The New Murrey and Blue blog

Three things I can say about Tewkesbury, which is only a few miles away from where I live, are that it is (a) historic, (b) beautiful and (c) full of ghosts. Well, I can vouch for the first two, but the third is something I have yet to experience.

According to this article https://www.greatbritishlife.co.uk/things-to-do/23727059.ghostly-walk-across-tewkesburys-bloody-meadow/?fbclid=IwAR38XvM57xwfaunaAQL3XWN_GsCsleTg3FnXIM4mg2pV5_cyJP_lRdhqUCI the town has Bloody Meadow and the War of the Roses battle of 1471 to thank for most of the paranormal activity. The article repeats the usual Tudor fibs about poor little Edward of Lancaster (the House of Lancaster’s Prince of Wales) being hauled from the sanctuary of the abbey and run through by the swords of George of Clarence and the then Richard of Gloucester. Edward IV certainly dragged some sheltering Lancastrians from the abbey, but what happened to Edward of Lancaster isn’t known. He probably died during the battle itself. He certainly wasn’t personally executed by the king’s brothers, one of whom, George of Clarence, had connections with Tewkesbury and is buried in a vault behind the high altar of the abbey. His bones (and those of his wife, Isabel, elder daughter of Warwick the Kingmaker) are supposed to be those on display in a glass case in the vault. Grim.

As for the screaming woman in white….well, maybe she is Margaret of Anjou, mother of Edward of Lancaster. But Margaret is said to haunt Owlpen Manor in its valley on the Cotswold escarpment. She gets around.

The article also states that Jasper Tudor was the father of Henry Tudor. Really? I wonder where that gem was unearthed? Did Margaret Beaufort have a saucy little secret?

Finally, there’s one ghost that the article has missed, but about which I wrote some time ago. It too concerned Edward of Lancaster, this time that an apparition of his coffin is sometimes seen being carried out of the abbey. Odd, because he’s supposedly buried within the great church. So you’d think his coffin would be carried inside. But no, if apparitions are truthful, he was, literally, spirited away elsewhere. No one knows where. But there’s a plaque inside the abbey that claims him.

My grizzles apart, the article is quite interesting and worth a read. It describes the setting of the battle and has illustrations of Bloody Meadow and Tewkesbury.