William III (Prince of Orange) (1650-1702) and Mary II (1662-1694), joint Monarchs


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I missed the insight that William III of Nassau, Prince of Orange was no "foreign invader" as spouse of Mary Stuart (daughter of King James II). He himself was half-British via his mother Mary Stuart, The Princess Royal (daughter of King Charles I). While Mary was the Number One in the line of succession, she married her full cousin William, who was the Number Four in that same succession.
 
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Marengo said:
Of course he was a foreign invader who initiated a succesfull coup-d'etat. He was accompanied by 15.000 Dutch troops and transported by a small armada of 400 vessels.

http://collectie.legermuseum.nl/sites/strategion/contents/i004557/arma23%20het%20nederlandse%20leger%20tijdens%20de%20stadhouder.pdf

The propaganda that was used is well documented. Lucy Worsley hardly has a scoop. ]
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A foreign invader is Louis XIV invading the Low Countries. Mary Stuart simply was the rightful heiress to her father, the King. Yes, she married a very rich, mighty and shrewd husband, himself a successor to the same throne and he enforced her throne, but I would not label it as a foreign invader, after all the rightful British Princess and her half-British Prince -a successor himself- came on the throne.
 
Technically it was a foreign invasion because he was a foreign prince whether his mother was English or not; plus they helped oust the rightful King. The only difference from a real foreign invasion is it was with the consent of the "invadee" country.
 
Duc_et_Pair said:
A foreign invader is Louis XIV invading the Low Countries. Mary Stuart simply was the rightful heiress to her father, the King. Yes, she married a very rich, mighty and shrewd husband, himself a successor to the same throne and he enforced her throne, but I would not label it as a foreign invader, after all the rightful British Princess and her half-British Prince -a successor himself- came on the throne.
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How was she the rightful heiress when she had a brother who was the heir?
 
Her brother and her father were both deposed and exiled since they were Catholics, which out Mary first in line to the throne. Of course, everybody didn't approve of this. And as you might know, lots of people in Scotland in particular would later fiercely support the Jacobites instead of the Hannoverians. But it seems like James II made himself so impopular in England, that Mary and William were encouraged to take over the throne instead. Ouch...
 
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Furienna said:
Her brother and her father were both deposed and exiled since they were Catholics, which out Mary first in line to the throne. Of course, everybody didn't approve of this. And as you might know, lots of people in Scotland in particular would later fiercely support the Jacobites instead of the Hannoverians. But it seems like James II made himself so impopular in England, that Mary and William were encouraged to take over the throne instead. Ouch...
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And the reason he was deposed was because parliament wanted to bring Mary and William in thereby concluding with a foreign invasion by invitation.
 
Parliament passed the Act of Association. This Act included a requirement on all holders of public office to swear that William III was the rightful and lawful king.
Was the Act of Association necessary? On February 13, 1689 William III and Mary II were jointly offered the throne under a Bill of Rights agreed by both Lords and Commons that made the monarchy subject to Parliament.
 
Duc_et_Pair said:
A foreign invader is Louis XIV invading the Low Countries. Mary Stuart simply was the rightful heiress to her father,.
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Shouldn’t her brother be the “ rightful heir” ? She still beats George I of Hanover though, who was below 50th in line when he became king !

The bottom line about the Revolution of 1688 and later the Act of Settlement is that Parliament claimed the power to define “ what is right” , including who the “ rightful heir” should be , even if it contradicted customary law ( in this case, male-preference primogeniture). That was a major step in the affirmation of parliamentary sovereignty.
 
The anniversary of the Protestant succession to the British throne is approaching. Here’s a memorable rendition of the ‘sash’


The Battle of the Boyne (Irish: Cath na Bóinne IPA: [ˈkah n̪ˠə ˈbˠoːn̪ʲə]) was a battle in 1690 between the forces of the deposed King James VII and II of Scotland, England and Ireland and those of Dutch Prince William of Orange who, with his wife Mary II (his cousin and James's daughter), had acceded to the Crowns of England and Scotland in 1688.

The battle took place across the River Boyne close to the town of Drogheda in the Kingdom of Ireland, modern day Republic of Ireland, and resulted in a victory for William. This turned the tide in James's failed attempt to regain the British crown and ultimately aided in ensuring the continued Protestant ascendancy in Ireland.



 
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Mbruno said:
Shouldn’t her brother be the “ rightful heir” ? She still beats George I of Hanover though, who was below 50th in line when he became king !

The bottom line about the Revolution of 1688 and later the Act of Settlement is that Parliament claimed the power to define “ what is right” , including who the “ rightful heir” should be , even if it contradicted customary law ( in this case, male-preference primogeniture). That was a major step in the affirmation of parliamentary sovereignty.
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Her brother was the rightful heir, and he would have remained so too if their father had not been deposed because he was a Catholic. So I would say that it was religion, that was more important than male primogeniture at that point.

Now I wonder who the other fifty people were, who had come before George I in the succession before the revolution. George was only two generations away from his British grandmother, and it's hard to believe that fifty closer heirs were around after such a short time. They must all have been Catholics though, since they all were overlooked.
 
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Furienna said:
Her brother was the rightful heir, and he would have remained so too if their father had not been deposed because he was a Catholic. So I would say that it was religion, that was more important than male primogeniture at that point.

Now I wonder who the other fifty people were, who had come before George I in the succession before the revolution. Sophia was only two generations away from her British grandmother, and it's hard to believe that fifty closer heirs were around after only two or three generations. They must all have been Catholics though, since they all were overlooked.
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The persons who were ahead of Sophia's descendants were, in addition to James Francis Edward Stuart, the descendants of Henrietta Anne Stuart (daughter of Charles I) and the descendants of Elizabeth of Bohemia (daughter of James I) via the elder siblings of Sophia of Hanover.

Wikipedia has a full list available in the following link.


Yes, the Hanoverian claim to the Crown was really that weak !
 
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Just read a little bit more on William III and good gracious are there any movies about him? If not there needs to be; a very impressive man. I do have a question about his duties in The Netherlands, what happened to them when he left to rule England? If William and Mary ever had a son would be be Prince of Wales and Prince of Orange?
 
The Declaration of Rights settled the succession on the children of Mary II, or if Mary died without issue, on her Protestant sister Anne and her heirs.
What if King William III remarried and his second wife had children? Were these children in line to the succession?
 
CyrilVladisla said:
The Declaration of Rights settled the succession on the children of Mary II, or if Mary died without issue, on her Protestant sister Anne and her heirs.
What if King William III remarried and his second wife had children? Were these children in line to the succession?
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Yes; they would have come after Anne and her children, just as if he'd never married Mary.
 
William was Mary's cousin, as well as her husband, so, even if the Glorious Revolution had never happened, he would have been in line to the throne through his mother, James II's sister. But, if he'd just been AN Protestant prince who happened to be married to Mary, and he'd remarried and had children, then ... it would all have got very complicated, but, hey, the situation never arose
 
This is a good programme I watched recently about William & about how the Dutch were so successful commercially.

 
XeniaCasaraghi said:
Just read a little bit more on William III and good gracious are there any movies about him? If not there needs to be; a very impressive man.
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Totally agree.

I've been looking but not managed to find any specifically about him (and Mary) yet!
 
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I doubt that anyone would make a film about him, certainly not in English, because he's seen as a very sectarian figure - "Orange marches" are still held around the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne, which causes quite a lot of religious tension in Northern Ireland, and there are "King Billy" murals in Protestant areas. It's not really very fair, because plenty of other people have done far more to contribute to religious tensions that he ever did, and all his achievements as a military commander and in areas such as setting up the Bank of England get overlooked, but a film about him would cause so much trouble that I don't think anyone would make one.
 
Alison H said:
I doubt that anyone would make a film about him, certainly not in English, because he's seen as a very sectarian figure - "Orange marches" are still held around the anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne, which causes quite a lot of religious tension in Northern Ireland, and there are "King Billy" murals in Protestant areas. It's not really very fair, because plenty of other people have done far more to contribute to religious tensions that he ever did, and all his achievements as a military commander and in areas such as setting up the Bank of England get overlooked, but a film about him would cause so much trouble that I don't think anyone would make one.
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Yeah, I think you are right, and it is a shame as there was so much more to him than that, including his life as Prince of Orange before he became King over here and Mary deserves to have her story told too.

I will look into whether a foreign language film or TV series - with subtitles hopefully!!! - has been made. You never know! ?
 
William III of Nassau, Prince of Orange, was a frequent feature in the first two seasons of the series Versailles, as the nemesis of Louis XIV: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M...NmQ1NGIwXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNTQzMTgxODY@._V1_.jpg

Louis XIV would ultimately hurt William III by occupying by looting the principality of Orange and destroying it's heavily fortified and garrisonized Château. As the principality of Orange was an enclave in the Provence, far-away William III (in The Hague or London) was practically defenseless when Louis XIV marched in.
 
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Louis XIV also supported the Stuart kings and the Jacobite cause. When James II landed at Kinsale in Ireland in 1689 ,French troops sent by Louis XIV also landed
A further force of 6,000 French troops in April 1690 under the command of the Marquis de St Ruth.
The arrival of French Troops caused major shockwaves at the English command at Dublin Castle.
In July that year the French defeated the Dutch and English at the
Battle of Fleurus which would have further soured Franco-Anglo/Dutch relations.
French Troops played a major role in the Williamite-Jacobite Wars in Ireland from 1689 until 1691.
 
Parliament passed the Act of Association, laying a requirement on all holders of public office that William III was "rightful and lawful king". James II was no longer King of England and Scotland.
 
The national debt King William III had built up was secured by William Paterson, a Scottish merchant.
Paterson established the Bank of England in 1694 and the Bank of Scotland in 1695.
 
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