Category: History

The Cranford Protocol

In ten years I will have forgotten that TV licences for 75 year-olds were once buckshee but anytime now I will mourn, selfishly, the revocation of the Cranford Protocol.

Racing Green

It took an hour yesterday to buy a used car. Last week it took longer than that to buy a toner cartridge for the printer.

The Duchess of Dudley

What became of Alice Dudley when her husband deserted her in 1605? She cannot have been left penniless as she paid most of the bills to build St Giles-in-the-Fields in London in the 1620s.

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Categorised as History

Robert Dudley

It’s not unusual for same-sex partners to have children but I was surprised to see that Robert Dudley’s parents are Robert and Douglas. He was born in 1574 in the reign of Elizabeth I.

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Categorised as History

Saint Leodegar

The St Leger has been run on Town Moor outside Doncaster since 1776, or thereabouts. It’s the oldest of the Classics run over a mile, six furlongs and 132 yards in September.

Rigaud and Handel

In yesterday’s post we were in the Private Chapel of St James at Great Packington and found no sculpture worth mentioning. Actually there are two recumbent plaster images succinctly dismissed by Pevsner as “rather bad”.

The Feildings

This portrait by van Dyck hangs in the National Gallery in London. It depicts William, 1st Earl of Denbigh (c 1587 – 1643). He had been to India in the early 1630s and is seen, looking florid,  in Indian dress with a servant helpfully pointing out a parrot for him to bag.