Jean de Waurin's Chronicle of England Volume 6 Books 3-6: The Wars of the Roses
Jean de Waurin was a French Chronicler, from the Artois region, who was born around 1400, and died around 1474. Waurin’s Chronicle of England, Volume 6, covering the period 1450 to 1471, from which we have selected and translated Chapters relating to the Wars of the Roses, provides a vivid, original, contemporary description of key events some of which he witnessed first-hand, some of which he was told by the key people involved with whom Waurin had a personal relationship.
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Paternal Family Tree: Coventry
In 1720 [his father] William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry [aged 44] and [his mother] Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry were married. She by marriage Countess Coventry.
On 26th April 1722 George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry was born to [his father] William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry [aged 46] and [his mother] Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry.
On 23rd November 1738 [his mother] Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry died.
On 18th March 1751 [his father] William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry [aged 75] died. His son George [aged 28] succeeded 6th Earl Coventry.
On 10th April 1751 John Bulkeley Coventry [aged 27] was elected unopposed MP Worcestershire following a by-election caused by his brother George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 28] having vacated the seat when he succeeded to his father's titles. He held the seat until 1761.
Letters of Horace Walpole. 27th February 1752. I write this as a sort of letter of form on the occasion, for there is nothing worth telling you. The event that has made most noise since my last, is the extempore wedding of the [his future sister-in-law] youngest [aged 18] of the two Gunnings, who have made so vehement a noise. Lord Coventry [aged 29]295, a grave young lord, of the remains of the patriot breed, has long dangled after the [his future wife] eldest [aged 19], virtuously with regard to her virtue, not very honourably with regard to his own credit. About six weeks ago Duke Hamilton [aged 27]296, the very reverse of the Earl, hot, debauched, extravagant, and equally damaged in his fortune and person, fell in love with the youngest at the masquerade, and determined to marry her in the spring. About a fortnight since, at an immense assembly at my Lord Chesterfield's, made to show the house, which is really magnificent, Duke Hamilton made violent love at one end of the room, while he was playing at pharaoh at the other end; that is, he saw neither the bank nor his own cards, which were of three hundred pounds each: he soon lost a thousand. I own I was so little a professor in love, that I thought all this parade looked ill for the poor girl; and could not conceive, if he was so much engaged with his mistress as to disregard such sums, why he played at all. However, two nights afterwards, being left alone with her while her mother and sister were at Bedford House, he found himself so impatient, that he sent for a parson. The doctor refused to perform the ceremony without license or ring: the Duke swore he would send for the Archbishop-at last they were married with a ring of the bed-curtain, at half an hour after twelve at night, at Mayfair chapel297, The Scotch are enraged; the women mad that so much beauty has had its effect; and what is most silly, my Lord Coventry declares that he now will marry the other.
Poor Lord Lempster [aged 30] has just killed an officer298 in a duel, about a play-debt, and I fear was in the wrong. There is no end of his misfortunes and wrong-headedness!-Where is Mr. Conway!-Adieu!
Note 295. George-William, sixth Earl of Coventry. He died in 1809, at the age of eighty-seven.-E.
Note 296. James, fourth Duke of Hamilton. He died in 1758.-D.
Note 297. On the 14th of February.-E.
Note 298. Captain Gray of the Guards [deceased]. The duel was fought, with swords, in Marylebone Fields. Lord Lempster took his trial at the Old Bailey in April, and was found guilty of manslaughter.-E.
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On 5th March 1752 George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 29] and Maria Gunning Countess Coventry [aged 19] were married. She by marriage Countess Coventry. He the son of William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry and Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry.
Letters of Horace Walpole. 27th July 1752. Our beauties are travelling Paris-ward: Lady Caroline Petersham [aged 30] and Lady Coventry [aged 19] are just gone thither. It will scarce be possible for the latter to make as much noise there as she and her sister [aged 18] have in England. It is literally true that a shoemaker in Worcester got two guineas and a half by showing a shoo that he was making for the Countess, at a penny a piece. I can't say her genius is equal to her beauty: she every day says some new sproposito [Note. blunder]. She has taken a turn of vast fondness for her lord [aged 30]: Lord Downe [aged 25] met them at Calais, and offered her a tent-bed, for fear of bugs in the inns. "Oh!" said she, "I had rather be bit to death, than lie one night from my dear Cov.!" I can conceive my Lady Caroline making a good deal of noise even at Paris; her beauty is set off by a genius for the extraordinary, and for strokes that will make a figure in any country. Mr. Churchill [aged 38] and my sister [aged 29] [Note. Half-sister] are just arrived from France; you know my passion for the writing of the younger Crebillon [aged 45]324 you shall hear how I have been mortified by the discovery of the greatest meanness in him; and you will judge how much one must be humbled to have one's favourite author convicted of mere mercenariness! I had desired Lady Mary to lay out thirty guineas for me with Liotard [aged 49], and wished, if I could, to have the portraits of Crebillon and Marivaux [aged 64]325 for my cabinet. Mr. Churchill wrote me word that Liotard's326 price was sixteen guineas; that Marivaux was intimate with him, and would certainly sit, and that he believed he could get Crebillon to sit too. The latter, who is retired into the provinces with an English wife [aged 40]327, was just then at Paris for a month: Mr. Churchill went to him, told him that a gentleman in England, who was making a collection of portraits of famous people, would be happy to have his, etc. Crebillon was humble, "unworthy," obliged; and sat: the picture was just finished, when, behold! he sent Mr. Churchill word, that he expected to have a copy of the picture given him-neither more nor less than asking sixteen guineas for sitting! Mr. Churchill answered that he could not tell what he should do, were it his own case, but that this was a limited commission, and he could not possibly lay out double; and was now so near his return, that he could not have time to write to England and receive an answer. Crebillon said, then he would keep the picture himself-it was excessively like. I am still sentimental enough to flatter myself, that a man who could beg sixteen gineas will not give them, and so I may still have the picture.
Note 324. Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crebillon, son of the tragic poet of that name, and author of many licentious novels, which are now but little read. He was born in 1707, and died in 1777.-D. ["The taste for his writings," says the Edinburgh Reviewers, "passed away very rapidly and completely in France; and long before his death, the author of the Sopha, and Les Egaremens du Coeur et de l'Esprit, had the mortification to be utterly forgotten by the public." Vol. xxi. p. 284.]
Note 325. Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux, the author of numerous plays and novels, some of which possess considerable merit. The peculiar affectation of his style occasioned the invention of the word marivaudage, to express the way of writing of him and his imitators. He was born in 1688, and died in 1763.-D.
Note 326. Walpole, in his Anecdotes of Painting, states Liotard to have been an admirable miniature and enamel painter. At Rome he was taken notice of by the Earl of Sandwich, and by Lord Besborough, then Lord Duncannon. See Museum Florentinum, vol. x.; where the name of the last mentioned nobleman is spelled Milord D'un Canon.-E.
Note 327. She was a Miss Strafford. The perusal of Crebillon's works inspired her with such a passion for the author, that she ran away from her friends, went to Paris, married him, and nursed and attended him with exemplary tenderness and affection to his dying day. In reference to this marriage, Lord Byron, in his Observations on Bowles's Strictures upon Pope, makes the following remark:-"For my own part, I am of the opinion of Pausanias, that success in love depends upon fortune. Grimm has an observation of the same kind, on the different destinies of the younger Crebillon and Rousseau. The former writes a licentious novel, and a young English girl of some fortune runs away, and crosses the sea to marry him; while Rousseau, the most tender and passionate of lovers, is obliged to espouse his chambermaid."-E.
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On 25th April 1758 [his son] George Coventry 7th Earl Coventry was born to George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 35] and [his wife] Maria Gunning Countess Coventry [aged 25]. He married (1) before 1764 Catherine Henley, daughter of Robert Henley 1st Earl Northington and Jane Huband (2) 10th January 1783 Margaret "Peggy" Pitches Countess Coventry and had issue.
On 3rd January 1759 John Campbell 5th Duke Argyll [aged 35] and [his sister-in-law] Elizabeth Gunning Duchess Hamilton and Argyll [aged 25] were married. He the son of John Campbell 4th Duke Argyll [aged 66] and Mary Drummond Bellenden.
On 30th September 1760 [his wife] Maria Gunning Countess Coventry [aged 28] died of lead poisoning, killed by the toxins used in her beauty products.
Before 1764 George Coventry 7th Earl Coventry [aged 5] and Catherine Henley were married. She the daughter of Robert Henley 1st Earl Northington [aged 55] and Jane Huband. He the son of George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 41] and Maria Gunning Countess Coventry.
Henrici Quinti, Angliæ Regis, Gesta, is a first-hand account of the Agincourt Campaign, and subsequent events to his death in 1422. The author of the first part was a Chaplain in King Henry's retinue who was present from King Henry's departure at Southampton in 1415, at the siege of Harfleur, the battle of Agincourt, and the celebrations on King Henry's return to London. The second part, by another writer, relates the events that took place including the negotiations at Troye, Henry's marriage and his death in 1422.
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In 1764 Coventry House, Piccadilly [Map], the site of the old "Greyhound Inn", was bought by George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 41] from Hugh Hunlocke for £10,000.
On 27th September 1764 George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 42] and Barbara St John Countess Coventry were married. She by marriage Countess Coventry. He the son of William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry and Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry.
Around 1774. Nathaniel Dance-Holland [aged 38]. Portrait of George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 51].
In 1778 [his son] Thomas Wilson Coventry was born to George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 55] and [his wife] Barbara St John Countess Coventry.
On 20th October 1778 [his son-in-law] Edward Foley [aged 31] and Anne Margaret Coventry were married. She the daughter of George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 56] and Maria Gunning Countess Coventry.
On 10th January 1783 George Coventry 7th Earl Coventry [aged 24] and Margaret "Peggy" Pitches Countess Coventry [aged 23] were married at St George's Church, Hanover Square. He the son of George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 60] and Maria Gunning Countess Coventry.
On 6th February 1783 Lancelot "Capability" Brown [aged 66] died. He collapsed on the doorstep of his daughter Bridget Holland's house, at 6 Hertford Street, Mayfair while returning after a night out at Lord Coventry's [aged 60]. He was buried at St Peter and St Paul's Church, Fenstanton [Map].
Before 1784. Allan Ramsay [aged 70]. Portrait of George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 61].
On 25th November 1804 [his wife] Barbara St John Countess Coventry died.
On 3rd September 1809 George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry [aged 87] died. His son George [aged 51] succeeded 7th Earl Coventry. Margaret "Peggy" Pitches Countess Coventry [aged 49] by marriage Countess Coventry.
Chronicle of Abbot Ralph of Coggeshall
The Chronicle of Abbot Ralph of Coggeshall (Chronicon Anglicanum) is an indispensable medieval history that brings to life centuries of English and European affairs through the eyes of a learned Cistercian monk. Ralph of Coggeshall, abbot of the Abbey of Coggeshall in Essex in the early 13th century, continued and expanded his community’s chronicle, documenting events from the Norman Conquest of 1066 into the tumultuous reign of King Henry III. Blending eyewitness testimony, careful compilation, and the monastic commitment to record-keeping, this chronicle offers a rare narrative of political intrigue, royal power struggles, and social upheaval in England and beyond. Ralph’s work captures the reigns of pivotal figures such as Richard I and King John, providing invaluable insights into their characters, decisions, and the forces that shaped medieval rule. More than a simple annal, Chronicon Anglicanum conveys the texture of medieval life and governance, making it a rich source for scholars and readers fascinated by English history, monastic authorship, and the shaping of the medieval world.
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[his daughter] Anne Margaret Coventry was born to George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry and Maria Gunning Countess Coventry. She married 20th October 1778 Edward Foley, son of Thomas Foley 1st Baron Foley and Grace Granville.
Great x 2 Grandfather: Thomas Coventry 
Great x 1 Grandfather: Walter Coventry
GrandFather: Walter Coventry of St Peter-le-Poor in London
Father: William Coventry 5th Earl Coventry
Great x 1 Grandfather: Humphrey Holcombe of St Andrew's in Holborn
GrandMother: Anne Holcombe
George Coventry 6th Earl Coventry
GrandFather: John Allen of Westminster
Mother: Elizabeth Allen Countess Coventry