Joan/Joanne/Joanna Holland, Duchess of York

  Joan Holland was born about 1380, one of the many children of Thomas Holland, 2nd Earl of Kent and his wife Alice Arundel (aka Fitzalan) and the second-eldest daughter. It seems to have been Kent’s policy to marry his daughters into every family that could conceivably inherit the throne. Accordingly, towards the end of…

The Tomb at King’s Langley

Quite by chance, I recently came across this rather ancient article written by, of all people, Enoch Powell: If Powell’s theory is correct, the tomb in which Edmund of Langley and Isabelle of Castile are buried was intended originally for Richard II and was reallocated after Anne of Bohemia died and Richard decided to commission…

A mystery at the Swan Inn at Clare, Suffolk….

On reading the February 2021 edition of the Mortimer History Society’s publication, Mortimer Matters, I was intrigued by an article (by Hugh Wood) about a curious piece of carved and painted wood. “….Brightening up the front of the Swan Inn in Clare in Suffolk is this colourful piece of carved wood. Its shape suggests that…

The Yorkist Connection to Cranborne in Dorset

Cranborne is a little village tucked away in the Dorset countryside. The roads leading to it are small and narrow, with very high hedges, and driving there can be a bit of a nightmare if you should meet up with a farm vehicle or delivery lorry (frequent)! However, it seems to have been heavily visited…

Was 29th March a day of retribution for a certain 14th-century lord….?

  For the past two/three years I have been grappling (off and on, so to speak) with some defiant dates. No doubt I’ve bewailed this particular problem before because my interest in the lord concerned is quite considerable. Not least because he may have had great significance for the House of York. So here goes…

Was the 3rd Duke of York like his youngest son in appearance….?

  When I posted on my Facebook page that it had been suggested to me I write an M&B article about the physical appearance of the 3rd Duke of York, a friend commented: “. . . .According to John Ashdown Hill’s biography of Cecily, he was probably tall because of some poem written about how…

Maria de Padilla

I am surprised to find the internet has several images of Maria de Padilla. Her daughters married John of Gaunt and Edmund of Langley and she was the grandmother of Catherine of Lancaster, aka Catalina, Queen of Castile,  Edward, Duke of York, Constance of York and Richard of Conisbrough. (Richard of Conisbrough is known thus to…

The Bard’s Richard, as played by Richard’s grandfather. . .!

Serial killer? Murdered his nephews? Infamous? Had no children? Oh, well, this New Zealand article does go on to say that the actual Richard had a much better reputation than the Bard saw fit to bestow upon him. But if the illustration above is supposed to be Richard….it’s more like his grandfather! Or Jeremy Corbyn…

Edward IV and Elizabeth Wydeville

(This letter, of which a version was published in the September 2018 Bulletin, was in response to Bryan Dunleavy’s article about Edward IV and Elizabeth Wydville.) The article in the latest Ricardian Bulletin by Bryan Dunleavy is interesting, and also provocative, given that the bulk of readers of the publication are, by definition, Ricardians. However…

“On the Trail of the Mortimers”

This song was written in conjunction with the Mortimer History Society for Philip Hume’s book about the noble family.