Clay Lane

The Copy Book

A Library of History and Literature in English

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1129

St Bega

An Irish princess fled to Cumbria to escape the Vikings, clutching her precious silver bracelet.

St Bega gave her name to the former Priory at St Bees, on the Cumbrian coast. Later biographers buried her life under conventional mediaeval romance, and confused her with St Begu, founder of a monastery at Hartlepool in the 7th century. But beneath it all lies a ninth-century Irish princess, and a mysterious bracelet.

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Picture: © Mike Peel (www.mikepeel.net), Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.. Source.

1130

Crayke Abbey

The long-lost monastery at Crayke in North Yorkshire was home to two saints with different but equally valuable gifts.

Crayke in North Yorkshire was at one time home to a thriving monastic community, founded by St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne (634-687), and blessed with two eighth-century saints, St Echa (or Etha) whose feast is kept on May 5th, and St Ultan, commemorated on August 8th.

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Picture: © Pauline E, Geograph. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.. Source.

1131

Honourable Mr Fox

The colourful Foreign Secretary humbly accepted a lesson in manners from a local tradesman.

Charles James Fox (1749-1806) was a larger-than-life statesman in the time of King George III. He supported the revolutionaries of France and America, frequently changed political sides, kept a mistress (whom he secretly married in 1795), gambled to excess, and campaigned against slavery – a maddening blend of rascal and man of honour.

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Picture: By James Gillray. From the National Portrait Gallery, via Wikimedia Commons.. Source.

1132

St Erkenwald, Light of London

The seventh-century Bishop of London helped kings and clergy to shine Christian light into the darkness of mere religion.

St Erkenwald, the 7th century Bishop of London, is not particularly well-known today, but he played a prominent role in building up Christian civilisation amidst the violence, ignorance and superstition of Anglo-Saxon England’s pagan kingdoms.

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Picture: © Aleem Yousaf, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.. Source.

1133

Mr Ivery Gets Away

Richard Hannay tracks a German spy down to a French château, but Hannay’s sense of fair play gives his enemy a chance.

Richard Hannay and Mary Lamington are on the tail of a German spy, who has been posing as an English gentleman named Moxon Ivery during the Great War. The chase has led to a French château, where Mary has uncovered a cache of biological weapons, and now Hannay has surprised the man himself.

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Picture: © Reivax670, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.. Source.

1134

Russia’s First Railway

Sixteen-year-old John Wesley Hackworth brought a locomotive over to St Petersburg, and Russia’s railway revolution was ready for the off.

British engineers and a sixteen-year-old boy played a key part in helping Imperial Russia begin her own railway revolution. In one respect, however, Russia failed to learn from the example the United Kingdom set for her: private enterprise.

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Picture: From Grace’s Guide. Licence: None stated (public domain assumed).. Source.