Tudor History with Claire Ridgway

On this day in Tudor history, 15 October 1542, William Fitzwilliam, Earl of Southampton, died on campaign at Newcastle, serving Henry VIII one last time. He’d been by the king’s side since childhood; a boyhood companion who became a soldier, sailor, ambassador, and royal enforcer. From the naval battles of 1512, to the splendour of the Field of Cloth of Gold, and even the downfall of Wolsey, Anne Boleyn, and Cromwell, Fitzwilliam’...

On this day in Tudor history, 14th October 1593, Arthur Grey, 14th Baron Grey of Wilton, died at his Buckinghamshire home. He’d served Elizabeth I as a soldier, statesman, and staunch Protestant, but his career left a stain that history has never quite erased.

In this episode,I explore the life of the man behind one of the most brutal episodes of Elizabeth’s rule, the Smerwick massacre, and ask how such a devout reformer became kno...

On 13 October 1549, Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, the man who had ruled England as Lord Protector for young Edward VI, lost it all. By the next day, he was in the Tower.

How did the most powerful man in Tudor England fall so fast?

In this episode, I uncover the character flaws, bad decisions, and political missteps that doomed Somerset’s rule. He was a soldier, reformer, and visionary, but also proud, volatile, and deaf to coun...

On this day in Tudor history, 10 October 1530, Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, died. Soldier, jouster, courtier, and grandfather of Lady Jane Grey, he lived a life that perfectly captured the dangers and rewards of Tudor ambition. Born into royalty - grandson of Elizabeth Woodville and Katherine Neville, sister of the Kingmaker - Thomas grew up in the shadow of shifting alliances and rebellion. He was imprisoned by Henry VII,...

• L...

• From Brazil voyages with his father to a Plymouth...

Historian Elizabeth Norton joins me to talk about her new book Women Who Ruled the World: 5000 Years of Female Monarchy—from ancient queens to early modern powerhouses. We cover how she chose her rulers, the thorny language of “queen” vs “female king,” why so many societies accepted women only in crises, and the single pattern she kept seeing across five millennia. We also chat process: research vs writing, routines, and beating wr...

• Where our assumptions on Mary come from.
• How a 17th-century portrait type has been re-identified as Mary Boleyn using dendrochronology (tree-ring dating), provenance, and family inscriptions.
• Why...

• Born to a family...

On this day in 1452, a boy was born at Fotheringhay Castle who would become England’s last Plantagenet king: Richard III.

I’m Claire Ridgway, and in today’s episode we trace Richard’s short, stormy road from noble son to fallen king, and the remarkable afterlife of his story, from Bosworth Field to a Leicester car park and DNA confirmation centuries later.

In this podcast:

• Birth & family: the House of York and Cecily Nevi...

On 1 October 1526, Dorothy Stafford was born, a woman of Plantagenet blood who would spend forty years at the heart of Elizabeth I’s privy chamber. In this episode, I trace Dorothy’s remarkable path:

• Family webs: Stafford–Pole lineage (Buckingham & Clarence), and marriage to Sir William Stafford, Mary Boleyn’s widower.
• Exile & faith: Under Mary I she fled to Geneva; in 1556 John Calvin stood godfather to her son (then...

• The glittering 1503 marriage to James IV and the Flodden a...