Historical Fun

Fun Facts About King Charles II of England On This Day In History, May 29th 1630, King Charles II of England was born. Follow me on Twitter for daily Historical Fun and #OnThisDay tweets. https://twitter.com/HistoricalFun Ten Fun Facts About King Charles II of England 1) He was oft referred to as the Merry Monarch. Yep, that's completely true. Maybe because of his drunken debauchery, or his fondness to porking every hooker he could find, nobody knows. 2) Charles-Not-A-Spaniel had no legitimate children. Nope, not a one. When he died in 1685 (February 6th), the crown of England passed to his brother, James, who became King James-Is-Gonna-Screw-it-Up. Although no legitimate children, Charles II did have at least a dozen illegitimate kiddies by seven mistresses. Bastards. Although not the cool ones from Game of Thrones. But some of them were actual bastards. At least that's what James II called them. One son of Charles II, the Duke of Monmouth, tried to wrest...

HISTORICAL FUN FACTS - MAY 27th On This Day in History in 1199 King John of England was crowned King John of England. Yep, the hated brother of Richard I of England, otherwise known as Richard the Lionheart, you know those two from Robin Hood Price of Thieves, finally became the King. Finally. He was never meant to be King of England. John Lackland, yes that was his name, was the youngest of the five sons of his father, King Henry II of England. As the youngest, he was way down the line of succession. But after all his older big bros did go kaput, he found himself wearing the big-boy pants. However, the pull-ups didn't help him in the last few days of his reign. Should have stuck to the diapers. King John ruled until 1216 when he faced a problem-with-me-poopa and died of dysentery

On This Day In History, May 14th 1610, King Henry IV of France was assassinated. During his lifetime King Henry IV of France had three assassination attempts made against him. Well, two attempted assassinations and one actual assassination. King Henry had been raised a protestant. When he became King of France in 1589, he was pretty much forced to convert to Catholicism, due to France being a catholic country, and them placing nipple clamps on him until he agreed. Everyone was happy about the King's sudden and unexpected change of religion, except for the protestants. They were not. At all. It also appeared that Spain wasn't happy either. Mainly with Henry, who they didn't like as he didn't share any of his chocolate biscuits with them. Henry IV was the first King of France from the House of Bourbon. Spain kept pestering Henry to give him those chocolate biscuits. Henry finally had enough. Instead of handing over the biscuits, he just went and declar...

On this day in history, April 22nd, in 1519, the Spanish adventurer, explorer, Conquistador, and total git, Hernan Cortes, established a settlement in Mexico called Veracruz.   Cortes had invaded Mexico with his Spanish army in the hope of finding some gold. Or a decent cigar. Or semi-decent massage parlour.   In his efforts to find some treasure, Cortes deposed or killed all the kings in and around Mexico, and anyone he met on his way. Even the bloke selling bananas by the pond.   The guy was a git. It's a fact.   To give an example: Cortes was out walking through the jungle one night, perhaps as part of an expedition, perhaps as part of a mating ritual with the local gorilla population, who knows.   He saw King-Now-A-Hostage Cuauhtémoc having a laugh with two of his fellow former-kingies. It seems the famous Spanish Explorer and Conqueror, Herman Cortes, didn't like laughter.   After asking a blo...

Top 5 Strangest Easter Traditions 1)  Scoppio del Carro or Explosion of the Cart   Ever wondered about starting a tradition where you strap a rocket to a dove and shoot it along a wire into a cart that explodes? You have? Psycho!   As it turns out, you don't need to wonder. In Florence, they actually did it. Yep, not kidding.   On Easter Sunday, a herd of oxen sprinkled with flowers and herbs, probably for the barbeque afterwards, pull an antique cart that is three-stories high from Porta al Prato to the Piazza del Duomo. The cart is escorted by soldiers, musicians, a flock of people dressed like they've been ejected from the 15th century, which is where this tradition began, and a chef specialising in oxen barbeques.   A fire -- Fire ... FIRE ... we're all gonna end up on fire -- is started by rubbing some ancient flints together, which is used to light a candle, which is then used to light some coals, which is then placed in the cart fo...

HISTORY Fun Facts - 12th April On This Day in 1945 the second most famous Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt,  died at the age of 63.   Franklin Delano Roosevelt was only 3 months into his 4th term of office as President when he died, He was replaced by the Vice-President, Harry Truman.   Franklin D. Roosevelt has consistently been rated in the top 3 of American Presidents, along with President Martin Sheen, who had a seven year term in the West Wing of the White House, and Morgan Freeman who head butted an asteroid.   David Palmer, friend of Jack Bauer, tends to always come fourth.   On This Day in 1960, Jeremy Clarkson, former presenter of Top Gear, and now presenter of The Grand Tour on Amazon Prime, was born.   Jeremy Clarkson, who became future chaos of the BBC car show, Top Gear, sped out of his mother at over 90 miles an hour before performing a handbrake t...

On this day in history in 1874, Charles Lightoller was born.   Charles Lightoller was the English 2nd officer on board the infamous unsinkable ship that sank, the RMS Titanic.   Lightoller was the most senior officer of the Titanic to survive the ship's sinking. He was the officer in charge of loading the passengers into lifeboats. And enforced the "Women and Children First" policy.   In fact, he went a lot further than that, and enforced his own "Women and Children ONLY" policy. He actually lowered lifeboats into the water with empty seats, even though there were no women or children to board them, and when there were men waiting.   Lightoller only permitted one adult male passenger to board a lifeboat. His name was Arthur Godfrey Peuchen, who had experience sailing and could help the women navigate their craft.   Lightoller himself survived, but almost didn't.   As the Titanic disappeared beneath the waves, Lightoller was suck...