Edward II, King of England

Edward, the son of Edward I and Eleanor of Leon and Castile, was born April 25 1284 at Caernarfon Castle, Wales
He married Isabelle, daughter of Philippe IV of France and Juana, Queen of Navarre, January 25 1308 at Boulogne.

Left: Caernarfon Castle, Wales
Right: Edward II

Edward, the first English Prince of Wales, succeeded his father, Edward I in July 1307 and was crowned in Westminster Abbey the following February. His reign proved disastrous; in 1314 English troops were overwhelmingly defeated at Bannockburn when Robert the Bruce won independence for the Scots.

Edward II annoyed his wife and members of his court by granting favours to Piers Gaveston and Hugh le Despenser. In 1324 Hugh le Despenser and his son persuaded the King to deprive Queen Isabelle of her French estates. She left for France and the following year became the lover of Roger Mortimer. In 1326 Mortimer and Isabel gathered an army and invaded England. They captured the Despensers who were executed by Thomas, Earl of Lancaster. Piers Gaveston was executed by the Earl of Warwick.

In 1326 Edward was deposed in favour of his son, Edward III and confined in Berkeley Castle. There he was brutally murdered; 'a plumber's instrument of iron made very hot, the which passing up into his entrails and being rolled to and fro burned the same'.

Isabelle died August 22 1358 and Hertford Castle, and was buried in Grey Friars' Church, London.

Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire.