Robert Curthose invasion of England in 1101

Robert, Duke of Normandy, nicknamed Curthose for the shortness of his legs and hence his leggings, was the oldest, nicest and least effective of William the Conqueror’s three sons. Brave, generous, good-natured and trusting, he was easily outmatched in statecraft, ruthlessness and cunning by his younger brothers – William Rufus and Henry.
Their father had no confidence in Robert as a ruler and arranged for Rufus to succeed him on the throne of England. Then, when Rufus died in 1100, Henry was on the scene. He seized the royal treasury instantly and had himself crowned within three days.

Robert was on his way back from crusade. Insisting that the crown was rightfully his, he won support from prominent figures in Normandy and England, including Ranulf Flambard, Bishop of Durham and a favourite of Rufus. Henry had incarcerated the bishop in the Tower of London, but in February 1101 he got his guards drunk, shinned down a rope and got away to Normandy. Duke Robert gathered an army, with which he crossed the Channel to Portsmouth in July. Henry meanwhile had expected him at Pevensey where he had assembled his English troops, whom he personally instructed in the art of resisting Norman cavalry.

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Manchester Martyrs

In September 1867, Colonel Thomas Kelly and Captain Timothy Deasy were arrested in the centre of Manchester on suspicion of terrorism. News of their arrest was immediately sent to Mr. Disraeli, the Prime Minister, as Colonel Kelly was the most prominent Fenian of them all, having only recently been confirmed as Chief Executive of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and as such was considered quite a capture. A few days later the both prisoners were conveyed from the Court House in Manchester to the County Jail on Hyde Road, West Gorton. They were handcuffed and locked in two separate compartments inside the Police van, there was a posse of 12 policemen to escort them.

Place to Visit: Eastnor Castle, UK

Eastnor was built by the 2^nd Baron (Lord) Somers, later 1^st Earl, between 1810 and 1824. The combination of inherited wealth, his judicious marriage to the daughter of the eminent and rich Worcestershire historian, Rev. Treadway Russell Nash, and his great ambition prompted the 1^st earl to commission a castle to impress his contemporaries and raise his family into the higher ranks of the ruling class. Then, as now, the size and splendour of a country house evidenced the standing and fortune of any family.

 

His architect, the young Robert Smirke, who was later well known for his design for the British Museum, proposed a Norman Revival style. From a distance, Eastnor tried to create the impression of an Edward Ist-style medieval fortress guarding the Welsh Borders. It was a symbolic a defiant assertion of power by an aristocrat in a period of fear and uncertainty following the French Revolution and during the Napoleonic Wars.

Thomas Müntzer and Peasants' War

Peasant-plebeian movement in Reformation strongest was expressed in the Anabaptist movement and the Peasants' War in Germany 1524-1525. Peasants and urban population (plebs) could not accept Lutheranism and princely Reformation. There were a new sects in the Reformation movement. Anabaptists (re-baptized because they required re-baptism in the mature years of life) were particularly disseminated in the plebeian classes. Some revolutionary Anabaptists preached the abolition of private property and common property.

Among these Anabaptists in Zwickau came preacher Thomas Müntzer and committed to them a strong influence. Spoke out strongly against Luther - "fat skin from Wittenberg," as he called it - as Luther put faith in the defense of private property and wealth. Müntzer was against the nobility, against feudalism, against class society and the authorities and called for the armed struggle against the utilization of people. Nobles and priests must leave the castles and palaces, begin to live in ordinary houses and live like all other people.

The Third Crusade: Richard The Lionheart in comparison with other crusaders

The allure of Jerusalem

King Richard I of England twice marched inland from the Palestinian coast towards Jerusalem, reaching the small dismantled fortress at Beit Nuba, just 12 miles from the Holy City - in December 1191 and gain in June 1192.

Christian warrior against the Muslim

On both occasions the Lionheart probably had little or no intention of actually prosecuting an attack on the city - instead these were feints, designed to test Saladin's resolve and to augment diplomatic negotiations. In all this, the king followed the best precepts of medieval generalship, but he failed to account for the distinct nature of crusading warfare - species of conflict underpinned by religious ideology and dependent upon the overwhelming devotional allure of Jerusalem.

King Charles’ II Flight after the Battle of Worcester

On Friday 5^th of September 1651 the future king Charles II hid in a Shropshire barn. It was Francis Wolfe of madley who provided this shelter from imprisonment and death, as Charles fled from defeat at the Battle of Worcester. Years later, after his restoration to the throne, the king gave a magnificent silver tankard to the Wolfe family in recognition of their kindness and bravery in concealing him. “King Charles’ barn” still stands in Madeley today.

King Charles II of England

What actually happened?

After his campaign went badly and finally finished at Worcester in 1651, Charles fled north out the Worcester and rode through the night, arriving in Shropshire on the morning of Thursday 4^th. One of his companions advised him to make for “White Ladies”, a large timber-framed house on the site of a medieval nunnery. The property was owned by a Catholic family sympathetic to the Royal cause. The owners were away, but luckily for Charles, their servants the Penderel family were staunchly Royalist.