This Day in History: 1814-01-10

On 10th January 1814, Irish poet Aubrey de Vere was born. In 1896, his sonnet about Pontefract Castle was published and although a frequent visitor to the Lake District in veneration of Wordsworth, it is not known if he toured Pontefract Castle:
‘PONTEFRACT CASTLE; OR, TREASON’S TWOFOLD REQUEST
WIND-WASTED castle without crown of towers!
Dread dungeon keep, watching the dying day!
A crownless king, great Edward’s grandson, lay
Wasting in thee, and counting prisoned hours:
A century passed: the Faith’s embattled Powers
Thus far advanced; here stood, a stag at bay:
The eighth Henry trembled in his blood-stained bowers:-
Thou saw’st that’ Pilgrimage of Grace’ decay!
Two Woes thou saw’st; the fall of England’s Crown,
That drowned in blood her old Nobility;
Then, baser plague, the old Temples trampled down
I mark of that Red Sea which rolls between
England that is, and England that hath been!