Example sentences of "[be] that he [was/were] [verb] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | ‘ I have n't had the pathologist 's report but the indications are that he was strangled after being stunned by a blow to the head . ’ |
| 2 | Or it may simply have been that he was hiding : that his confused sexuality could at any time have brought him down . |
| 3 | During the first government of Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson , one of whose election slogans had been that he was going to introduce a white hot technological revolution , AEA was empowered by act of Parliament to undertaken R&D on non-nuclear topics . |
| 4 | Ward 's excuse for talking in Spanish had been that he was accustoming himself to using it freely . |
| 5 | There were no words in the experience , but he became aware of the fact that he was keeping something at bay ; or another way of looking at it would be that he was wearing some rigid outer clothing , like corsets or a suit of armour . |
| 6 | It might be that he was speaking the truth , but before she could answer footsteps sounded along the passage , and they both faced the door as his mother came reluctantly in . |
| 7 | It may be that he was influenced in his thinking yet again by the British , whose officer class cultivated the honourable wound , and whose subalterns had lately contributed in altogether disproportionate numbers to the casualties suffered by the British army in France . |
| 8 | Henry Calverley won the arrow at the first meeting at Scorton , but it was not held there again until 1754 , so it may be that he was keeping this promise . |
| 9 | I mean the rumours were that he was gon na go to Cheam , he was supposed to be Saturdays for Cheam . |
| 10 | His voice was muffled by something — could it be that he was smoking a cigar even whilst disembodied ? |
| 11 | ‘ Well , one thing I know about Mr Coffin is that he was born in the early nineteen-twenties . |
| 12 | It is difficult to understand why Clemens Alexandrinus called him a Peripatetic ( Strom. 1.72.4 ) , but perhaps the important point is that he was assigned to a philosophic school at all , because this was quite unusual for a Jew of the second century B.C. Aristobulus quoted Greek writers — authentic or forged — to support the truth of the Bible and the dependence of the Greeks on Jewish wisdom . |
| 13 | What I suspect is that he was inspecting the binding and moved the candle to study it more closely to see if there was a gap between the cover and its backing : underneath the candle flame the writing must have appeared . ’ |
| 14 | But what he must not pretend is that he was led to this solely by his ‘ rational doubt ’ when in fact he was led to it by his faith , that is , his humanism . |
| 15 | What he calls the ‘ fancy explanation ’ for this architectural love is that he was baptised in a Romanesque font in the Dorset village of Stoke Abbot , but the reality is that as a student at Durham he was profoundly influenced by the majestic presence of the cathedral : |
| 16 | The second thing Victor wants to say is that he was spurred into action by the piece on holes in bread , which has put one or two of you into a right old sandwich . |
| 17 | ‘ One of the odd things about it is that he was wearing brand-new clothes , ’ he added . |
| 18 | He chose to remain close to Marxism , but my impression is that he was shifting his ground … |
| 19 | The answer is that he was wreaking a horrible revenge for having had his box of leads confiscated that morning , on suspicion that he was attending a job interview . |
| 20 | ‘ All we know is that he was knocked out while someone jumped on him . ’ |
| 21 | I do n't need to spell it out for you but the assumption is that he was going back drunk and got hit . |
| 22 | It appears he took his own life but the truth is that he was murdered . |
| 23 | You say that your information is that he was wounded ? ’ |
| 24 | The official story is that he was playing it at a party and people wanted to hear it over and over . |
| 25 | The story I 've got is that he was forced out because Ron Barron was threatening to prosecute him for fraud . ’ |
| 26 | The fact was that he was soured by a murder case with no body , by family enmity amounting to hatred , by a surfeit of gossip and a veneer of superstition which was much more than half pretence . |
| 27 | The reason for this was that he was contaminated with radon decay products from his house . |
| 28 | It was that he was beginning to understand why Aziz the janitor and his friends might be convinced he was no ordinary child . |
| 29 | But what really surprised me was that he was holding out both hands to me . |
| 30 | But the point was that he was holding this place in trust , on my behalf . ’ |