HISTORY
Following hundreds of years of religious in-fighting in England, the prospect of an openly catholic monarch was anathema to many in the Kingdom. Charles died suddenly in 1685 – apparently converting
fully to catholicism on his deathbed. his successor, his brother James, was thought also to be sympathetic to the catholic cause, following his marriage to a catholic woman. however, in 1677 his daughter mary had, for political reasons, married the Dutch Protestant William III of Orange. This union was to hold James’ downfall within it. James started his reign as he meant to go on - by fighting with parliament to allow catholics to hold positions of power. This was essentially to allow him to have a standing army (something not allowed at the time, for fear the monarch would challenge the rule of Parliament) with Catholic commanders. There were also two rebellions in his early reign, one
led by his nephew, which did nothing to help his image around the country.
Then he took a step too far – he declared his male son, the heir to the throne, would be raised as a catholic. A plot was soon hatched to replace James with his daughter and her protestant husband. A group wrote to them ‘inviting’ them to take the throne. James thought he had a big enough army to stand against the Dutch fleet, and so refused an offer of help from the King of France, believing it would further alienate his subjects. he asked Legge to ‘intercept’ the Dutch fleet when it was clear William (despite terrible seasickness) was on
his way in October 1688. George tried to follow the command, but bad weather (and indications that other commanders in his small fleet hated the King and wanted William to be successful) meant he missed the chance, allowing William to land in Torbay on November 5th
.
The majority of officers in James’ army defected following this development. It didn’t take long for James to flee the country and, by the end of the year, the `Glorious revolution’ was complete. This was, obviously, not good news for the 1st
Baron of
Dartmouth. Legge tried to make the best of it, taking an oath of allegiance to William and Mary and refusing a request to help James’ wife and the Prince of Wales flee the country but to no avail. He was arrested in 1691 for treason and sent to the
Tower of London. he died there a few months later, protesting his innocence. Dartmouth’s Baron found that backing the wrong monarch can be a costly business.•
Written by Phil Scoble. Many articles on Dartmouth’s history can be found on our website www/
bythedart.co.uk
King William III
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