0 Henry VIII or George I : Who Dined With More Style?

To celebrate 300 years since George I acceded to the throne of England, the Queen’s Chambers, Hampton Court Palace, have been opened to the public. I was particularly struck by the dining room, where King George I dined alone, but with an audience watching his every move – Somewhat reminiscent of a chimps tea-party! 

A table set for one - King George I dines before an audience
at Hampton Court Palace

This in sharp contrast to the Great Hall, where Henry VIII presided at the top table, over what must have been boisterous and rowdy mealtimes.

In contrast, Henry VIII sat at the top table in
the Great Hall, at Hampton Court.

‘Banketynge Braynlesse’

The excess of Henry VIII’s banquets and feasts are legend. In an earlier post we looked at the Tudor kitchens at Hampton Court Palace, and the industry required to produce such feasts.  

From the perspective of the 21^stcentury, we get the impression of a feast being a cross between binge drinking and a brawl, but the impression Henry had poor table manners is erroneous. A Tudor saying advises, ‘leaving one’s manners at the table’ – but here ‘manners’ refers to the left-over food, which would be fed to the poor waiting at the gate.

King Henry's view, watching over proceedings

 Indeed, in Babee’s Book (1475) of sage advice to those wishing to dine at court:

Wash your hands before you eat

Don’t let children linger at the table

Don’t fart

Don’t pick your nose, your teeth or any part of your body whilst at the table,

Don’t wipe your hands on the tablecloth or your clothes.

Perhaps Henry used these occaisions to watch the factions at court, or listen for gossip, but whatever his motivation, he was frequently at the centre of things when it came to eating in public.

 

Alone, and yet surrounded by a crowd.
George I was the only diner, whilst the watching audience were
corralled behind a barrier.

Contrast this, with King George I in the 1720’s. George was a much more private man. He preferred to dine privately but could not completely avoid the show of dining in regal splendour at a table of plenty, as previous kings had done.

‘Persons of good fashion and good appearance that have a desire to see us at dinner.’ Charles II

Detail of the barrier re-created by historians from the Historic Royal Palaces

The desire to ogle the masticating king seems to know no bounds, and in order to contain the crowds a barrier, or rail, was erected around the royal table to confine the spectators. Even so, incidents occurred where the barrier gave way, causing injury.  No records exist of exactly what these fences looked like and so the historians at Hampton Court Palace have used contemporaneous sources to re-create the barriers.

The view from George's chair

What George I hadn’t grasped, was the importance of royal feasts and entertaining as a means of drumming up support. George didn’t get on with his son and heir, the Prince of Wales, and in a battle of popularity, the future George II hosted feasts and made his table a place of entertainment and influence. The son’s popularity then dangerously eclipsed the father’s, who had his hand forced into more public revelry than he felt comfortable with.

Dine with Henry or George?
Which would you prefer?

Anyhow, I feel sure you will agree that royal dining at Hampton Court was a sight to be seen. Which do you prefer? George's refined luxury or Henry's boisterous opulence? Do comment and tell us!

Detail: Henry VIII or George I : Who Dined With More Style?

0 Southsea Castle, King Henry VIII and the Mary Rose

Did King Henry VIII stand on this spot to
watch the Mary Rose sink...

‘Your Highness’s new fortress here…may be called a castle, both for the compass, strength and beauty…and marvellously praised of all men that have seen it.’

Sir Anthony Knyvet, 22 Oct 1544

Southsea Castle (centre, in the distance to the left of the lighthouse)
Seen form Southsea Common.

            On a perfect summer’s day, I fed my history addiction by visiting Southsea Castle and then the Mary Rose museum, Portsmouth.
Indeed, Southsea Castle is perhaps most well-known for being the place from which, on 19^th July, 1545, King Henry VIII witnessed the sinking of the Mary Rose. My aim was to revisit the spot where Henry stood…

The Mary Rose - flying green and white Tudor pennants.

Southsea Castle was built to Henry VIII’s own design, in 1544. He was concerned about a French invasion of Portsmouth and positioned his new castle, or fortress, at a strategic site overlooking the Solent (the stretch of water between the mainland and the Isle of Wight). It commanded a stretch of deep water where ships passed closest to shore on their way into the important naval base of Portsmouth.

The entrance to Southsea Castle.

Henry appointed Sir Anthony Knyvet, Governor of Portsmouth, to oversee the construction. Knyvet took care to report regularly to his majesty. In one letter, some idea of the pressure to complete the build is hinted at when he bemoans a 10 day period in June 1544 when the weather was too poor to ship building supplies over from the Isle of Wight. Just a week later he reports construction will be far enough advanced, 12 days hence, to support weaponry.  However, on 8^th July he wrote again, anxious to correct the king who had been told the castle was fully defensible, “the which [sic] is not.” Again, supplies seem to have been the problem:

“Only a small quantity of gunpowder and the two sacres [small brass canon firing 6 pound shot]had been delivered, along with a good store of bows, arrows, bills and pikes.”
 

The keep - an original part of Henry's Castle.

Keen as he was to have the new fortification finished, Henry was slow to send money for wages and materials, and Knyvet was forced to apply for more funds on several occasions. Over the six months it took to build Southsea Castle  3,000GBP was spent, of which 1,300 GBP came from the dissolution of the monasteries.

‘I dare say your Majesty had never so great a piece of work done and so substantial, in so little time, as all skilful men that have seen it do report.’

Sir Anthony Knyvet.

When completed Knyvet wrote to Lord Wriothesely, the High Chancellor, that never had such a fortress been built at so little cost. He also hoped the king would be pleased “which was of his Majesty’s own device” – that is to say, Henry himself had been responsible for the design.

Standing on the ramparts, looking west across the entrance
to Portsmouth harbour.

Over the centuries the castle has been adapted and expanded, to meet changing defence needs. Indeed, Charles II visited in 1683 to inspect improvements made by his chief engineer, Sir Bernard de Gomme. Charles’ coat of arms can be seen carved in stone above the castle’s entrance.

It is hard to imagine how Southsea Castle looked in Tudor times but part of Henry’s original castle can still be seen at the keep, as well as East and West gun platforms. The keep, its walls up to 3 metres thick, was blissfully cool inside on the hot summer’s day of my visit. Whilst I’m not convinced I found the exact spot where King Henry VIII stood on that fateful day in 1545 – I hope the photos give some flavour of the view. Most of the photographs were taken from the ramparts – which were built in the early 1800’s as canon placements during the Napoleonic wars.

View from the keep over-looking the Solent.

 

Detail: Southsea Castle, King Henry VIII and the Mary Rose

0 Unnatural Deaths

The main entrance - Appuldurcombe House - sadly behind the facade is a ruin,
the building destroyed by a World War II bomb.

Q. What do a priest, John Smith and an heir to Appuldurcombe House have in common?

A.  They all died unnatural deaths on the Isle of Wight.

This week I'm on holiday and my blog post was inspired by a recent ghost walk around Appuldurcombe House, near Wroxall. A monk (!) conducted the tour through the ruins and recounted some of the gory tales of unnatural death pertaining to the house in its heyday when it was the most important estate on the IOW (Isle of Wight).

Sadly, the house is largely now ruins - destroyed by a WWII bomb.

Appuldurcombe's history starts in the 16th century with a page to King Henry VII, called James Worsley, whose family originated in Lancashire. The boy Worsley was educated along side the future King Henry VIII. The tale goes that no person was allowed to harm an heir to the throne, so when the young Henry misbehaved, his tutors whipped his friends to make the prince feel guilty- it is from this practice that the expression 'whipping boy' originates.

The future Henry VIII must have had quite a guilty conscience because when he became king he appointed James Worsley as Keeper of the Wardrobe, knighted him and gifted him a monastery that stood on the site of the current Appuldurcombe House. (On James' death he bequeathed his best gold chain to Henry VIII and his largest standing cup to Thomas Cromwell.)

A marble floor under which 4 Worsley children are buried.
Not the love hearts at the corner of the design : 2 blue and 2 pink, denoting 2 boys and 2 girls.

But what of unnatural deaths?
Well, James Worsley had a son, Richard. Under King Henry VIII, one of the Worsley's responsibilities was to protect the IOW from French invasion. Indeed the King is said to have visited to inspect the state of local defences, and gifted his host a fine Holbein portrait of himself.

Richard organised regular military manoeuvres which included the use of live firearms. However one day it was raining and the gunpowder got wet. Richard's two sons took the damp powder to a gatehouse to let it dry out, unfortunately the barrel got too close to the fire and the whole lot exploded -demolished the gatehouse and killed 6 people including both of Richard's sons and heirs.

Part of the cellar network beneath Appuldurcombe House.

Moving forward in time to the mid 1600's, we find the Worsley's were secret catholics at a time of persecution. The punishment for harbouring catholic priests was severe - a red hot poker up the derriere and so people went to great lengths to hide visiting cleris and those wishing to conduct mass had a number of secret hiding places or 'priest holes.' Appuldurcombe was no different and had a tunnel leading from the cellar to woodland 500 feet away. Unfortunately, the excavation of the tunnel followed a natural geological fault that dipped at one point and was prone to collecting water. This meant the escapee had to hold his breath, crawl underwater a few seconds before emerging on the other side.

The entrance to the 'priest tunnel' within the cellars.

One Father Ewan was not so lucky. He used the tunnel and was never seen again. It was assumed he'd got safely away into the woods and no one worried, until a while later a dreadful smell filled the cellars. It seems he drowned in the natural dip and it wasn’t until heavy rain and decaying body parts washed down the tunnel that anyone was any the wiser.

The ornamental pond into which John Smith was thrown and left to his fate.

Our third unnatural death is that of a school boy, John Smith. By Victorian times the house had passed out of the Worsley's hands and for a short time became a hotel, and then a school. The Rev. Pound established "a college for young gentlemen." However, it seems his school was not a happy place and bullying was rife. One boy, John Smith, was mercilessly picked on because he was short. One freezing November night John's dormitory mates plotted to throw him in the large ornamental pond outside the main entrance. They had to break the ice to get him in, and worse still, he was unable to get out unaided. The pond is 8 ft deep at the centre and 5 ft deep at the edges, with a vertical lip that meant unless you were tall it was impossible to grasp the ledge to pull yourself out.

The room (now ruined) where John Smith hung himself.

Poor John Smith was left in the freezing water and was only rescued when a master happened past. Despite this the bullying continued and a short while later, sadly John took his own life and hung himself.

A hint of the splendour that once existed.

And finally, much of the information for this post was obtained from a pamphlet printed by the Department of the Environment, Ancient Monuments and Historic Buildings Department, published in 1967. I found the leaflet in a tea-shop near Freshwater, selling second hand books. The cover price was 35p, but the tea-shop resold it for 3 GBP - strikes me that this is quite a good mark up. Anyone any idea what 35p from the 1960's is worth in today's money?

Widget- ghost or cat?

Detail: Unnatural Deaths