Someone on Twitter was talking about Ashby St Ledgers. This is a small, attractive, village in Northamptonshire, famous for being home to the Catesby family and for its associations with the Gunpowder Plot. Then I remembered a brief winter’s morning…
Bess of Hardwick, Countess of Shrewsbury, was one of the characters of Elizabethan England. Like the winner of a reality show, rising from relatively humble beginnings to rub shoulders with royalty, Bess is famous for being famous, a status assured…
We strolled to Walmer Castle from Deal in September sunshine. Infamous as the place where the Duke of Wellington died, Walmer Castle was one of Henry VIII’s so-called ‘device forts’, a network of artillery strongholds built to protect England against…
In the story of the Mary Rose, we took a brief look at the history of the famous Tudor warship, said to be a favourite of Henry VIII’s, that sank without warning on 19 July 1545, with the tragic loss…
Every now and again, something takes our breath away. I thought I knew roughly what to expect when visiting the Mary Rose Museum. I broadly knew the story: the 16th century English warship, a favourite of Henry VIII’s, that sank…
England’s King Henry VIII is usually thought of as the nasty big bloke with all the wives; the chap who officially stopped his subjects being Roman Catholic, gave them the Church of England instead and closed down all the nice…
The views of Worcester Cathedral, elegantly perched on the east bank of the River Severn, are surely among the best of any cathedral in Britain. Inside, Worcester is also one Britain’s most fascinating cathedrals. This compensates for it being a…
People often compare the relative merits of Britain’s two largest membership heritage organisations, the National Trust and English Heritage. In fact, there are several heritage organisations in the United Kingdom that offer membership, the main ones being Cadw, Historic Houses,…
Some places inspire a sense of curious awe. Though the past is ubiquitous, shaping who and what we all are, there are particular spots on earth where the shades of great events and people gather, jostling for attention. Visiting them…
This is Cross Bones Graveyard, surely one of the saddest places in London. Its story belongs within a wider narrative about poverty and prostitution, an important aspect of the two-thousand year history of the Borough of Southwark. Just an unfashionable…
I’m not easily given to hyperbole; I’ve told you that a million times. But it is genuinely hard to think of a British town that can be quite so achingly beautiful as Oxford. Perhaps I should qualify that by saying…
The Ryedale village of Sheriff Hutton is unlikely to be on most people’s tourist trails. Yet it is a reminder, if one is needed, that history, like love, is all around us. Frankly, the first I heard of the place…
We bowled up to Pevensey Castle on a blue-sky day in the company of Molly. Molly, I should say, is a small dog of exceptional poise and dignity, but has no relevance whatsoever to our story. She is mentioned merely…
Finally – A Bit About Britain’s History (From a long time ago until quite recently) is available as both an e-book and paperback on Amazon. A Bit About Britain’s History is a light introduction to Britain’s fascinating story. It could…