Castleton Garland Day the band back through the village dancing the "Criss-Cross." Castleton Garland Day Castleton Garland Day or Garland King Day is held annually on 29 May (unless that date falls on a Sunday, when the custom is transferred to the Saturday) in the town of Castleton in the Derbyshire Peak District. The Garland King, on horseback, and covered to the waist in a heavy, bell-shaped floral garland, leads a procession through the town. The date of the custom coincides with Oak Apple Day and it is said to commemorate the restoration of King Charles II in 1660. By the 1960s, it
Charles II of England founded a number of schools, including the Royal Mathematical School in London and The King's Hospital in Dublin, as well as the Erasmus Smith schools in various parts of Ireland. The anniversary of the Restoration (which was also Charles's birthday)—29 May—was recognised in England until the mid-nineteenth century as Oak Apple Day, after the Royal Oak in which Charles hid during his escape from the forces of Oliver Cromwell. Traditional celebrations involved the wearing of oak leaves but these have now died out. Charles II is commemorated by statues in London's Soho Square, in Edinburgh's Parliament Square, in St Mary's