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WARWICKSHIRE DID YOU KNOW

The Royal Connection

The first Kenilworth Castle was built in the early 12th century. A hundred or so years later King John added an outer stone wall and a dam to hold back a great lake, making one of the best fortresses in England. In 1266 Simon de Montfort (read about him here ) held the castle against a siege set up by the forces of Henry III. The siege lasted for six months.

In 1563 Elizabeth I gave the castle to her very good friend and favourite, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. He oversaw the transformation of the castle into a superb palace fit for his Queen. To demonstrate this fact Elizabeth was entertained at Kenilworth Castle for 19 days of fun and festivities in 1575.

Although the castle is now a ruin, the gardens built by Dudley have been recreated and can be visited.

The castle's fortifications were dismantled in 1650 but the ruins became famous when Sir Walter Scott wrote his novel, Kenilworth, in 1821.

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Warwickshire Eats

Obviously, for this section of our "English Counties" pages I did quite a bit of research. Not only did I want to find something traditional to each county or metropolitan borough but I also wanted it to be easy enough for our young followers to cook. Owlbut insisted on that.

This one is a bit strange then because, despite all that research, the only food I could find special to Warwickshire was Warwickshire Stew.

Now to my untrained palette, a stew is popular all over the place. Furthermore I am not an expert into any special ingredients for a stew.

Nevertheless, here it is, cooked by the man who seems to be doing anything that resembles a stew. (No, not me)

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Warwickshire VIPs

Seven random people who were born in Warwickshire in the last 100 years:-
Ken Loach (Film Maker), Tim Pigott-Smith (Actor), Nick Skelton (Show Jumper and Olympic Gold Medlaist), James Morrison (Singer, Songwriter), Colin Brignall (Typeface Designer), Antony Worrall Thompson (Restauranteur and TV chef) and (not quite within the 100 years) William Shakespeare (Playwright).

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Richard Remembers

Warwickshire is on my list of a county I have driven through rather than ever stayed in. I knew of it from the fact that it is the birthplace of William Shakespeare, a man who wrote the plays I had to learn and read at school and then answer questions on for exams. As such they were not a favourite of mine.

However pictures that I saw of Stratford-upon-Avon did appeal to me with their typical Tudor buildings, mainly with black and white exteriors. Several years ago, maybe many years ago, I was watching a TV programme starring one of the funniest people I have seen, namely Barry Humphries. Look him up. To be honest he's a bit old now so I think it was definitely a long time ago. Since I wrote this in 2021 Mr Humphries has sadly died, aged 89, managing at least 37 more years than Shakespeare. If a moral is needed for a long life then it could be that you should be liked by me.

He was talking about the buildings in Stratford-upon-Avon, calling them half-timbered houses. Suddenly, while images of these houses were on screen, a car drove by which, as you can see from the picture, was described by Mr Humphries, as a half-timbered car. It amused me muchly.

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Owlbut's Birdwatch

The Rook is a member of the crow family. They are very friendly birds and you are unlikely to see one on its own. They feed, fly and nest together. There are over one million pairs in the country. They eat almost anything from insects and worms to grain and nuts. They also sometimes eat small mammals and the eggs of other birds.

They are black in colour with a greyish white face and a peaked head. They are about 45cm in length, have a wingspan between 80 and 100cm depending on age and weigh 280 to 340 grams. They can be found in many areas like woodland, farmland, grassland and in towns and villages. However they usually keep away from the middle of big towns and cities.

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Two extra sections, "It Happened Here" and "Now That's Weird", will appear on 14 April 2025