by Alex David
During her reign England had a long-running enmity
with Spain which was fought by military proxy in the Netherlands, and at sea through piracy. After Mary
Queen of Scots’ execution in 1587 King Philip II of Spain sent his Spanish Armada to invade England in 1588 and dethrone Elizabeth. She however led the country to
defend itself, and on that occasion she gave a famous, rousing speech on the English shore at Tilbury to stir courage into her troops. The Armada was defeated.
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She encouraged and sponsored English maritime
exploration abroad. Her reign saw the first English circumnavigation of the globe by Francis Drake in 1577-80; the exploration of South America by Walter Raleigh in 1595; the first English colony established in North America in 1584; and trading posts established in Africa and Asia in the 1580s-1590s.
Among the legacies of her age are the works of
William Shakespeare, whom she supported in the 1590s; the establishment of the first Royal Exchange in the 1560s; the empowering of the House of Commons; and
the eventual union of England and Scotland into one crown after her death.
Peculiar Fact:
One of the reasons Elizabeth I wore elaborate make-up and wigs was to cover the effects of a near-fatal case of smallpox she suffered in 1562 that left her face scarred and her hair thinned. Her obsession with her appearance grew worse with the years, and in her old age she refused to have mirrors hung in any rooms she used.
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James I
Reign:
24 March 1603 – 27 March 1625
Birth:
19 June 1566 at Edinburgh Castle, Scotland. Only son of Mary Queen of Scots and of Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley.
Queen:
Anne of Denmark (1574-1619), daughter of King
Frederick II of Denmark.
Death:
27 March 1625, at Theobalds House, Hertfordshire.
Key Facts:
The first Scottish and first Stuart king of England, James was a king for almost his entire life after he acceded to the throne of Scotland at the age of one year in 1567, 36 years before assuming the English crown. His claim to the English throne derived from both his parents, 126
Mary Queen of Scots and Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, who were great-grandchildren of King Henry VII. James never met either of his parents.
He was the first monarch to join England and
Scotland into one crown and to call himself King of Great Britain. He tried to unite England and Scotland into one single nation, without success, however he did succeed in introducing a new flag for the two joined countries in 1606, the Union Flag, combining the flags of England and Scotland.
Perhaps the most learned of all English monarchs, he was an accomplished writer, philosopher and linguist. He wrote two political treatises, The True Law of Free Monarchies and Basilikon Doron, in which he articulated his theory of the divine right of kings. Yet he was also hard-drinking, slothful and lecherous towards young men, famously earning for himself the nickname of ‘the wisest fool in Christendom’.
He famously escaped the Gunpowder Plot in 1605,
an attempt by Catholic extremists to blow up the Houses of Parliament whilst James and the country’s government assembled in it for the State Opening. The occasion is remembered in England today every November 5th in Guy Fawkes Night, named after one of the conspirators.
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In 1604, to standardise many Bible versions that
were being used at the time, he commissioned a group of scholars to produce a new translation of the Bible into English, the writing of which he personally supervised.
The work was later named after him as the King James Bible. A great literary patron, he also supported
Shakespeare, Ben Jonson and John Donne.
In 1609 he initiated the settlement of Protestants in Northern Ireland on lands confiscated from local
Catholics chiefs, and in so doing he sowed the seeds of a conflict that persists to this day. His reign also saw the establishment of the first permanent colonies in North America from 1607.
Peculiar Fact:
James was a strong opponent of tobacco after it was first introduced to England from America, and ordered an
exorbitant import tax on it to reduce its consumption. He even wrote a treatise in 1604 called A Counterblaste to Tobacco, where he described smoking as ‘loathsome to the eye, hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs’.
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Charles I
Reign:
27 March 1625 – 30 January 1649
Birth:
19 November 1600, in Dunfermline Palace, Fife, Scotland.
Second son of King James VI of Scotland, later James I of England, and of Queen Anne of Denmark.
Queen:
Henrietta Maria of France (1609-1669), daughter of King Henri IV of France.
Death:
30 January 1649, on the execution scaffold in Whitehall, London.
Key Facts:
Charles is considered by many to be one of worst
monarchs in English history. His belief in the divine right of kings, his inflexibility, and his untrustworthy
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personality made him unsuited to deal with the growing religious tensions in England and Scotland, and the growing power of Parliament.
He married Henrietta Maria of France, one of the
most influential but also most pernicious royal consorts in British history. Said to be even more inflexible than Charles on the subject of royal power, she encouraged him to fight against Parliament and supported him during the Civil War by selling off royal jewels abroad. She also introduced Catholic worship in the royal family, sowing the seeds of future troubles for the Stuart dynasty A committed Anglican, Charles alienated both
English Puritans and Scottish Presbyterians by trying to impose elaborate Anglican worship in churches. His
attempts to impose the Book of Common Prayer in
Scotland in 1637 caused a rebellion and a short civil war which Charles lost.
He ruled without parliament for 11 years from 1629
to 1640, and tried to usurp its power to raise taxes. After finally being forced to call Parliament into session in 1640
Charles tried in 1642 to arrest members who had raised grievances against him. A heightened feeling of
untrustworthiness between Charles and Parliament led directly to civil war.
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In 1642 he was the first to raise the standard of war against Parliament, starting the English Civil War. He won initial royalist victories but the tide of war turned against him after Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell and Thomas Fairfax, created the groundbreaking New Model Army.
This army won resounding victories at Marston Moor in 1644 and Naseby in 1645, after which Charles lost the war and was taken prisoner.
After he was taken prisoner in 1646 Charles tried to play different Parliamentary factions against each other to his own advantage, but with no success. After a
Puritan army faction gained control of Parliament he was put on trial in 1649 for treason against the people, and was sentenced to death during a great show trial in Westminster.
The only British king to be publicly executed, he was beheaded with an axe on a scaffold in Whitehall, London, in January 1649. The courage and dignity he showed in death gained him wide public sympathy, and he was
hailed as a martyr immediately after his execution.
Despite his political failings and personal flaws, he was one of the greatest patrons of the arts in British history. He personally employed Antony Van Dyck and Peter Paul Rubens as painters, and Bernini as a sculptor.
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He also amassed the most valuable painting collection in all of Europe, containing works by Leonardo, Raphael and Titian. The collection was sold after his execution and only partly recovered after the restoration of the
monarchy i
n 1660.
Peculiar Fact:
Born a sickly and weak child, Charles could still not walk nor speak properly by the age of four. His walk was impaired by weak ankle joints and his speech was
affected by a tongue deformity. He managed to
overcome both defects by the age of 8 by sheer
determination and with the help of a caring governess, though he retained a slight stammer for the rest of his life.
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The Interregnum
Duration:
30 January 1649 – 29 May 1660
After the execution of Charles I in 1649, the Puritan army faction that had taken control of Parliament
proceeded to abolish the monarchy, the House of Lords, the Episcopal Church, and proclaimed England to be a free republican Commonwealth.
Although power was nominally vested in parliaments and councils, from 1651 onwards true power was exercised by the army’s most capable and forceful general, Oliver Cromwell, who in 1653 was declared Lord Protector and ruled as king in all but name until his death in 1658.
Greatly unpopular among the people, the rule of the Commonwealth slowly descended into chaos after
Cromwell’s death in 1658. Finally in 1660 a select group of leaders decided to restore political stability to the country by recalling Charles I’s heir from exile and re-establish the monarchy.
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Charles II
Reign:
29 May 1660 – 6 February 1685
Birth:
29 May 1630, in St James’s Palace, London. First surviving son of King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria of
France.
Queen:
Catherine of Braganza (1638-1705), daughter of King John IV of Portugal.
Death:
6 February 1685, at Whitehall Palace, London.
Key Facts:
Stripped of the crown of England in 1649 after the
execution of his father and the abolition of the monarchy, Charles was briefly crowned King of Scots in 1650, before the monarchy was abolished in Scotland also. He led 134
royalist troops in the last great clash of the Civil War, the Battle of Worcester in 1650, and following that defeat he escaped into exile, wandering the courts of Europe for the next 10 years. He was finally restored to the throne in 1660 when the monarchy was re-established in England.
He successfully healed the wounds of the Civil War
by being merciful towards all former enemies, famously refusing to take revenge on Parlamentarians except those who had signed his father’s death warrant. He included both royalists and parliamentarians in his government, and whilst he re-established monarchical power he
remained pragmatic in his dealings with Parliament.
He was famously nicknamed the ‘Merry Monarch’
because of his love affairs with many mistresses. He fathered over a dozen illegitimate children from whom descended several British noble families today. He was however unable to father legitimate children with his wife, Catherine of Braganza, which made his brother James the next in line to the throne.
During the Great Fire of London of 1666 he took part in rescue efforts by personally turning out in the streets to help fire-fighters and distributing money to homeless Londoners. He later supported the rebuilding of many London buildings, naming Sir Christopher Wren as the main architect.
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A patron of sciences, sports and entertainment, he
founded the Royal Society for scientists and philosophers; he authorised the building of new theatres and
supported acting companies; he introduced yachting to England; and he was the first monarch to patronise horse racing.
In 1678 he achieved a significant political victory against Parliament during the great Exclusion Crisis, when a parliamentary faction tried to pass a law excluding Charles’ heir, his brother James, from the succession because he was Catholic. Charles successfully prevented the law to be passed, preserving the principle of inherited royal succession which persists to this day. The event saw the birth of the two-party political system in Britain, with those supporting Charles and James forming together as Tories, and those opposed to them grouping as Whigs.
Always an ambiguous Protestant, Charles signed the
Secret Treaty of Dover with Louis XIV of France in 1670
which stipulated that Charles would receive large
amounts of money from Louis in exchange for a promise to publicly convert to Catholicism at some point in the future. Although most of the money was paid, the
promise was never fulfilled, however Charles did secretly convert to Catholicism on his deathbed in 1685.
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Peculiar Fact:
One of Charles’ nicknames during his lifetime was Old Rowley, after a racing horse he owned who was also a breeding stallion, a tongue-and-cheek reference to his own womanising. The nickname was first given to him in the racing town of Newmarket, Suffolk, where there still exists a racetrack called The Rowley Mile (named after both the king and the horse).
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James II
Reign:
6 February 1685 – 11 December 1688
Birth:
14 October 1633, in St James’s Palace, London. Second son of King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria of
France.
Queen:
Mary of Modena (1658-1718), daughter of Duke Alfonso IV of Modena, Italy.
Death:
16 September 1701, at the Chateau of St Germain-en-
Laye, near Paris, France.
Key Facts:
The second son of Charles I, he inherited his father’s inflexibility of character and belief in absolute monarchy.
He accompanied his brother Charles into exile after the Civil War and became his heir in 1660, remaining so after Charles failed to father legitimate sons.
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A capable naval commander and Lord High Admiral
during his brother’s reign, he was forced to resign his posts in 1672 after his conversion to Catholicism. He still remained his brother’s heir after his conversion however and, despite fierce opposition from some quarters,
succeeded his brother to the throne.
Soon after his accession in 1685 he defeated a
Protestant rebellion seeking to depose him led by Charles II’s eldest illegitimate son, the Duke of Monmouth. James refused mercy to Monmouth, his own nephew, after his capture and had him executed. He also authorised fierce reprisals towards those who had supported the
Monmouth Rebellion in the west of England.
In 1687 he issued a Declaration of Indulgence
granting freedom of worship to all Christian
denominations, and ending the requirement to be in
communion with the Church of England to take up public office. Although welcomed by many, the Declaration
raised fears that James was planning to impose
Catholicism in England.
He provoked general alarm among the people when
he began to adopt despotic tendencies and started to appoint Catholics to positions of power in the Privy Council, the army and the courts. Fears that James would 139
establish a new Catholic absolutist dynasty in England modelled on France were heightened in June 1688 after his wife finally gave birth to a son after several
miscarriages and child deaths.
He finally lost his throne after William of Orange, James’ son-in-law, was invited to invade England by a group of Protestant political leaders to free the country from James’ increasing despotism. After William landed in England in November 1688 James was deserted by
many and fled the country instead of fighting, leaving the throne vacant. Afterwards, he tried to regain his crown by invading Ireland with an army but he was defeated at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. He lived out the rest of his life in exile in France.
Peculiar Fact:
When he was 13-years-old James was taken priso
ner by Parliamentarians during the English Civil War and put under house arrests at St James’s Palace. After two years of imprisonment he escaped in 1648 during a game of hide-and-seek in the palace gardens, slipping secretly into the adjacent St James’s Park where some accomplices were waiting for him. He then donned a girl’s clothes and sailed down the Thames to board a ship to Holland.
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William III & Mary II
Reign:
William and Mary: 13 February 1689 – 28 December 1694
