23 August
23 August 1305 – Sir William Wallace is executed.
24 August
24 August 895 – Guthred, king of Northumbria died
24 August 1198 – Alexander II of Scotland (d. 1249) was born
He was King of Scotland from 1214 until his death. He was the only son of the Scottish king William the Lion & Ermengarde of Beaumont. He concluded the Treaty of York (1237) which defined the boundary between England & Scotland, virtually unchanged today.
24 August 1200 - King John married Isabella of Angoulême
25 August
25 August 1482 - Margaret of Anjou died
Margaret of Anjou (French: Marguerite; 23 March 1430 – 25 August 1482) was the Queen of England & nominally Queen of France by marriage to King Henry VI from 1445 to 1461 & again from 1470 to 1471. Born in the Duchy of Lorraine into the House of Valois-Anjou, Margaret was the second eldest daughter of René, King of Naples, & Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine. She was one of the principal figures in the series of dynastic civil wars known as the Wars of the Roses & at times personally led the Lancastrian faction. Some of her contemporaries such as the Duke of Suffolk praised "Her valiant courage & undaunted spirit" & Edward Hall describes her personality: "This woman excelled all other, as well in beauty & favour, as in wit and policy, & was of stomach & courage, more like to a man, than a woman." Owing to her husband's frequent bouts of insanity, Margaret ruled the kingdom in his place. It was she who called for a Great Council in May 1455 that excluded the Yorkist faction headed by Richard of York, 3rd Duke of York, & this provided the spark that ignited a civil conflict that lasted for more than 30 years, decimated the old nobility of England, & caused the deaths of thousands of men, including her only son Edward of Westminster, Prince of Wales, at the Battle of Tewkesbury in 1471. Margaret was taken prisoner by the victorious Yorkists after the Lancastrian defeat at Tewkesbury. In 1475, she was ransomed by her cousin, King Louis XI of France. She went to live in France as a poor relation of the French king, & she died there at the age of 52.
25 August 1805 - Prince William Henry, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh died
Prince William Henry, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh, was a grandson of King George II & a younger brother of King George III of the United Kingdom.
Prince William Henry was born at Leicester House, Westminster. His parents were Frederick, Prince of Wales, eldest son of George II & Caroline of Ansbach, & Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, then Princess of Wales. His father died in 1751, leaving the Prince's elder brother, Prince George, heir-apparent to the throne. He succeeded as George III on 25 October 1760, & created William Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh & Earl of Connaught on 19 November 1764. He had been made a Knight of the Garter on 27 May 1762, & invested on 22 September of that year.
In 1764 he began to court Maria Walpole, the Dowager Countess of Waldegrave, an illegitimate granddaughter of Sir Robert Walpole. He initially wished for active service in the military, but his health & intelligence both proved insufficient. Instead he was appointed colonel of the 13th Regiment of Foot in 1766. That same year he & Maria married in secret in his home on Pall Mall. This marriage only became known to the King after the passing of the Royal Marriages Act 1772. The Duke & Maria lived at St Leonard's Hill in Clewer, near Windsor & had three children, all of whom were styled Highness from birth & used the territorial designation of Gloucester in conjunction with their princely styles, as great-grandchildren in the male line of George II. In 1767 he was promoted to major-general & made colonel of the 3rd Regiment of Foot Guards. He was made the thirteenth Chancellor of Trinity College, Dublin in 1771, holding the post until 1805. The Duke & Maria's first child, Princess Sophia of Gloucester (1773 – 1844), was born in 1773. Princess Caroline of Gloucester (1774 – 1775) followed just over a year later. However, Princess Caroline died aged just nine months following a smallpox inoculation, intended to protect her from the disease. The Duke & Maria had a third & final child in 1776, Prince William Frederick (1776 – 1834).
Prince Henry later transferred to the 1st Regiment of Foot Guards, & he became a field marshal on 18 October 1793. The Duke died aged 61 at Gloucester House in London in 1805 & was succeeded as duke by his son William Frederick.
25 August 1942 - Prince George, Duke of Kent died
Prince George was born on 20 December 1902 at York Cottage on the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk, England. His father was the Prince of Wales (later King George V), the only surviving son of King Edward VII & Queen Alexandra.
His mother was the Princess of Wales (later Queen Mary), the only daughter & eldest child of the Duke & Duchess of Teck. At the time of his birth, he was fifth in the line of succession to the throne, behind his father & three older brothers Edward, Albert & Henry.
At the age of 13, like his brothers, the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VIII) & Prince Albert (later King George VI), before him, he went to naval college, first at Osborne &, later, at Dartmouth. He was promoted to sub-lieutenant on 15 February 1924, & was promoted to lieutenant on 15 February 1926. He remained on active service in the Royal Navy until March 1929, serving on HMS Iron Duke & later on the flagship of the Atlantic Fleet (renamed the Home Fleet in 1932), HMS Nelson. He served on the latter as a lieutenant on the Admiral's staff before transferring in 1928 to HMS Durban on the America & West Indies Station, based at the Royal Naval Dockyard at Bermuda (where his father had previously served on HMS Canada & HMS Thrush), as a watch-keeping Lieutenant. After leaving the navy, he briefly held posts at the Foreign Office & later the Home Office, becoming the first member of the royal family to work as a civil servant. He continued to receive promotions after leaving active service: to commander on 15 February 1934 & to captain on 1 January 1937.
From January to April 1931, Prince George & his elder brother the Prince of Wales travelled 18,000 miles on a tour of South America. On 23 June 1936, George was appointed a personal aide-de-camp to his eldest brother, the new King Edward VIII. Following the abdication of Edward VIII, he was appointed a personal naval aide-de-camp to his elder brother, now George VI. On 12 March 1937, he was commissioned as a colonel in the British Army & in the equivalent rank of group captain in the Royal Air Force (RAF). He was also appointed as the Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Fusiliers from the same date.
On 8 June 1939, George was promoted to the ranks of rear admiral in the Royal Navy, major-general in the British Army & air vice-marshal in the Royal Air Force. At the start of the Second World War, George returned to active naval service with the rank of rear admiral, briefly serving in the Intelligence Division of the Admiralty. He was patron of the Society for Nautical Research between 1926 & 1942.
On 12 October 1934, in anticipation of his forthcoming marriage to his second cousin, Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark, he was created Duke of Kent, Earl of St Andrews, & Baron Downpatrick. The couple married on 29 November 1934 at Westminster Abbey They had three children:
Prince Edward, Duke of Kent (9 October 1935). He married Katharine Worsley on 8 June 1961.
Princess Alexandra, The Hon. Lady Ogilvy (25 December 1936). She married the Hon. Angus Ogilvy, son of David Ogilvy, 12th Earl of Airlie & Lady Alexandra Coke, on 24 April 1963.
Prince Michael of Kent (4 July 1942). He married Baroness Marie Christine von Reibnitz on 30 June 1978.
On 25 August 1942, George & 14 others took off in a RAF Short Sunderland flying boat W4026 from Invergordon, Ross & Cromarty, to fly to Iceland on non-operational duties. The aircraft crashed on Eagle's Rock, a hillside near Dunbeath, Caithness, Scotland. All but one were killed, including George, who was 39 years old.
His death in RAF service marked the first time in more than 450 years that a member of the royal family died on active service. The prince's body was transferred initially to St. George's Chapel, Windsor, & he was buried in the Royal Burial Ground, Frogmore, directly behind Queen Victoria's mausoleum. His elder son, six-year-old Prince Edward, succeeded him as Duke of Kent. Princess Marina, his wife, had given birth to their third child, Prince Michael, only seven weeks before Prince George's death.
26 August
26 August 1346 - The Battle of Crécy
26 August 1819 - Prince Albert was born
Prince Albert was the consort of Queen Victoria from their marriage on 10 February 1840 until his death in 1861.
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26 August - 1944 Prince Richard, Duke of Gloucester was born
He is the second son of Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester & Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, as well as the youngest of the nine grandchildren of King George V & Queen Mary. He is currently 30th in line of succession to the British throne, & the highest person on the list who is not a direct descendant of King George VI, who was his uncle.
He practised as an architect until the death of his elder brother placed him in direct line to inherit his father's dukedom of Gloucester, which he assumed in 1974. He is a paternal first cousin of Queen Elizabeth II. He married Birgitte van Deurs in July 1972. They have three children.
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27 August
27 August 1172 - Henry the Young King married Margaret of France
On 2 November 1160, he was betrothed to Margaret of France, daughter of King Louis VII of France & his second wife, Constance of Castile, when he was 5 years of age and she was at least 2. The marriage was an attempt to finally settle the struggle between the counts of Anjou & the French kings over possession of the frontier district of the Norman Vexin, which Louis VII had acquired from Henry's grandfather, Geoffrey Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, in around 1144. By the terms of the settlement, Margaret would bring the castles of the Norman Vexin to her new husband. However, the marriage was pushed through by Henry II when Young Henry & Margaret were small children so that he could seize the castles. A bitter border war followed between the kings. Young Henry was crowned on Saturday 14 June 1170 on the feast of St Basil at Westminster Abbey during the reign of his father Henry II. Young Henry & Margaret were formally married on 27 August 1172 at Winchester Cathedral, when Henry, aged seventeen, was crowned King of England a second time, this time together with Margaret, by Rotrou, the Archbishop of Rouen.
Henry the Young King (28 February 1155 – 11 June 1183) was the eldest surviving son of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Beginning in 1170, he was titular King of England, Duke of Normandy, Count of Anjou & Maine. Henry the Young King was the only English king since the Norman Conquest to be crowned during his father's reign, but was frustrated by his father's refusal to grant him meaningful autonomous power. He died aged 28, six years before his father, leaving his brother Richard to become the next king.
Margaret of France (1158 – 18 September 1197) was queen of England by marriage to Henry the Young King, & queen of Hungary & Croatia by marriage to Béla III of Hungary in 1186. Margaret was the eldest daughter of Louis VII of France by his second wife Constance of Castile.
27 August 1968 - Princess Marina, Duchess of Kent died
Marina was a princess of the Greek royal house, who married Prince George, Duke of Kent, fourth son of George V & Queen Mary, in 1934. They had three children: Prince Edward, Princess Alexandra, & Prince Michael.
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27 August 1979 - Louis Mountbatten was assassinated
28 August
28 August 1640 – Second Bishop's War: King Charles I's English army loses to a Scottish Covenanter force at the Battle of Newburn.
The Battle of Newburn, also known as Battle of Newburn Ford, took place on 28 August 1640, during the Second Bishops' War. It was fought at Newburn, a village just outside Newcastle, situated at a ford over the River Tyne. A Scottish Covenanter army of 20,000 under Alexander Leslie defeated an English force of 5,000, led by Lord Conway. The only significant military action of the war, victory enabled the Scots to occupy Newcastle, which provided the bulk of London's coal supplies. The Treaty of Ripon agreed on 26 October allowed the Scots to occupy large parts of northern England, and paid them daily expenses of £850, which only ended with the August 1641 Treaty of London. Funding this forced Charles to recall Parliament, a key element in the events that ended in August 1642 with the First English Civil War.
28 August 1648 – The Siege of Colchester ends when Royalists Forces surrender to the Parliamentary Forces after eleven weeks, during the Second English Civil War.
The siege of Colchester occurred in the summer of 1648 when the English Civil War reignited in several areas of Britain. Colchester found itself in the thick of the unrest when a Royalist army on its way through East Anglia to raise support for the King, was attacked by Lord-General Thomas Fairfax at the head of a Parliamentary force. The Parliamentarians' initial attack forced the Royalist army to retreat behind the town's walls, but they were unable to bring about victory, so they settled down to a siege. Despite the horrors of the siege, the Royalists resisted for eleven weeks & only surrendered following the defeat of the Royalist army in the North of England at the Battle of Preston (1648). Casualties were high with the Royalists losing around 1,000 men & the Parliamentarians 500 -1000 men..
28 August 1837 - Francis, Duke of Teck was born (d.1900)
Francis, Duke of Teck, known as Count Francis von Hohenstein until 1863, was an Austrian-born nobleman who married into the British royal family. He was the father of Queen Mary, & thus a great-grandfather of the current British monarch, Queen Elizabeth II. Francis held the Austrian title of Count of Hohenstein (Graf von Hohenstein), & the German titles of Prince (Fürst) & later Duke of Teck (Herzog von Teck), & was given the style of Serene Highness in 1863. He was granted the British style of Highness in 1887.
28 August 1972 - Prince William of Gloucester died in a plane crash
Prince William was born on 18 December 1941 at Hadley Common, Hertfordshire.
His father was Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester, the third son of George V & Queen Mary. His mother was Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, the third daughter of the 7th Duke of Buccleuch & Lady Margaret Bridgeman. A Cambridge & Stanford graduate, he joined the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, serving in Lagos & Tokyo, before returning to take over royal duties. He led an active life, flying Piper aircraft, trekking through the Sahara, & even ballooning.
A licensed pilot & President of the British Light Aviation Centre, Prince William owned several aircraft & competed in amateur air show races. On 28 August 1972, he was competing in the Goodyear International Air Trophy at Halfpenny Green, near Wolverhampton, with Vyrell Mitchell, a pilot with whom the prince had often raced listed as a passenger. Shortly after their take-off & at a very low altitude, the Piper Cherokee banked abruptly to port, with an extreme increase in the rate of turn & corresponding loss of altitude; the wing hit a tree & sheared off, & the out-of-control plane flipped over & crashed into an earthen bank, bursting into flames. Prince William & Mitchell were killed. The crash happened before 30,000 spectators, the fire took two hours to control, & the bodies were identified at inquest the next day from dental records. His father, Prince Henry, was in such poor health at the time of his death that his mother hesitated whether to tell him. She later admitted in her memoirs that she did not, but that he may have learned of their son's death from television coverage.
Prince William was buried in the Royal Burial Ground, Frogmore. The comprehensive school in Oundle, which he opened in 1971, was renamed Prince William School in his memory. William was the heir apparent of his father's peerages, Duke of Gloucester, Earl of Ulster, & Baron Culloden. Upon his death, his younger brother Prince Richard of Gloucester became heir apparent, & succeeded to these peerages in 1974. William was the first grandchild of King George V & Queen Mary to die.
29 August
29 August 1189 - King john married Isabella, Countess of Gloucester
On 28 September 1176, King Henry II betrothed Isabella to his youngest son, John Lackland. John & Isabella were half-second cousins as great-grandchildren of Henry I, & thus within the prohibited degrees of consanguinity. But in the marriage agreement, the King agreed to find the best husband possible for Isabella should the Pope refuse to grant a dispensation for the marriage. Henry also declared Isabella the sole heir to Gloucester, disinheriting her two sisters. On 29 August 1189, John & Isabella were married at Marlborough Castle in Wiltshire, & John assumed the Earldom of Gloucester in her right. Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury, declared the marriage null by reason of consanguinity & placed their lands under interdict. The interdict was lifted by Pope Clement III. The Pope granted a dispensation to marry but forbade the couple from having sexual relations. Shortly after John acceded to the throne in 1199, & before the end of August, he obtained an annulment of the marriage. The annulment was granted on the grounds of consanguinity, by the bishops of Lisieux, Bayeux, and Avranches, sitting in Normandy. John, however, kept her lands, & Isabella did not contest the annulment.
King John married Isabella of Angoulême (c. 1186/1188 – 4 June 1246) in 1200. She was also suo jure Countess of Angoulême from 1202 until 1246. Isabel Countess of Gloucester later married Geoffrey FitzGeoffrey de Mandeville, 2nd Earl of Essex, on 20 January 1214. He died in 1216. A year after Essex's demise, she married Hubert de Burgh (later Earl of Kent), later the justiciar of England, in September 1217.
29 August 1350 - The Battle of Winchelsea
29 August 2012 - The Queen accompanied by the Earl & Countess of Wessex opened the London 2012 Paralympic Games at the Olympic Stadium
30 August
30 August 1525 - The Treaty of the More was agreed between King Henry VIII & the French king, Francis I
The Treaty of the More was concluded on 30 August 1525 between Henry VIII & the interim French government of Louise of Savoy. It was celebrated by Henry & the French ambassadors at the More, Hertfordshire, a castle owned by Henry's chief minister, Cardinal Wolsey. England, with Wolsey negotiating, agreed to give up some territorial claims on France, receiving in return a pension from the French of £20,000 a year. France settled what was owed to Henry VIII's sister, Mary, dowager queen of France. England also agreed to work to secure the release of King Francis of France, then held prisoner by Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain. England had been troubled by the threat of a renewal of the "Auld Alliance" between France & Scotland, & France agreed to prevent the Scottish Duke of Albany from returning to Scotland.
30 August 1548 - Catharine Parr gave birth to a daughter, Mary Seymour
Henry VIII died on 28 January 1547. After the king's death, Catherine was allowed to keep the queen's jewels & dresses as queen dowager. About six months after Henry's death, she married her fourth & final husband, Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley. The marriage was short-lived, as she died on Wednesday, 5 September 1548 due to complications of childbirth.
Mary Seymour (30 August 1548 – unknown), was born at her father’s country seat, Sudeley Castle in Gloucestershire. Although Catherine was married four times, Mary was her only child. Complications from Mary's birth would claim the life of her mother on 5 September 1548, & her father was executed less than a year later for treason against Edward VI. In 1549, the Parliament of England passed an Act (3 & 4 Edw. 6 C A P. XIV) removing the attainder placed on her father from Mary, but his lands remained property of the Crown. As her mother's wealth was left entirely to her father & later confiscated by the Crown, Mary was left a destitute orphan in the care of Katherine Willoughby, Duchess of Suffolk, who appears to have resented this imposition. After 1550 Mary disappears from historical record completely, & no claim was ever made on her father's meagre estate, leading to the conclusion that she did not live past the age of two.
30 August 1727 - Princess Anne, is created Princess Royal.
Anne, Princess Royal & Princess of Orange (2 November 1709 – 12 January 1759) was the second child & eldest daughter of King George II of Great Britain & his consort Caroline of Ansbach. Anne was the second daughter of a British sovereign to hold the title Princess Royal. She was the wife of William IV, Prince of Orange, the first hereditary stadtholder of all seven provinces of the Northern Netherlands.
31 August
31 August 1422 - King Henry V of England died
Henry V died on 31 August 1422, at the Château de Vincennes. He had been weakened by dysentery, contracted during the siege of Meaux, & had to be carried in a litter towards the end of his journey. A possible contributory factor is heatstroke; the last day he was active he had been riding in full armour in blistering heat. He was 35 years old & had reigned for nine years. Henry's comrade-in-arms & Lord Steward, John Sutton, 1st Baron Dudley, brought Henry's body back to England & bore the royal standard at his funeral. Henry V was buried in Westminster Abbey on 7 November 1422.
Henry V (16 September 1386 – 31 August 1422), also called Henry of Monmouth, was King of England from 1413 until his death in 1422. Despite his relatively short reign, Henry's outstanding military successes in the Hundred Years' War against France made England one of the strongest military powers in Europe. Immortalised in Shakespeare's "Henriad" plays, Henry is known & celebrated as one of the greatest warrior kings of medieval England.
During the reign of his father Henry IV, Henry gained military experience fighting the Welsh during the revolt of Owain Glyndŵr & against the powerful aristocratic Percy family of Northumberland at the Battle of Shrewsbury. Henry acquired an increasing role in England's government due to the king's declining health, but disagreements between father & son led to political conflict between the two. After his father's death in 1413, Henry assumed control of the country & asserted the pending English claim to the French throne. In 1415, Henry embarked on war with France in the ongoing Hundred Years' War (1337–1453) between the two nations. His military successes culminated in his famous victory at the Battle of Agincourt (1415) & saw him come close to conquering France. Taking advantage of political divisions within France, he conquered large portions of the kingdom, resulting in Normandy's occupation by the English for the first time since 1345–1360. After months of negotiation with Charles VI of France, the Treaty of Troyes (1420) recognised Henry V as regent & heir apparent to the French throne, & he was subsequently married to Charles's daughter, Catherine of Valois. Everything seemed to point to the formation of a union between the kingdoms, in the person of Henry. However, he died two years later & was succeeded by his only child, the infant Henry VI.
31 August 1997 - Diana, Princess of Wales, died
The tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales happened on Sunday 31 August 1997 following a car accident in Paris, France. The vehicle in which The Princess was travelling was involved in a high-speed accident in the Place de l'Alma underpass in central Paris shortly before midnight on Saturday 30 August.
The Princess was taken to the La Pitie Salpetriere Hospital, where she underwent two hours of emergency surgery before being declared dead at 0300 BST. The Princess's companion, Mr Dodi Fayed, & the driver of the vehicle died in the accident, whilst a bodyguard was seriously injured.
Read more about Diana here...
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