English Royalty Biographies

An examination of the politics and social mores of Queen Anne's reign. The book includes sections on the War of Spanish succession, politics, literature, and society and manners. Queen Anne’s reign had lasting effects, like the dominance of the Church of England, The Act of Union, and the flowering of literature.

Her reign of 63 years and seven months is known as the Victorian Era, a period of industrial, cultural, scientific, and political change that was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. But Victoria was raised under close supervision and near isolation until she became Queen of the United Kingdom at the young age of 18. She married her first cousin, Albert, and had nine children who married into families across Europe.

"Did I not tell you this would happen? I knew they would never allow me to live, I was too great an obstacle to their religion." - Mary, Queen of Scots The position in history of Mary Queen of Scots is a paradoxical one. Her fame as a monarch lies less in her personality or achievements than in her position within the dynastic maneuvers and political-religious upheavals taking place in northwest Europe in the 16th century. Most monarchs spend their early years learning in preparation to rule and then spend the latter part of their lives wielding power and status.

A biography of the remarkable, and in her time scandalous, seventeenth-century writer Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle.

The 12th Duke of Beaufort, known to his friends as 'Bunter', inherited his Dukedom and Badminton House in 2017, at the age of sixty-five. But he is also a singer and songwriter with the rock group The Listening Device. Now he combines his responsibilities as Duke with his life as a rock performer. In this lively and anecdote-filled memoir, Harry Beaufort takes us behind the scenes of his varied life: from playing poker with politicians, to partying on Ibiza with film stars to people watching with The Queen from a balcony at Windsor Castle.

Life in a castle isn’t always a fairytale, as the Duchess of Rutland vividly illustrates in her fascinating, revealing and funny autobiography. When Emma Watkins, the pony-mad daughter of a Welsh farmer, imagined her future it was as the wife of a younger version of her father. But then she fell in love with David Manners, having no idea that he was heir to one of the most senior hereditary titles in the land. When David succeeded his father, against all the odds Emma became the chatelaine of Belvoir Castle, ancestral home of the Dukes of Rutland.

Described as the 'most beautiful princess in Europe', and a woman 'capable of arousing profane passion', this is the story of a woman whose life combined privilege and tragedy, love and riches, conviction and courage, humanity and inhumanity.

Unforgettable as it was, the public response to the death of Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022 was not without precedent. When her great-grandfather King Edward VII - glamorous, cosmopolitan and extraordinarily popular - died in May 1910, the political, social and cultural anxieties of a nation in turmoil were temporarily set aside during a summer of intense and ritualised mourning. In The King Is Dead, Long Live the King! Martin Williams charts a period of tension and transition as one era slipped away and another took shape.

Henry VIII is Britain's most notorious monarch, remembered for his six wives and splitting the church in two for the sake of annulling his first marriage. But few know the full story of his tempestuous reign. This captivating biography chronicles Henry VIII's life and times, from his early childhood at Eltham to his dominant role as one of the leading players on the international stage. It includes his love affairs, military campaigns, the scheming and plotting of his courtiers and the way in which sex and politics were sometimes fatally intertwined with the Tudor Court.

Drive-by shootings, drug overdoses, and multi-car accidents—as a paramedic, he thought he had seen it all, until he answered a small job advertisement that changed his life forever. Welcome to the mysterious world of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, one of the most fundamentalist Islamic countries on the globe. Working as a paramedic at the only level one trauma center in the Middle East, he found his skills and knowledge tested to the limit on a daily basis.

When the glamorous Elizabeth Chudleigh, Duchess of Kingston, Countess of Bristol, went on trial at Westminster Hall for bigamy in April 1776, the story drew more attention in society than the American War of Independence. A clandestine, candlelit wedding to the young heir to an earldom, a second marriage to a Duke, a lust for diamonds and an electrifying appearance at a masquerade ball in a diaphanous dress: no wonder the trial was a sensation.

Drawn from the Royal archives, including Prince Albert’s voluminous correspondence, this brilliant and ambitious book offers fascinating never-before-known details about the man and his time. A superb match of biographer and subject, Prince Albert, at last, gives this important historical figure the reverence and recognition that is long overdue.

This biography evokes the pervasive importance of religion to Queen Victoria's life, but also that life's centrality to the religion of Victorians around the globe. The first comprehensive exploration of Victoria's religiosity, it shows how moments in her life - from her accession to her marriage and her successive bereavements - enlarged how she defined and lived her faith.

In 2017, the 29th Sultan of Brunei, Hassanl Bolkiah, celebrated his Golden Jubilee, marking his 50th year in power. Bolkiah negotiated Brunei's independence from the British Empire in 1978, a freedom which they achieved in 1984. The first sultan to also serve as Prime Minister, Bolkiah has ruled over this prosperous nation ever since. He is officially the world's wealthiest monarch thanks to his country's oil and gas reserves. Whether you know him for his extravagant lifestyle or his political work establishing Shari'ah Law, the Sultan of Brunei is a powerful leader.

The history of women in medieval Wales before the English conquest of 1282 is one largely shrouded in mystery. This misfortune touches even the most well-known royal woman of the time, Joan of England, the wife of Llywelyn the Great of Gwynedd. This first-ever account of Siwan, as she was known to the Welsh, interweaves the details of her life and relationships with a gendered re-assessment of Anglo-Welsh politics by highlighting her involvement in affairs, discussing events in which she may well have been involved but have gone unrecorded and her deployment of royal female agency.

Florence Bramford was a ladies' maid to the ladies-in-waiting of two Queen Elizabeths from 1939 to 1974. Think real-life The Queen, Downton Abbey, or Upstairs Downstairs...inside the British Royal Family from the servant's perspective half a century ago. Margaret Bramford presents the life of her aunt, told in her own words. Florence had a Victorian childhood and Edwardian adolescence. She was privileged to reside in many royal residences with her ladies-in-waiting and joined many royal tours around the world.

Henrietta Maria is the most reviled consort to have worn the crown of Britain's Three Kingdoms. Condemned as that 'Popish brat of France', a 'notorious whore' and traitor, she remains in popular memory the wife who wore the breeches and turned her husband Catholic—so causing a civil war—and a cruel and bigoted mother. Leanda de Lisle's White King was hailed as 'the definitive modern biography about Charles I' (Observer). Here she considers Henrietta Maria's point of view, unpicking the myths to reveal a very different queen.

A.N. Wilson, one of England's most beloved writers, imagines the Queen reflecting on her early life. We watch as she discovers, at the tender age of ten, that she is heir to the throne. We witness her meet the dashing Prince Phillip of Greece, who she loved steadfastly from the age of fifteen, and see their friendship blossom into passionate love. Above all, we learn of her astonishing sense of vocation and public duty, which grew during the dark years of WWII and her father's subsequent years of ill health.

This is the story of the real bodyguard, Lee Sansum, ex-Royal Military Policeman, martial arts champion and expert in close protection. Part of Mohamed and Dodi al-Fayed's protection team, Lee also had to protect the most famous woman in the world, Princess Diana. He formed a close bond with Diana and the young princes, particularly Harry and it was only by a stroke of luck that he was not in the car the night Diana died. That night proved to be the turning point in his own life.

King Alfred of Wessex is the only king in British history to have been honoured with the epithet of "Great", yet he is usually remembered for the story of the burnt cakes, his finer achievements are often forgotten. Afflicted by poor health for most of his life, Alfred nevertheless showed unflagging energy as a warrior, administrator, scholar and educator. He was remarkable for both his range of interests and his wisdom. In battle he was faced by the Danish invaders and the real threat of Viking supremacy in England.