King James II invited observers to witness Queen Mary give birth
NITPICKING about the Duchess of Cambridge’s impeccable grooming when she left hospital six hours after the birth of her third child pales in comparison to the public spite hurled at Queen Mary of Modena after the birth of her first surviving son.
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NITPICKING about the Duchess of Cambridge’s impeccable grooming when she left hospital six hours after the birth of her third child pales in comparison to the public spite hurled at Queen Mary of Modena after the birth of her first surviving son.
The second wife of England’s King James II had lost nine infants before their first birthday, and another daughter died at age four.
But when James and Mary welcomed James Francis Edward, Prince of Wales on June 10, 1688, Protestants opposed to James’ Catholic sympathies and Mary’s Italian Catholic practices insisted the child was a changeling.
Maliciously inflaming rumours the impostor infant was smuggled into the royal birth chamber were James’ daughters from his first marriage — Mary, married to her cousin, William of Orange, was four years younger and Anne seven years younger than Mary of Modena, who was 15 when she married James, 40. She died from breast cancer while in exile in Paris 300 years ago, on May 7, 1718.
Born Mary Beatrice d’Este on October 5, 1658, she was the eldest surviving child of Alfonso IV, Duke of Modena in northwestern Italy, and his wife Laura Martinozzi, who consented to her marriage to James.
Then the Duke of York, James had secretly converted to Catholicism in 1668. Married by proxy on September 30, 1673, Mary first saw her husband in November at their second marriage ceremony. James was scarred by smallpox and afflicted with a stutter; Mary at first disliked him and burst into tears each time she saw him.
She later warmed to James, who reputedly told his daughters at their introduction to his bride, “I have brought you a new playfellow.” But Anne disliked Mary, despite Mary’s attempts to win her affection.
When James ascended the throne in 1685, following the death of his brother Charles II, English nobles were split between the century-old Church of England and Catholicism. The Church of England’s break from Roman Catholic and Papal authority during the Reformation sweeping 16th century Europe was accelerated by Henry VIII.
English and Scottish Protestant nobles suspected, with reason, that James, who had grown up in exile in France, was pro-French and pro-Catholic, and intended to install himself as an absolute monarch. His attempts to give civic equality to Catholic and Protestant dissenters inflamed Parliament and was seen as favouritism towards Catholics. Politically inept, James refused to heed advice on political manoeuvres against him and believed a male heir would appease Protestant opponents.
But in April 1688, ambassador Johann Hoffmann wrote: “Many of the most judicious here are of opinion that if the Queen gives birth to a Prince, far from destroying the aspirations of other persons to the Crown ... such an event would only increase aversion for the King, and make them use every effort to prevent Catholic succession to the Crown”.
With rumours Mary was not pregnant, or had already miscarried, James attempted to discredit nay-sayers by inviting 40 observers to Mary’s birth chamber and his own anteroom. Mary was eventually persuaded to agree to witnesses. James had invited sympathisers, who in October 1688 signed a declaration that they witnessed the infant’s birth around 10am on June 10, to counter rumours that a warming-pan used to air sheets had conveyed “a little Pretender”. Other rumours and cartoons queried James’ paternity.
Mary had been persuaded against using a wet nurse, as with previous infants who had died. Her son was sent with a governess to the country, where the healthy baby was soon seriously ill: doctors had advocated feeding the baby water gruel and boiled bread.
The baby was expected to die as doctors gave “him all the remedies to be found in the apothecaries’ jars (except milk, which is not to be found there) declaring they would not give him half an hour to live if he were suckled.” After the King ordered a trial of breastmilk, recruiting a wet-nurse, the baby again flourished.
Mary and James soon accepted rumours that James’ daughter Mary and nephew William, encouraged by Protestant sympathisers, planned a challenge. William set sail with a fleet of 463 ships from Hellevoetsluis, South Holland, to land at Torbay, Devon, on November 5, 1688, initiating the Glorious Revolution. After an attempt to recover his crowns in 1689, James lived in exile in France, where King Louis XIV gave the exiled royals use of Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, where they set up court-in-exile.
Mary gave birth in 1692 to their last child, Princess Louise Mary. James died in 1701, and Louise in 1712. Her son James died in January 1766.
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