Leicestershire

In 1485, all the lands in the Desford and Peckleton area belonged to Lancastrian nobility. This left the people of these communities in little doubt that they owed their allegiance to the Lancastrian cause during the Wars of the Roses. On 22nd August 1485, these wars ended on the Bosworth battlefield, some 7 miles from Desford. The death of King Richard III in the battle and the triumph of the nominal Lancastrian leader Henry VII led to the beginning of the Tudor Dynasty in England. […]

Earlier in the Introduction, I mentioned Thomas Gregory, a rector at Peckleton in 1534. An essay by W.G. Hopkins published in 1950 concluded that church ministers in the late medieval period ‘were largely poor men living obscure lives in country parishes’. […]

No record of Rychard Gregorye’s birth has survived, so I have estimated his birth year to be 25 years before his recorded marriage in 1559. This calculation would make the birth year about 1534, which puts Rychard’s birthdate broadly in line with the future Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603), the last of the five Tudor monarchs. […]