Blog Archives - Meandering Through Time

Margaret of England

29/9/2017

It has been claimed that Margaret, the second daughter of Henry III and Eleanor of Provence, was named after her aunt Margaret of Provence, the wife of King Louis IX of France. However, chronicler Matthew Paris states that she was named after Saint Margaret of Antioch who her mother called upon whilst giving birth. There is also some confusion over Margaret's date of birth which is stated as being either this day in 1240 or in the first weeks of October.

By the age of eleven Margaret had married the ten year old King Alexander III of Scotland, and it was in Scotland that Margaret is said to have spent a great deal of time in a miserable existence. Margaret's first child a daughter, also Margaret and later queen of Norway, was born ten years after her marriage.

Alexander was Margaret's second child and heir to the throne of Scotland, his death three years after his brother David in 1281 would cause a succession crisis, this would end with one John Baillol being crowned as king of Scotland. Eventually, the enthronement of Baillol would lead to the Scottish Wars of Independence.

But what of Margaret? She outlived her father by three years, she was present at the coronation of her elder brother Edward I as king of England in Westminster in the August 1274.

Of Margaret it was written

‘She was a lady of great beauty, chastity, and humility, three qualities which are rarely found together in the same person.’

The Usurpation of Richard II

27/9/2017

The last years of Richard II's reign were dominated by a number of political crises, notably the Lords Appellant, however, a smaller but more far reaching issue was the fall out of the squabble between Henry of Bolingbroke and Thomas Mowbray. The two men sought to resolve their differences in the form of a duel, but before it began Richard stepped in and banished Bolingbroke and exiled Mowbray. It was during Bolingbroke's banishment that his father, John of Gaunt died, and Richard proceeded to deprive Henry of the right to inherit his father's land, much angered, Henry returned to England and landed at Ravenspur in the summer of 1399.

Rory Kinnear as Henry of Bolingbroke in The Hollow Crown

Bolingbroke would get his revenge, Richard was made to surrender at Flint Castle on the 19th August and following his arrest was imprisoned in the Tower of London. It was there on the 29th of September, on a promise not to have him killed, Richard was forced to abdicate. Henry was clever, he knew that with throne of England unoccupied he was not guilty of usurpation with malice aforethought, the very next day Henry of Bolingbroke was proclaimed king of England.

In the official version of the events - the Records and Progress of 1399, it states that King Richard II had 'with a cheerful countenance' waved goodbye to the throne of England, I find it hard to believe that Richard II slapped Henry Bolingbroke on the back, placed the crown in his hands and said "there you go mate!"

Ben Whishaw as Richard II relinquishes the Crown to Rory Kinnear as Henry Bolingbroke

In an account of the proceedings, probably written by an eyewitness, it states that Richard's real response was that he 'that he would not do it under any circumstances; and he was greatly incensed, and declared that he would like to have it explained to him how it was that he could resign the crown,and to whom'. Even Shakespeare makes it clear what Richard really thought "Well we know no hand of blood and bone can gripe the sacred handle of our sceptre unless he do profane, steal, or usurp"

However, regardless of who said what, thirty-three charges were brought against Richard II at Westminster and on the 30th of September, a gloating Thomas Arundel, who no doubt considered Richard's fall as payback for the execution of his brother few years earlier, informed those present that Parliament was dissolved and would reconvene with Henry Bolingbroke as King Henry IV on the 6th October.

Of course there are many who would argue that Richard II's deposition by Henry Bolingbroke was justified. However, the starving to death of an anointed king, in a dank dungeon of the bowels of a castle, I believe was murder. And just as Henry Tudor would do, nearly eighty five years in the future, Henry Bolingbroke would have to work hard to prove that he was the rightful king and not a usurper who had taken the throne illegally.

The English Civil War

23/9/2017

In the book 1066 and All That, a humorous and satirical look at history, it states that the English Civil Wars were fought between the Cavaliers (Wrong but Wromantic) and the Roundheads (Right but Repulsive) and that Charles I thought that

"He was king and that was right, kings were divine and that was right, kings were right,
and that was right, and therefore everything was alright"

We may find the ideas of Divine Right ludicrous and amusing today, but what must be remembered is the cost of it to our ancestors.

The English Civil Wars put family against family and father against son and no better example of this is William Frederick Yeames's painting where a little boy in a royalist household is being spoken to by parliamentarians who ask the question "And When Did You Last See Your Father" which quite naturally puts the child in a difficult position and his family in a dangerous one.
While researching my 17th century Cornish ancestors I wondered if any of them found themselves in this position, for many were loyal to their king - however a few were not, I have discovered it certainly placed friend against friend. Sir Bevill Grenville of Stowe in Cornwall was a Royalist whose allegiances were torn when his friend St John Eliot of St Germans was incarcerated, on more than one occasion, in the Tower of London for his views on parliamentary rights. Eliot eventually died in the Tower and King Charles refused his son permission to bury his father in his homeland cruelly stating

"Let Sir John Eliot be buried in the church of that parish where he died."

These men were dealing directly with the fall out of King Charles I's ideas of the Divine Right of Kings and his attempt to enforce it in the wars that raged between 1642 and 1651. These wars resulted in the loss of over eighty thousand lives plus the hundreds of thousands who died from war related diseases, ultimately though King Charles I would be held responsible and he would pay with his life.

My research into this period is presently focusing on my family in the years 1636 to 1646, this family lived in the Cornish village of St Columb Major. You can see some of the architecture from that period in two of the images below.

In 1641 the marriage of my ancestor took place just five days before parliament passed the Triennial Act, an Act that was drawn up to prevent kings from ruling without Parliament, and in 1645 Royalist troops, under Sir Thomas Fairfax, camped just outside St Columb Major.

Battle of Fulford

19/9/2017

20th of September 1066

Harold Godwinson's succession to the throne of England was confirmed by the Witan, Edward the Confessors council, and following this the crown of England passed from the third great-grandson of King Alfred to the son of a Saxon thegn, seemingly without any trouble at all! However, as the crown was placed on Harold's head, others who considered that it was their rightful place to sit on the throne of England were preparing to stake their claim.

In the 10th century Aelfric of Eynsham had written of Saxon kingship:

“No man can make himself king, but the people have the choice to choose as king whom they please; but
after he is consecrated as king, he then has dominion over the people, and they cannot shake his yoke off their necks”

Harold was king, but Edgar Aethling, Harald Hardrada, and William of Normandy had every intention of holding that title themselves.

Edgar Aethling’s claim was by descent from Alfred the Great, having Ethelred the Unready as his great grandfather. He had the support of both the Archbishop of York and Stigand, who had taken over from the ousted Robert of Jumieges as Archbishop of Canterbury, plus the Earls Edwin and Morcar, but his cause was abandoned when the Norman conqueror arrived in the capital. Norway’s king, Harald Hardrada’s claim was by way of a promise made by the younger of king Canute's son Hardicnut. William of Normandy's claim was based on promises too and he would invoke Edward the Confessors's promise, and a promise made by King Harold himself.

The law of succession followed the laws of primogeniture. However, in the 11th century, after the death of a king with no heir, the Witan had the right to choose the king from among the royal family. Edward had made his choice known to the Witan and all had agreed, therefore Harold’s claim to the throne was valid, but this made no difference when rule by the right of conquest was just as lawful.

So, on hearing the news that England's crown had been placed on Harold Godwinson's head, the first of these claimants' made plans for an invasion. Hardrada's force, consisting of about 300 longships and a total of about six thousand men, were joined by his new ally, the vengeful and treacherous Tostig Godwinson. Hardrada landed in the Humber Estuary on the 18th September and met the northern forces of Edwin and Morcar on a marshy area at the River Ouse near the village of Fulford. The Norwegian army defeated the Saxon army on the 20th September 1066 at what is known as the Battle of Fulford.

At Fulford England's northern army sustained substantial losses, and together with the Battle of Stamford Bridge just six days later, despite that being an English victory, resulted in a depleted and weakened English army who faced the third and ultimately successful claimant to the throne - William the Conqueror.

James Audley

17/9/2017

James Audley had spent much of his time, as did his father, arbitrating between the English lords and the Welsh and was appointed one of the royalist members of the council of fifteen appointed to advise Henry in accordance with the provisions of Oxford. A year later he witnessed, as James of Altithel, the king's confirmation of the council's powers on the 18th of October 1258, and by the end of 1264 he replaced his brother in law, Peter de Montfort, (no relation to Simon) as Constable of both Bridgnorth and Shrewsbury Castles.

Audley was a supporter of Henry III and was with the king at the Battle of Northampton and the Battle of Lewes in 1264. He had married Ela, the granddaughter of William Longspree, the acknowledge illegitimate son of Henry II, but their relationship was not a happy one, and this may have been one reason why my ancestor, Alice Mohun, became Audley's mistress and the mother to his son James.

In 1237, Alice's first husband had died and it was not until 1245 that she remarried. That year, James Audley had witnessed a Charter issued by Alice’s father confirming the Soke of Mohun in Westminster to Alice and Robert Beauchamp and it maybe that it was in connection with this Alice had met Audley.

Alice gave birth to six children with Beauchamp and James Audley was the father of six children with Ela Longspree, but where Alice and James's son fits in (date wise) I am yet to find out.

James Audley gave a number of manors and land to Alice but she had to fight to retain them, which after his death she succeeded in doing.

James Audley appears in another of my family histories. His elder sister, Amice Audley, had married into my Whitchurch/Blanchminster family of Shropshire, and he appears in a dispute of the over the warship of the Whitchurch heiresses with John de Warenne the Earl of Surrey.

Below is tomb of the William Longspree, the great grandfather of Alice's son James.

William Henry Fox Talbot

17/9/2017

Today marks the anniversary of the death of William Henry Fox Talbot who died this day in 1877.

Fox Talbot was an member of parliament, scientist and inventor but is most commonly known as a pioneer of photography. Fox Talbot's idea for the photograph came to him whilst on honeymoon by Lake Como in Italy, he was irritated at his inability to document the beautiful scenes around him and his lack of artistic skill that his wife had in abundance. He is said to have commented

"How charming it would be if it were possible to cause these natural images to imprint themselves durable, and remain
fixed upon paper"

Lacock Wiltshire: The home of Fox Talbot (2013)

From his home of Lacock in Wiltshire, Fox Talbot discovered what he called his "photogenic drawings." By placing objects in the sun, on a sheet of paper coated with a solution of salt and silver nitrate, these objects left a silhouetted image. Sadly for Fox Talbot, he had other commitments that took him away from his work, this delayed publishing his discoveries and in that time, one Louis Daguerre had published his photograph. He had captured an image in his "Camera Obsura" and therefore Daguerre became known as "the father of Photography."

Inside of the famous Oriel Window at Lacock (2013)

Original photograph taken by Fox Talbot from the negative at the below

Outside of the famous Oriel Window at Lacock (2013)

A few years ago I was able to visit Fox Talbot's home at Lacock and was able to take the above photographs. My photograph on the left features Talbot's camera along with the famous negative (see below) placed in the Oriel window which was the subject of his photograph. The image of the window on the negative (above centre) which was the size of a postage stamp, was captured in 1835, four years before Daguerre's work became known.

Fox Talbot's image is the most famous in the history of photography and is now recognised as the oldest photograph in existence.

Death of John of Eltham

12/9/2017

This magnificent tomb of John of Elham stands in Westminster Abbey.

You can see parts of the tomb in detail in the drawing below, also in the second image you can see John's armour and his a sword, and on his shield you can see his coat of arms. The lion at his feet symbolises strength and loyalty and John was certainly loyal to his brother King Edward III and Edward, who was greatly impressed by John's many of actions, returned the favour by creating this magnificent tomb in his honour.

John of Eltham, the second son of Edward II and Isabella of France was named after the place he was born, that is the original 'palace' of Eltham in Greenwich. In 1328 John was given the title of Earl of Cornwall by Edward and a year later was considered competent enough to act as regent while the king was in France.

John was made Warden of March of Scotland in 1335, it was while he was in Scotland that he died on this day in 1336, he was just twenty years old.

John of Etham's body was not interred at Westminster Abbey until the second week of January the following year.

Blanche of Lancaster

12/9/2017

Blanche of Lancaster was just twenty-three when she died this day in 1368. She was the first wife of John of Gaunt the son of Edward III and Philippa of Hainault.

Blanche is said to have died of the plague that had ravaged the country that year. This was the plague's third appearance since it first arrived on English shores twenty years earlier. The previous outbreak in 1361, according to Henry Knighton an Augustinian canon of the abbey of St Mary of the Meadows in Leicester, had

'a general mortality oppressed the people. It was called the second pestilence and both rich
and poor died, but especially young people and children.'

The Leicestershire outbreak cost Blanche's parents their lives. In Lincolnshire that year there was an outbreak in Louth, a town just fifteen miles north of Bolingbroke Castle, where Blanche had given birth to Henry, the future Henry IV.

By 1368 Blanche was weakened by childbirth and susceptible to infection, she was therefore 'ripe for the picking' so to speak.

Blanche had given birth to a daughter in 1368 who died as an infant, it is plausible that Blanche may have died in childbirth her poor body weakened from the years of constant pregnancy. She was married at twelve/thirteen, had her first baby nine months later and was pregnant with another child before her body had chance to recover from the last until the aforementioned daughter born in 1368. Blanche died in Staffordshire where there was a recorded outbreak in 1369 which may have taken the life of her last child, it is not unreasonable to suppose the 'black death' took poor Blanche too.

French author Jean Froissart wrote that Blanche was 'young and pretty' even Geoffrey Chaucer was so inspired by her beauty that he wrote of her in his work The Book of the Duchess.

Blanche's body was laid to rest in Old St Paul's Cathedral in London, where Gaunt later joined her. Their tomb was destroyed by fire when the cathedral burnt down in 1666.

Note: Blanche's maternal aunt was Eleanor of Lancaster. Eleanor's first husband, John de Beaumont was also Blanche's paternal uncle.
meanderingthroughtime.weebly.com/history-blog/eleanor-of-lancaster

Note: What is interesting is that both Blanche and Eleanor dates of death are one day off being exactly fifty years apart.

Eleanor of Lancaster

11/9/2017

The 11th of September 1318 saw the birth of Eleanor of Lancaster at Grosmont Castle in Wales. Eleanor was the wife of Richard Fitzalan, the daughter of Henry of Lancaster and Maud Chaworth, great granddaughter of Henry III, and my 20th great grandmother.

Eleanor was in the service of Edward III's queen Philippa of Hainault. She may have accompanied Philippa to Scotland and in the first years of her marriage she was with the queen in Europe in her capacity as Philippa's lady in waiting. It was while she was with the queen in Ghent that Eleanor gave birth to her first child, Henry. Her marriage to Henry's father, John de Beaumont, had ended with his death in a tournament in the spring of 1342, leaving her with Henry who was just two years old.

Eleanor second marriage, two years later, was to my direct ancestor Richard Fitzalan, which was a love match I believe. With Fitzalan she gave birth to seven children, the second, John, being the next in my family line.

Richard's, Eleanor's eldest child and heir to the earldom of Arundel, claim to fame, apart from carrying the crown of England at the coronation of Richard II, was his membership of the Lords Appellant, a group of men who disagreed with Richard's rule and his reliance on favorites - Fitzalan would lose his head over it. Thankfully Eleanor was long gone by that time as was Richard.

The proof of the love between Eleanor and her husband defies time and lies in the request Richard Fitzalan made in his will -

"near to the tomb of Eleanor de Lancaster, my wife; and I desire that my tomb be no higher than hers, that no
men at arms, horses, hearse, or other pomp, be used at my funeral, but only five torches...
as was about the corpse of my wife, be allowed."

Captain William Bligh

9/9/2017

William Bligh was a West Country man born on the 9th September 1754. He is thought to have been born in Plymouth where his father was a custom's officer, however the origins of the family lie further west in the county of Cornwall at Tinten Manor in St Tudy.

Bligh, I think, was never meant to pass into the annals of history unnoticed, his story, in one way or another, was meant to be told. It's a shame however that his reputation is based on the portrayal of the brutish Charles Laughton or the hard faced Trevor Howard in the 1935 and 1961 films Mutiny on the Bounty - because of this William Bligh is forever a villain.

Bligh's career at sea covered the years between 1761 and 1814, he steadily climbed through the ranks from ships boy to Vice Admiral. It is due to Bligh that we know of Captain Cook's final voyage and his fate at the hands of a Hawaiian chief. However, it is the events of April 1789 that many of us associate with William Bligh.

In 1787, Bligh was given the position of lieutenant on the Bounty, a small three masted cutter built three years earlier in the port of Hull.

Under Bligh was a small crew with one Fletcher Christian as Master's Mate. The Bounty sailed for Tahiti in the winter of 1787 and left in the spring of 1789, it was on this return journey that the infamous mutiny took place.

After the non compliance of an order by Christian and following an accusation of theft Bligh's troubles began, this eventually lead to Bligh and eighteen crew members being cast adrift. By the 14th June the small boat reached the island of Timor after travelling nearly 4,000 miles. Captain Bligh eventually returned to England arriving on the 14th of March the following year only to find that the country was already talking of the mutiny. He was at first proclaimed a hero, but later court martialed for the loss of his ship, his court case resulted in his acquittal.

Bligh went on to captain at least eight more vessels, he was appointed Governor of New South Wales for a short time and ended his career as a Vice Admiral.

The crew of Bounty, led by Fletcher Christian, had mutinied just off the Friendly Islands in Polynesia, and following setting their captain adrift, they headed for the Pitcairn Islands.

So who was the goody and baddie in this sad tale? Was it Bligh, the supposed cruel and brutal captain? Was Fletcher Christian a hero for not being afraid to standing up to a bully or was Bligh doing what he was supposed to do, that is captain his ship and keep control his men, or was Christian a rebel who mutinied when he was denied what he wanted.

These are questions not easily answered I think.