Soviet Union.

Back in print after almost 60 years, with a new foreword by Neema Parvini, Major-General Richard Hilton’s "Imperial Obituary" provides an innovative and invaluable contribution to the discussion of the end of the British Empire, surveying its origins, rise, zenith, and ultimate decline. With unerring instinct and brutal honesty, Hilton dissects this vast institution, and the result is a lively and provocative work which takes no prisoners.