Assassination: The Royal Family's 1000-Year Curse (36 page)

He later tried to regain the throne through Scotland and Ireland, but he failed and returned to exile. In truth, James’s first flight from London was his abdication. It was the act of a man who had lost his courage. The brave soldier fighting for France and then for Spain, the Admiral directing the English fleet, a man nearly killed in battle on two occasions, was a distant memory.

From the tenth century the Laurenburg family ruled the county of Nassau in what is now Germany as self-appointed counts. Their scattered possessions were in time divided between two brothers, Otto and Walram.

In 1403, Otto’s descendant, Count Engelbert, married Johanna of Polanen, who brought lands in the Netherlands and through whom their son inherited the barony of Breda. It was 112 years later that his descendant, Count Hendrik III of Nassau-Breda married Claudia of Chalon-Orange, and their son René eventually inherited the principality of Orange from Claudia’s brother, Philip.

Far from being in the Netherlands, the tiny principality of Orange was in Provence in southern France, not far from Avignon. When René died childless in 1544, his lands passed to his cousin William who became Prince William of Orange (a place he never visited), the founder of the House of NassauOrange. He was called William the Silent, possibly because he had for a time managed to keep his Protestant allegiance secret from the Spanish rulers of the Netherlands.

William led the Dutch revolt against the Spanish, and he was appointed stadholder (lieutenant, in effect head of state) of Holland, the first province to rebel. He is known to the Dutch as ‘Father of the Fatherland’. William was shot by a Spanish agent in 1584 (the first person to be assassinated with a firearm), and was succeeded in turn by three of his sons, Philip, then Maurice and then Frederick.

In 1647, Frederick was succeeded by his son, William II of Orange; and the following year, after 80 years of struggle, the Netherlands (being the Protestant northern provinces of the Spanish Netherlands) became an independent state. William married Mary, the oldest daughter of King Charles I of England and sister of Charles II and of James II.

When William died of smallpox at the age of 24, he was succeeded by his son, William III of Orange, who was born a week after his father died. On his birth, William was, through his mother, fifth in line to the English throne after his (so far) childless uncles Charles, James and Henry and their sister (William’s mother) Mary.

Years later, William’s leadership in resisting the French led to his appointment as Captain-General of the army for life and stadholder of Holland, although governmental rule of the country still lay with the States General (in Dutch,
Staten Generaal –
hence Staten Island, which kept its name unlike New Amsterdam (New York), Fort Orange (Albany) and Nassau (Long Island)). Small as the Netherlands was, it had become the leading trading nation in Europe, and had the highest level of literacy and the freest press in the world.

The Netherlands was a republic, but William’s thoughts were not focused on the crown; they were, and they would always be, dominated by the need to resist French aggression. For that, William needed support. Against the Catholic French, his best ally should have been his Protestant uncle, King Charles II of England. But Charles favoured his French cousin, Louis XIV.

As a result, the war with France went badly, and the States General was reluctant to provide further funds for hopeless fighting. So, in 1676 William journeyed to England; his plan was to marry the heir of the heir, his cousin Mary, the daughter of James, the King’s brother. William hoped that the marriage would encourage the States General to believe that England might join the war against France. Also, there was a chance that one day William would be consort to Mary, a position that would enable him to ensure English assistance.

Admittedly, Charles might have a legitimate child or James might have a son who would take precedence over Mary, but there was still hope – after all, the Nassaus had gained their main Dutch lands through marriage, and had also gained their title of ‘Prince of Orange’ through marriage. It could happen for a third time.

The marriage was quickly agreed, although the 15-year-old Mary was less than happy to leave home to marry a 27-yearold ugly man with a hunched back and asthma who was five inches shorter than her. However, she had no choice, and the Protestant union was very popular in England.

As soon as Mary and her husband reached the Netherlands, William was off to war. He loved military campaigning and the company of men. Nevertheless, Mary and William became devoted to one another, the relationship smoothed by Mary’s acceptance that she should not interfere in politics and matters of state.

Over a short period of time, William saw to it that his rivals in the Netherlands were murdered, and he assumed increased power as the French were driven back. Peace was negotiated in 1678, but four days after the treaty was signed, and before the two armies were aware of it, William’s forces attacked the French at the Battle of St Denis near Mons (in what is now Belgium).

Leading the attack, William exposed himself to danger without hesitation as he had always done. Then, in the heat of the battle, a French soldier found himself face-to-face with William. He reached out and held his pistol to William’s chest. Seeing the Frenchman about to shoot, Hendrik Ouwerkerk Count of Nassau, William’s second cousin, swung round and shot the French soldier before he could pull the trigger. The attempt to kill William, just seconds from certain success, had been thwarted. With 2,000 men killed on either side, the battle ended in a stalemate.

William was extremely annoyed that the States General had signed a peace treaty with France, especially as French aggression continued. Even worse, Louis seized the principality of Orange, which had become a refuge for Protestants. William was powerless to do anything about it, as he had no support from the States General or from England.

In 1685 Charles II died and James II was crowned king. William’s position was now more hopeful; his wife Mary was first in line and William himself was third in line after Mary
and her sister Anne. William was content to wait.

The events of 1688 changed everything. James’s second wife was pregnant and a son was expected. The Queen’s pregnancy was believed by both William and Mary to be a trick to cheat Mary of the succession. In addition, James’s deteriorating relationship with Parliament and the English people made William fear a revolution in England that would see the abolition of the monarchy. Matters were urgent, William would have to act.

After James’s son was born, there was only one option. Asked to invade in a letter from seven senior Englishmen, William decided to secure the throne for Mary; and more importantly, to take the steps that would bring England on to the Netherlands’ side against France.

It had been William’s intention to land on the north-east coast, but an easterly wind blew the invasion fleet through the Channel. That meant landing in the Protestant south-west, miles from James’s forces, most of whom had been deployed to defend the expected landing in the east.

Before any fighting started James fled to France, and William was left as the only power in the country. But he was not entitled to the crown. With contorted reasoning, Parliament declared

that by fleeing, James (and his infant son) had abdicated, and therefore his daughter Mary was entitled to the crown. Neither William nor Mary would accept this, so instead Parliament had to offer them the throne jointly, with Anne nominated as heir if William and Mary had no children. In February 1689, William and Mary were proclaimed King and Queen of England, and later of Scotland (the Scots having announced that James had forfeited the throne; someone with a divine right could not abdicate,itoffendedGod’sorder).However,apartfrommatters concerning the Church, Mary took a subordinate role, and William acted almost as sole monarch.

One of William’s principal supporters was Hendrik Ouwerkerk Count of Nassau, the man who had saved William’s life at the Battle of St Denis. Having changed his surname to Overkirk, he was rewarded for his services with a house in London that he called Overkirk House. Some years after his death, Overkirk House was incorporated with the adjoining terraced house and cottage, and the combined building is now known as 10 Downing Street. The terrace had been built by Sir George Downing. Born in Dublin, Downing went to the colonies to live in Massachusetts Bay where his uncle was the Governor. Downing was one of nine students in the first class to graduate from Harvard University. He then returned to England and fought with Cromwell, later becoming one of his main spies, tracking down exiled Royalists in the Netherlands. After the Restoration, Downing confessed his ‘errors’ and changed sides. He stayed on in the Netherlands, where he saw to the arrest of three of the regicides (his former colleagues), who were returned to England to be hanged, drawn and quartered. Diarist Samuel Pepys called Downing ‘a perfidious rogue’ and ‘an ungrateful villain’. With the rewards of spying and informing, Downing built the terraced houses in what is now Downing Street as a property speculation.

Finding themselves in a strong negotiating position, those in Parliament took the opportunity to extract all they wanted when offering William and Mary the throne, and William was happy to agree to it all as he was totally unconcerned with ‘divine rights’. By the end of the year, the Bill of Rights had been enacted. This confirmed the succession, and stated that no Catholic or spouse of a Catholic could become king or queen of England. Other provisions included the rules that in time of peace a standing army might only be raised with the consent of Parliament, that parliamentary debates and elections were to be free, that Parliament should meet regularly and that Protestants had the right to bear arms. This was one of the most important enactments in English history, giving the people more than most countries gained by bloody revolution. Although William’s invasion was called the ‘Glorious Revolution’, arguably it was the Bill of Rights that was entitled to that name. In time, the US Constitution would draw heavily on the Bill, not least the right to bear arms contained in the Second Amendment.

Yet true parliamentary rule only arrived when Parliament refused to provide William with income for life. From now on, the monarch would have to rely on periodic grants. He was beholden to Parliament; the balance of power had changed.

Titus Oates was released from prison and given a pension of £5 a week. But he had insulted Mary’s father, so she had his pension cancelled. It was reinstated after Mary died. Fortunes also changed for Judge Jeffries; he was captured whilst trying to flee the country and was sent to the Tower where he died.

Despite all his concessions, almost from the start of his reign William was unpopular. Any gratitude for saving the English from enforced Catholicism was clouded by the fact that they had never intended that William should be king. They only wanted his help; they certainly did not want a foreigner as monarch. The feeling was mutual; William hated London and the court, and despite surrounding himself with Dutchmen, he was homesick. To William’s disappointment there was no time to visit his homeland; he was pressed into action in Ireland.

Ex-King James II had incited a futile uprising in Scotland. Although there was victory at the Battle of Killiecrankie, Viscount Dundee the leader of the Jacobites (as supporters of James and his successors were called) was killed. Defeat followed at Dunkeld, and the Jacobite army disbanded. James’s position improved when William declared war on France – always his ambition. In retaliation, King Louis XIV agreedtosupportJames’sattempttoregainthethronethrough Ireland.

With the settlement of Protestants in Ireland and the confiscations, by 1660 the Catholic majority owned less than 10% of the land. Under James II the position had been reversed, and the Catholics recovered much of the land and all the power; it was the Protestants who were being driven out. The Catholics, led by the Earl of Tyrconnel, saw a chance to finish the job and destroy the position of the Protestants for good before the new Protestant monarchy was ready to move.