All Categories - Meandering Through Time

Birth of Catherine of Valois

17/10/2017

Catherine of Valois, the beautiful and virtuous Kate from Shakespeare's Henry V is defined by the events of her later life, her marriage to Henry V, a suspected relationship with Edmund Beaufort, her affair with Owen Tudor and the ill-treatment of her body by diarist Samuel Pepys. However, little is known of her childhood and early life.

Catherine of Valois was born in Paris on the 27th October in 1401. She was the ninth child and the fifth daughter of King Charles VI of France and his queen, Isabella of Bavaria. Cathrine was born while France was in turmoil - the beginnings of a power struggle at home and the continuing conflict with the enemy over the sea, the English.

Catherine's mother Isabella receiving The Book of the City of Ladies

It is thought that Catherine had a troubled childhood and indeed she may have witnessed at first hand her father's bouts of mental illness and her mother struggling to come to terms with the situation. History tells us of the poverty ridden French court, but it doesn't tell us how it affected her, and historians differ in their view of Catherine's upbringing, some suggest that her mother was cold and cruel and openly flaunted her lovers about court, while other say that see was kind, generous and very close to all her children.

By the time Catherine was seven years old, English king Henry IV was looking for peace with France, he considered that a match between his son and a French princess would bring this about and therefore the subject was discussed on and off over the following years, eventually though Catherine was betrothed to the future Henry V.

Shakespeare writes of their meeting

"You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate: there is more eloquence in a sugar touch of them than in the tongues
of the French council, and they should sooner persuade Harry of England than a general petition of monarchs."

These sweet and seductive words to Catherine would succeed where seventy years of battling did not.

The Hollow Crown : Tom Hiddleston as Henry V and Melanie Thierry as Catherine of Valois

Henry and Catherine were betrothed on 21st May 1420, they were married within a few weeks and Catherine would be a widow just over fifteen months later. Catherine son from her marriage to Henry V was Henry VI, his weak rule would bring about the Wars of the Roses and from Catherine's relationship with the son of a Welsh publican the mighty Tudor dynasty sprang.

Death of Marie Antoinette

15/10/2017

On the 15th October 1793 Marie Antoinette had been tried and found guilty on charges of treason, conspiracy and collusion with domestic and foreign enemies, a fifth charge, that of incest was dropped.

Early in the morning of the 16th, Louis XVI's queen wrote a letter to her sister, in this letter she stated that she had a clear conscience, that she loved, and was concerned for, the future of her children, the letter was taken from her but never delivered. By midday the she was climbing the steps of the scaffold. History tells us that Marie accidentally stood on the foot of her executioner and said "Pardon me, sir, I meant not to do it" but just a few minutes later, at 12.15, the much despised Marie Antoinette was dead and her body was unceremoniously thrown into an unmarked grave.

There can be no doubt that Marie Antoinette was despised and hated, to the the French people she represented the vices of wealth and greed and more importantly aristocracy and absolutism. Even her contemporary, Mary Wollstonecraft, who was an advocate of women's rights and a supporter of the French revolutionaries, places the blame squarely on queen's shoulders. Despite the passing of two centuries this view prevails, however there are those who believe that she was misunderstood and as much a victim of the revolution as the hundreds of others who went to the guillotine.

The sketch below was drawn as Marie Antoinette was paraded through the crowd on the way to her execution, you can see that she wears a white dress and that her long blonde hair has been cut - was this an attempt on the part of the revolutionaries to show how even the mighty can be toppled or an attempt by the queen herself to show that she was indeed a innocent victim.

Edgar Aetheling Proclaimed King

15/10/2017

After his victory at the Hasting William the Conqueror headed for London. He left behind, among the dead, the mutilated body of the defeated English king Harold Godwinson.

The following day, the 15th October 1066 as the mighty conqueror's army made their way to the capital, Edgar Aetheling, one of three claimants to English throne was proclaimed king. Aetheling had the support of both the Ealdred, Archbishop of York, Stigand Archbishop of Canterbury and the Earls of Northumbria Edwin and Morcar.

If Edgar Aetheling could take on the Norman army, his future, as king, would be secured.

However, as the noise of the approaching Norman army headed their way Edgar's cause was abandoned and the men, who initially supported him, began frantically feathering their own nests.

Edgar Aetheling was taken as a captive to Normandy from where he escaped. By 1068 he was in the Scottish court of King Malcolm III, who was his sister's husband. However, by 1097 Edgar was leading an English invasion against Scotland.

Eighteen years later it was reported by William of Malmesbury that Aetheling was still alive in 1125 Malmesbury wrote
‘he now grows old in the country in privacy and quiet.’

Robert Grosseteste

8/10/2017

Bishop Robert Grosseteste died on the night of the 8th or the very early morning of the 9th of October in 1253 at Buckden in Huntingdonshire.

Very few people have heard of Bishop Robert Grosseteste, even here in his home city of Lincoln he is really only known because of the university which took his name.

In the 13th century Lincoln was the largest diocese in England it's inhabitants made up one fifth of the entire population of the country and it was here in 1235 that he was appointed bishop.

Before his appointment however, Grosseteste had written several important texts on the subjects of creation and redemption. He was also a scientist, and is seen as having a major role in the development of western scientific tradition. His work On Light or the Beginning of the Forms - which was written around 1220, includes his thoughts on cosmogony, he even wrote of the physics of rainbows.

Grosseteste was intelligent and influential and according to English chronicler Matthew Paris he regarded himself as personally responsible for the spiritual welfare of every individual in the diocese.

Almost as soon as he had settled into his position as Bishop of Lincoln he quarreled with the clergy, he denounced the pope and the Lincoln's cardinals to their faces stating that they ‘acted contrary to Christ’. Grosseteste was uncompromising and forthright and this lead to the Pope giving him up as unmanageable. He also had a sharp tongue and didn't mince his words, he once said to Henry de Montfort, the eldest son of the more famous Simon.

"My beloved child, both you and your father will meet your deaths on one day, and by one kind of death, but it will be in the name of justice and truth."

Grosseteste was right for on the 14th of May 1264 at the Battle of Lewes, both Henry and his father Simon died grisly deaths.
Of Henry de Montfort's death, the

'first born son and heir, in full view of his father, perished, split by a sword.

and Simon himself:

"the head was severed from his body, and his testicles cut off and hung on either side of his nose"

Bishop Robert Grosseteste died an old man and was laid to rest in a chapel dedicated to him in Lincoln Cathedral. Over his body a plaque reads: Robert Grosseteste Bishop of Lincoln 1235 - 1253.

The Moustache

3/10/2017

Victorian artists, such as John Gilbert, were known for their pencil sketches of historical events, these illustrations would appear in the Illustrated London News. It was during this period that the moustache had a bit of a revival.

In the first of the above images, John Gilbert has a number of Yorkists, including a misshapen Richard of Gloucester mocking the body of John Clifford who you can see has a moustache, in his illustration of Shakespeare's Henry VI Part III. Also from the same play, another of Gilbert's illustrations depicts a moustached Earl of Warwick speaking to a messenger.

Both these images are confusing, very few men from this period shaved their beards and left only a moustache - although it wasn't unknown as you can see from the tomb of Edward, the Black Prince, he has a fine long moustache.

During the Elizabethan period many men wore beards, but during the reign of James I beards had had their day and moustaches became fashionable as the would, as previously mentioned, at the beginning of the Victorian era - Lord Bryon wore a splendid one.

If you want to read a bit more on the subject of facial hair Lucinda Hawksley's book Moustaches, Whiskers and Beards: A History of Facial Hair, is worth read. It looks at the worst and the most hilarious examples of facial hair.

www.lucindahawksley.com/moustaches-whiskers-beards/

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 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, on 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 long ships 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 the 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.