Elizabeth Longford Prize
The Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography was established in 2003 in memory of Elizabeth Longford, the British author, biographer and historian. The £5,000 prize is awarded annually for a historical biography published in the preceding year.
The Elizabeth Longford Prize is sponsored by Flora Fraser and Peter Soros and administered by the Society of Authors.
Winners
2020s
2025- Winner: Augustus the Strong: Tim Blanning for A Study in Artistic Greatness and Political Fiasco '
- Stephen Alford for All His Spies: The Secret World of Robert Cecil
- Helen Castor for The Eagle and the Hart: The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV
- Dan Jones for Henry V: The Astonishing Rise of England’s Greatest Warrior King
- Adam Shatz for The Rebel’s Clinic: The Revolutionary Lives of Frantz Fanon
- Winner: Jackie Wullschläger for Monet: The Restless Vision
- Deborah E. Lipstadt for Golda Meir: Israel’s Matriarch
- Kal Raustiala The Absolutely Indispensable Man: Ralph Bunche, the United Nations, ''and the Fight to End Empire
- M.W. Rowe for J.L. Austin:Philosopher and D-Day Intelligence Officer '
- Winner: Ramachandra Guha for Rebels Against the Raj: Western Fighters for India’s Freedom
- Leanda de Lisle for Henrietta Maria: Conspirator, Warrior, Phoenix Queen Vintage Books
- Michael Broers for Napoleon: The Decline and Fall of an Empire 1811-1821
- Ruth Harris for Guru to the World: The Life and Legacy of Vivekananda
- Daisy Hay for Dinner With Joseph Johnson: Books and Friendship in a Revolutionary Age
- Winner: Andrew Roberts for George III: The Life and Reign of Britain’s Most Misunderstood Monarch
- Timothy Brennan for Places of Mind, A Life of Edward Said
- Helen Carr for The Red Prince: The Life of John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster
- Jonathan Petropoulos for Göring's Man in Paris: The Story of A Nazi Art Plunderer and His World
- Jane Ridley for George V: Never a Dull Moment
- Winner: Fredrik Logevall for JFK: Vol 1
- Sudhir Hazareesingh for Black Spartacus: The Epic Life of Toussaint Louverture
- Sarah LeFanu for Something of Themselves: Kipling, Kingsley, Conan Doyle and the Anglo-Boer War
- Samanth Subramanian for A Dominant Character: The Radical Science and Restless Politics of J.B.S Haldane
- Winner: D W. Hayton for Conservative Revolutionary: The Lives of Lewis Namier
- Andrew S. Curran for Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely
- Richard J. Evans for Eric Hobsbawm: A Life in History
- Oliver Soden for Michael Tippett: The Biography
- A. N. Wilson for ''Prince Albert: The Man Who Saved the Monarchy''
2010s
2019- Winner: Julian Jackson for A Certain Idea of France: The Life of Charles de Gaulle
- Diarmaid MacCulloch for Thomas Cromwell: A Life
- Andrew Roberts for Churchill: Walking with Destiny
- Jeffrey C. Stewart for The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke
- Giles Tremlett for Isabella of Castile: Europe's First Great Queen
- John Bew for Citizen Clem: A Biography of Attlee
- Andrew Gailey for The Lost Imperialist: Lord Dufferin, Memory and Mythmaking in an Age of Celebrity
- Ben Macintyre for A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
- Charles Moore for Margaret Thatcher: The Authorized Biography. Volume 1
- Anne Somerset for Queen Anne: The Politics of Passion
- Frances Wilson for How to Survive the Titanic or The Sinking of J. Bruce Ismay
- Philip Ziegler for Edward Heath
- Tristram Hunt for ''The Frock-Coated Communist - The Revolutionary Life of Friedrich Engels''
2000s
2009- Mark Bostridge for Florence Nightingale. The Woman and Her Legend
- Rosemary Hill for God's Architect: Pugin and the Building of Romantic Britain
- Jessie Childs for Henry VIII's Last Victim: The Life and Times of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey
- Charles Williams for Petain: How the Hero of France Became a Convicted Traitor and Changed the Course of History
- Ian Kershaw for Making Friends with Hitler: Lord Londonderry, the Nazis, and the Road to War
- Katie Whitaker for Mad Madge: Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, Royalist, Writer and Romantic