Sandal Castle Sussex and Reigate in Surrey, Castle Acre Castle in Norfolk and Conisbrough in Yorkshire. In 1347, Edward III granted Sandal to his fifth son Edmund of Langley who was six years old at the time. His elder brother John of Gaunt held Pontefract and Knaresborough Castles, Edmund was granted Wark Castle near Coldstream in the Scottish Borders, and in 1377 Fotheringhay Castle in Northamptonshire which was to become his home, and for the next 75 years the family seems to have spent little time at Sandal, leaving it to the management of constables or stewards. In 1385 Edmund was made
Fotheringhay Castle with Edward IV of England to supplant his brother on the throne of Scotland. Mary, Queen of Scots, who had spent much of her 18 years of imprisonment at Sheffield Castle and Sheffield Manor, spent her final days at Fotheringhay, where she was tried and convicted of treason. In this time it was used as a state prison. She attended her own trial in the Great Hall on October 5, 1586, where it lasted two days. After waiting over two months for Elizabeth I of England to officially sign her death warrant, Mary was only given the verdict the day