And a very happy new year to History Jar readers – let’s hope I’m a bit more organised in 2025! I’m not sure what happened to 2024 or to December for that matter.

And with that in mind I’m having a sort out of my computer files so that I can be more organised. I’ve already come across a rather helpful document from Leeds Library and Information Service that I forgot I had. It outlines Yorkshire battles from Saxon times onwards and can be found here: https://secretlibraryleeds.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/yorkshire-battles-research-guide-viewing-version-new.pdf. I think I’ll probably do something similar for Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire – not that it will contain so many significant battles but it will at least help me be a bit more organised as yet another writing deadlines approach.

And talking of which – I’m giving a talk on the border reivers via Zoom this Saturday for YAHS Medieval Section at 2pm. I usually focus on the Elizabethan period so there is a little tweaking of material going on presently and, of course, I am starting a series of History Jar zoom talks on Monday 20 January on the subject of the Winter Queen, Elizabeth Stuart the daughter of King James VI/I. A place can be book at the HistoryJar via PayPal.

The Winter Queen was a rather cruel jest against Elizabeth’s husband, Frederick V of the Palatinate who was offered the crown of Bohemia but only ruled from 1619 until 1620. The problem was that the people of that kingdom were largely Protestant but their rulers were Catholic. In 1618 they rebelled against Ferdinand II, the Holy Roman Emperor, and then asked Frederick if he fancied the job. The nobles had their fingers crossed that if Frederick took the crown he would have the backing of his father-in-law, James VI/I. They also thought that the Protestant Union, which had been founded by Frederick’s father, would support him. Unfortunately for the Bohemians and for Frederick neither the king nor the union was prepared to back the new king. A year and four days after he was crowned Frederick lost the Battle of the White Mountain (which sounds as though it should be something in Lord of the Rings).

Elizabeth and her family was forced to flee into exile in The Hague while her husband became enmeshed in the Thirty Years War which had been heralded by his assumption of the Bohemian Crown. A kinder nickname for Elizabeth was the Queen of Hearts – mainly because everyone liked her.