The mysterious mother of Henry II's son

I’d expected to have a new blog up by now, but real life interfered with my plans, as usual. The delay will provide more time, however, for entering the book giveaway for Priscilla Royal’s newest mystery, Satan’s Lullaby. Priscilla asked me to let everyone know that she will do the drawing on this coming Monday, March 9th. She won’t be able to send the signed copy to the winner until she gets back from Left Coast Crime, but we will announce the winner next week.

Back to history now. On March 7th, 1226, Henry II’s illegitimate son, William Longspee (Longsword), Earl of Salisbury died. He has appeared in Here de Dragons, A King’s Ransom, and in several of my mysteries, cast in a sympathetic light, although I was wrong about his age in all the books except Ransom. When I wrote Dragons and the mysteries, we did not know the identity of his mother, so historians could only speculate as to his age. But in the wonderful way that historical discoveries turn up like gold nuggets, we now know she was Ida de Tosney, subsequently the Countess of Norfolk. As a result of this new knowledge, we know William was much younger than originally believed. I mention his likely birth year in Ransom, 1177, but I will have to stick with the older William in any future mysteries since I can’t go back and rewrite the earlier ones. Thank heaven for Author’s Notes!