Accession of Queen Anne of England, Scotland & Ireland.

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Act of Settlement 1701, Charles II, Duke of Gloucester, George of Denmark, House of Hanover, King James II-VII of England and Scotland, Kings and Queens of England, Kings and Queens of Great Britain, kings and queens of Scotland, Prince William, Queen Anne, The House of Stuart, William III of England and Scotland

On this date in History. Death of King William III-II of England, Scotland and Ireland, Stadholder of the Netherlands and Prince of Orange and the accession of his sister-in-Law/cousin Anne.

Anne (February 6, 1665 – August 1, 1714) was the Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland between March 8, 1702 and May 1, 1707. On May 1, 1707, under the Acts of Union, two of her realms, the kingdoms of England and Scotland, united as a single sovereign state known as Great Britain. She continued to reign as Queen of Great Britain and Ireland until her death. Anne remained Queen of Ireland in the form of a personal union with the British Crown and wouldn’t be politically united with Great Britain until 1801.

Anne was born at 11:39 p.m. on February 6, 1665 at St James’s Palace, London, the fourth child and second daughter of the Duke of York (afterwards James II and VII), and his first wife, Anne Hyde. Her father was the younger brother of King Charles II, and her mother was the daughter of Lord Chancellor Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon. At her Anglican baptism in the Chapel Royal at St James’s, her older sister, Mary, was one of her godparents, along with the Duchess of Monmouth and the Archbishop of Canterbury, Gilbert Sheldon. The Duke and Duchess of York had eight children, but Anne and Mary were the only ones to survive into adulthood.

Since Anne’s uncle Charles II, had no legitimate children, her father, James, Duke of York was thus heir presumptive to the throne. His suspected Roman Catholicism was unpopular in England, and on Charles’s instructions Anne and her elder sister, Mary, were raised as Anglicans. Three years after he succeeded Charles, James was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Anne’s sister and Dutch Protestant brother-in-law and cousin William III of Orange became joint monarchs. Although the sisters had been close, disagreements over Anne’s finances, status and choice of acquaintances arose shortly after Mary’s accession and they became estranged. William III-II and Mary II had no children. After Mary II’s death in 1694, William III-II reigned alone until his own death in 1702, when Anne succeeded him.

Marriage

Anne’s second cousin George of Hanover (her eventual successor) visited London for three months from December 1680, sparking rumours of a potential marriage between them. Historian Edward Gregg dismissed the rumours as ungrounded, as her father was essentially exiled from court, and the Hanoverians planned to marry George to his first cousin Sophia Dorothea of Celle as part of a scheme to unite the Hanoverian inheritance. Other rumours claimed she was courted by Lord Mulgrave (later made Duke of Buckingham), although he denied it. Nevertheless, as a result of the gossip, he was temporarily dismissed from court.

With George of Hanover out of contention as a potential suitor for Anne, King Charles II looked elsewhere for an eligible prince who would be welcomed as a groom by his Protestant subjects but also acceptable to his Catholic ally, Louis XIV of France and Navarre. The Danes were Protestant allies of the French, and Louis XIV was keen on an Anglo-Danish alliance to contain the power of the Dutch. A marriage treaty between Anne and Prince George of Denmark, younger brother of King Christian V, (sons of King Frederik III of Denmark and Norway and Sophie Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg) Anne’s second cousin once removed, was negotiated by Anne’s uncle Laurence Hyde, who had been made Earl of Rochester, and the English Secretary of State for the Northern Department, Robert Spencer, 2nd Earl of Sunderland. Anne’s father consented to the marriage eagerly because it diminished the influence of his other son-in-law, William of Orange, who was naturally unhappy at the match.

Bishop Compton officiated at the wedding of Anne and George of Denmark on July 28, 1683 in the Chapel Royal. Though it was an arranged marriage, they were faithful and devoted partners. They were given a set of buildings, known as the Cockpit, in the Palace of Whitehall as their London residence, and Sarah Churchill was appointed one of Anne’s ladies of the bedchamber.. Within months of the marriage, Anne was pregnant, but the baby was stillborn in May. Anne recovered at the spa town of Tunbridge Wells, and over the next two years, gave birth to two daughters in quick succession: Mary and Anne Sophia.

Anne’s seventh pregnancy resulted in the birth of a son at 5 a.m. on July 24, 1689 in Hampton Court Palace. As it was usual for the births of potential heirs to the throne to be attended by several witnesses, the King and Queen and “most of the persons of quality about the court” were present. Three days later, the newborn baby was baptised Prince William Henry after his uncle King William III by Henry Compton, Bishop of London. The King, who was one of the godparents along with the Marchioness of Halifax and the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Dorset, declared him Duke of Gloucester, although the peerage was never formally created.

Prince William, Duke of Gloucester was viewed by contemporaries as a Protestant champion because his birth seemed to cement the Protestant succession established in the “Glorious Revolution” that had deposed his Catholic grandfather James II-VII the previous year. Prince William died close to 1 a.m. on July 30, 1700, with his parents beside him. In the end, the physicians decided the cause of death was “a malignant fever”. An autopsy revealed severe swelling of the lymph nodes in the neck and an abnormal amount of fluid in the ventricles of his brain: four and a half ounces of a limpid humour were taken out.” A modern diagnosis is that Gloucester died of acute bacterial pharyngitis, with associated pneumonia. Had he lived, though, it is almost certain the prince would have succumbed to complications of his hydrocephalus.

Although Anne had ten other pregnancies after the birth of Gloucester, none of them resulted in a child who survived more than briefly after birth. The English parliament did not want the throne to revert to a Catholic, so it passed the Act of Settlement 1701, which settled the throne of England on a cousin of King James, Sophia, Electress of Hanover, and her Protestant heirs.

During her reign, Anne favoured moderate Tory politicians, who were more likely to share her Anglican religious views than their opponents, the Whigs. The Whigs grew more powerful during the course of the War of the Spanish Succession, until 1710 when Anne dismissed many of them from office. Her close friendship with Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, turned sour as the result of political differences. The Duchess took revenge in an unflattering description of the Queen in her memoirs, which was widely accepted by historians until Anne was re-assessed in the late 20th century.

Anne was plagued by ill health throughout her life, and from her thirties, she grew increasingly lame and obese. Despite seventeen pregnancies by her husband, Prince George of Denmark, she died without surviving issue and was the last monarch of the House of Stuart. Under the Act of Settlement 1701, which excluded all Catholics, she was succeeded by her second cousin George I of the House of Hanover, whose maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia, was a daughter of James VI and I.

Survival of Monarchies: England Part III

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English Civil War, France, Glorious Revolution, House of Stuart, King James II-VII of England and Scotland, Kings and Queens of England, William III and Mary II, William III of England and Scotland

The Glorious Revolution of 1688 was when Parliament became supreme and limited the power of the Crown. Although the Glorious Revolution did limit the powers of the monarch it would take a few hundred years until the monarchy became the constitutional and symbolized figurehead monarchy we see today. It has been this gradual limiting of the powers of the crown that has allowed the British monarchy to survive, and thrive, to this very day.

The Revolution resolved the struggle between Crown and Parliament and it also helped settle the religious struggles within the country. Basically at its heart it was a revolution that deposed King James II-VII of England and Scotland. In 1679 Parliament wanted to exclude James from the succession due to his Catholicism. To be Catholic in a Protestant England at that time was troublesome even if you were the king. During his reign James did not do what others feared, nor what his predecessor Mary I did, and tried to revive Catholicism and make it the official religion of England. No, James did what his brother Charles II did and promoted religious tolerance. Sadly these enlightened kingly brothers were way ahead of their times. England had little tolerance for religious tolerance if that religious tolerance included acceptance of Catholics.

What kept James II-VII on his throne was the knowledge that eventually his Protestant daughter, Princess Mary, would succeed him. Mary was married to her first cousin Prince Willem III of Orange, who was next in line to the throne after Mary and her sister, Princess Anne. Prince Willem III of Orange was the Stadholder of the Netherlands and the son of Willem II of Orange and his wife, Princess Mary of England and Scotland, daughter of Charles I of England and Scotland. Willem II was in constant battle with the Catholic King of France, Louis XIV, who also happened to be the first cousin to King James II-VII.

In 1673 as the Duke of York, James married his second wife, Mary Beatrice d’Este of Modena, the elder child of Alfonso IV, Duke of Modena, and his wife, Laura Martinozzi. The new Duchess of York was a devout Catholic and numerous pregnancies ended in either miscarriages or sickly children that did not live long which seemed to assure a Protestant succession. However, after James came to the throne Mary-Beatrice delivered a healthy son, Prince James Francis Edward, shortly thereafter created Prince of Wales. This solidified the fact that the successor to James II-VII would be another Catholic king. This was not acceptable to many people including Parliament and Prince Willem III of Orange himself who was considerably anti-Catholic and did not want to see his wife’s chance on the throne (and his) slip away.

It is interesting to note that historians greatly debate whether or not the birth of a Catholic Prince of Wales was the reason for James being overthrown. The truth it seems is that James was so unpopular that Willem III of Orange was planning to invade England prior to the birth of the Catholic heir. Willem did not want to be seen as an invader and therefore asked members of Parliament to conduct an act of treason by inviting him to come to England and take the throne. When seven brave members of Parliament achieved this honor, Willem began assembling his fleet and waited for the right moment to invade. When France was engaged in a battle in Germany Willem sailed his fleet to England and came ashore on 5/15 November 1688. James II-VII showed little resistance and on December 10, 1688 the king, queen and Prince of Wales fled to France.

With James II-VII now exiled in France Willem took control of the provisional government and called for a Conventional Parliament. His legal right to do so was questionable but this was a time of revolution. This new Parliament consisted of many loyal monarchists who had sat in Parliament under Charles II. The English Convention Parliament was very divided on the issue of who should wear the crown. The radical Whigs in the Lower House proposed to elect Willem as a king (meaning that his power would be derived from the people); the moderates wanted an acclamation of William and Mary together; the Tories wanted to make him regent only and acclaim Mary as Queen.

On January 28 a committee of the whole House of Commons promptly decided by acclamation that James II-VII had broken “the original contract” had “abdicated the government” and had left the throne “vacant.” The House of Lords rejected the wording of the acclimation and what followed were weeks of debate on the wording of the acclimation and who should be the monarch. Princess Anne, next-in-line after her sister, declared that she would temporarily waive her right to the crown should Mary die before William. Mary, for her part, refused to be made queen without William as king by her side, paving the way for the inevitable mounting of the throne of Willem III of Orange onto the English & Scottish thrones. The Lords on February 6 changed their minds and avoiding a possible civil war now accepted the words “abdication” and “vacancy.” in the House of Commons acclimation. On February 13, 1689 Willem III of Orange along with his wife were offered the Crown by Parliament and then became joint sovereigns as King William III and Queen Mary II of England and Scotland.

Parliament had decided the succession and the power to name the monarch and regulate the succession has been in their hands ever since. The next step was to limit the power of the Crown and this was through the establishment of the Bill of Rights which I will examine next week.

Legal Succession: The House of Stuart, Part V

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Act of Succession of 1701, Glorious Revolution, Holyrood Abbey, King James II-VII of England and Scotland, Mary II, Pope Innocent XI, the Bill of Rights of 1689, The Scottish Privy Council, William III and Mary II, William III of England and Scotland, William of Orange

Where I left off in this series was with William III and Mary II having granted joint rule by Parliament after James II was forcecd to leave the country. Although the English Parliament gave the throne jointly to William and Mary, their rule in Scotland also needed to be legalized for at this time in history the governments of England and Scotland were still separate.

When William landed in England there was also trouble brewing in Scotland. Rumors of plots against the Scots wer rampent. Riots broke out and as rioters approached Holyrood Abbey soldiers responded with gun fire making the Glorious Revolution not so bloodless in Scotland. The Abbey was stormed by a large mob and Catholic furnishings were torn down and the tombs of the Stuart kings there desecrated. Students even burned an efficgy of Pope Innocent XI and the heads of executed Covenanters that were hanging above the city gates. The crisis was soothed after James VII officially fled from England that December. Although there was not any Scottish involvement in bringing William of Orange over to England the  majority members of the Scottish Privy Council did go to London to offer their services to William. The Scottish Privy Council asked William to take over the responsibilities of government as they were certain William would be the next King of England as well as Scotland.

This makes the succession of William III and Mary II legal. In the next section I want to examine the Bill of Rights of 1689 and the Act of Succession of 1701 and how the impacted the legal succession to the crown.

The question I asked when examining the Glorious Revolution was can William III and Mary II be classified as usrpers? The dictionary definition of a usrper is: to seize and hold (a position, office, power, etc.) by force or without legal right: The pretender tried to usurp the throne. Persoanlly I do not see William III as a usurper by that definition. I have always seen it as an unpopular king, James II-VII, being deposed. Unlike Henry IV who took it upon himself to depose Richard II, William III was part of a larger revolution than the stealing of the throne by one individual. William was welcomed with open arms by many people, subjects and the government including, in getting rid of an unpopular king. James fleeing the country does give the sign that he abdicated and aboandoned the throne leaving it vacant. Had William taken the throne by force and then, by force, had Parliament sanction his taking of the throne then I could see calling him a usurper. However, since this was a bloodless revolution and William was practically invited to invade and take the throne, he doesn’t deserve the label of usurper.