Monarch Profile: King George I of Great Britain & Ireland

His Highness Georg Ludwig, Duke of Brunswick-Lueneburg was born on May 28, 1660, the eldest son of Ernest Augustus, Elector of Hanover and his wife Sophia of the Palatinate. The first son born to the Hanoverian ruling family in some time, he was mostly raised alongside his younger brother and was known as a very serious little boy, responsible and who established himself early on as the leader of his younger siblings. He gained many lofty titles in quick succession as his childless uncles passed away but the grandest title he stood to came originated some distance from his flat, beloved lands of meandering rivers in northern Germany. His mother, known as Sophie of Hanover, was the daughter of Elizabeth of Bohemia, who was the daughter of King James I of England. As they were Protestants, in 1701 the English Parliament passed a new Act of Succession which stated that, “the most excellent Princess Sophia, Electress and Dowager Duchess of Hanover, daughter of Elizabeth, late Queen of Bohemia, daughter of James I, shall be next in succession to the Crown” after the Stuart Queen Anne.

For the young George, however, that seemed a remote a distant possibility. He was raised entirely with the intention of being Elector of Hanover and no more. His father feared his son would have to fight to keep his inheritance and stressed his military education, taking his teenage son on campaign with him during the Franco-Dutch War in which the German empire backed the Dutch republic against King Louis XIV of France. In 1682 he married his first cousin (another effort to secure the family fortune) Sophia Dorothea of Celle and the following year George and his brother Frederick Augustus fought with the Austrians against the Turks at the Battle of Vienna while his wife gave birth to a son and heir, George Augustus, whom his father would thoroughly despise. Family feuding meant that George spent a great deal of time fighting for and trying to gain favor with the Hapsburg Emperor and powerful figures in Germany as they tried to unite the Hanoverian lands into a single state under his control. In 1692 his father was formally made an Elector of the Holy Roman (German) Empire and this went a long way to securing the position of George due to the previous passage of primogeniture.

After the birth of another child, a daughter, the family life of George fell apart, if it had ever been real in the first place. George took a succession of mistresses but when his wife did the same with a Swedish aristocrat, the man was eventually murdered and George himself did not escape suspicion. Their marriage was dissolved and George had his wife placed under house arrest and was not allowed to see her children, which certainly could not have helped the father-son relationship between George and George Augustus which would become extremely bad. However, in 1698 George’s father passed away and he became the ruler of Hanover and a Prince-Elector of the Empire. He made his court quite an attraction with a palace described as a smaller-scale Versailles and which was frequented by numerous prestigious intellectuals and artistic figures. The security of Hanover was, undoubtedly, George’s top priority but in 1710 he did send an agent to London, Baron von Bothmar, to represent his interests in the matter of the British succession. The idea that he would actually become King of England and Scotland was not really secured until the death of Queen Anne and the work of her minister the Duke of Shrewsbury to put the Act of Settlement into effect.

Contrary to what some still think, the Elector of Hanover was not anxious to take the British throne. Hanover was his home, his first concern and the land he loved most. He delayed going to England and took his time getting there, knowing that, while being King of England was certainly more prestigious than being Elector of Hanover, it would also be a much more complicated undertaking. In Hanover, he was effectively an absolute monarch, military matters were left entirely at his discretion and any expenditure over 12 pounds required his consent. The people were loyal and accepted that government was for the Elector and not their concern. In Britain, on the other hand, there was an entrenched political class, contentious religious divisions, animosity between England, Scotland and Ireland as well as a considerable number of people still loyal to the House of Stuart. Scotland, the English country gentry and many in the Church of England were not pleased at all to see George arrive on English shores, his largest base of support basically being the political class that wanted and needed his favor to maintain themselves. He could hardly speak English at all and caused some reaction when he landed and announced to the assembled people that he had, “come for your goods, I have come for all your goods”.

Becoming King of England and Scotland in August of 1714 (his mother had died earlier in the year), King George I wanted to make it clear from the outset that he asserted his right to the throne on the basis of heredity rather than an act of Parliament, as a way to show that he did not owe his Crown to politicians and to assert that he was not a usurper to the Jacobite supporters of the Stuarts. In truth though, he was only king because of an act of Parliament and if the Stuart heir had, as he was advised, abandoned Catholicism and become an Anglican, there was no doubt that he would have been able to take the throne and would have been head of a much more robust monarchy than George I was handed. However, Britain accepted King George I quietly, without much enthusiasm but also without much serious opposition beyond bitter words and ridicule at his rather scandalous private life. European politics, as well as religion, helped King George I in his cause. As well as being Catholic, the Stuarts were very closely allied with the French whereas King George, as Elector of Hanover, had opposed the French, allied with Britain and others, as commander of the (German) Imperial army on the Rhine during the recent War of Spanish Succession. The Dutch and other European Protestants were united in support of a Protestant monarch in Britain but many Catholics were supportive as well, even if not overtly, due to Austrian and Papal opposition to the power of France.

The first beneficiary of King George I was the Whig party. The Tories had tried to get the Stuarts to embrace Protestantism and thus ensure their own succession, so they were out of favor while the Whigs who rallied to him, along with his trusted German officials, were rewarded with high office. The King also baffled many of his new subjects by his behavior, which was unlike anything they had seen before. He disliked crowds and preferred meals in his private apartments to large state dinners. He lived in only two rooms of the palace and while royal mistresses were nothing new, George’s were known for being absurdly ugly which greatly amused the public. King Charles II had, at least, shown better taste in many mistresses. Most singled out were two German mistresses (they were invariably German), one of whom was extremely thin and the other extremely fat. He distrusted strangers, clever women and had little time for poets or painters though he was a great patron of music.

As King, his first challenge was the Jacobite uprising of 1715. Started by the Earl of Mar who proclaimed the Stuart heir King James VIII of Scotland and III of England and with propaganda support from the exiled Tory leader Henry St John in France, the rebellion had considerable support. Most of Scotland outside Edinburgh favored the Jacobites and there were demonstrations of support in many towns across England. Supporters of King George I described him as calm and solid during this crisis but the truth may well have been that losing the British throne would have made his life easier, allowing him to return permanently to his beloved Hanover. Fortunately for King George, the Jacobite uprising was very poorly coordinated and was soon squashed without undue difficulty. By the time the Stuart heir arrived on British soil, his cause was already effectively lost and a great many aristocrats were put to death in the aftermath, a fact which caused some lack of support for George I in the upper echelons of British society. Tory support for the Stuarts also ensured that the Whig party could enjoy an uncontested hold on power. It also helped that the King spoke English so poorly that he rarely attended council meetings and mostly let them do as they pleased, though he could be counted on to intervene when it concerned Hanover.

Although obliged to spend most of his time in England, the government was considerate enough, or willing enough to be rid of him, that they repealed the law requiring Parliamentary consent for the King to leave the country so that George I was able to take length leaves of absence in Hanover in 1716, 1719, 1720, 1723 and 1725. His son presided over a regency council while he was away and given that the King and his son thoroughly hated each other, government opposition tended to gather around the Prince. Since it often involved Hanover, King George I did take an active interest in foreign affairs and played a leading part in gathering an alliance of the British, Germans, French and Dutch against the Spanish who, in 1719, invaded Scotland and tried to spark their own Jacobite rebellion. However, only a few hundred Spanish troops managed to land successfully and they, along with barely a thousand Jacobites, were easily crushed. The King also saw to it that Hanover benefited by gaining territory at the expense of Sweden in the resolution of the “Great Northern War”, a Russian-backed war to destroy the dominance of the Kingdom of Sweden in northern and eastern Europe.

The last major crisis King George I presided over was the collapse of the so-called “South Sea Bubble”. What happened was that the government-backed South Sea Company was given a monopoly on trade with South America in exchange for buying the British national debt from the government. Despite having no real assets, speculators bid up the price of shares in the company higher and higher so that dozens of “bubble companies” sprang up. When the government passed a law to squash these companies, it sparked the bursting of the South Sea Bubble, causing a stock market crash, forcing the resignation of many government officials and severely undermining faith in the government. The King and his ministers were never more unpopular than after their bungled attempts at controlling the economy had cost so many so much. The public did not know that King George I had hardly been the cause of it all and evidence shows that he lost money in the affair as well. It was not a good situation though for King George’s first minister, Robert Walpole, generally regarded as the first British Prime Minister as people today would recognize it. He was better recognized by sticking to simpler forms of patronage, such as in convincing King George I to revive the Order of the Bath as a way to reward political supporters.

King George I died in Germany on June 11, 1727 which did not provoke a great deal of sorrow in the British Isles. All in all, about the best that can be said for George I, as King of England, is that he was not terrible. He was a very effective Elector of Hanover but as for the British Isles, the best that can be said is that the three kingdoms did not descend into chaos or poverty during his reign. He did have his good qualities. He was a good military leader, courageous on the battlefield, thrifty in economic matters and was fairly astute in political matters. His shyness led to some unfair criticism and he was not an unintelligent man, however he was far from a good man either. His treatment of his family was deplorable, he frankly did not care all that much about Britain and was from start to finish a German more concerned with events in Germany than in the British Isles. Brought to the throne by an act of Parliament rather than by birth, the political class became more entrenched under his reign as he was fairly disinterested in events that did not impact Hanover. The changes put in place in 1688 were not really fully felt until the reign of King George I when the King’s first minister first began to rise in prominence as being the real “leader” of the country, a trend which would (with one interruption named George III) continue and become more pronounced over time.

Monarch Profile: King George II of Great Britain & Ireland

The second British monarch of the House of Hanover, George II was the sort of king that probably would have been much more popular had he reigned at a different time. In time he would be hated by some, respected by others but rarely ever loved by his subjects to any great degree. He was born in Hanover, Germany in 1683 and was part of what would be a Hanoverian family tradition from the start; antagonism. His parents separated and Prince George probably never saw his mother again after around the age of ten. His father, later Elector of Hanover and King George I of Great Britain, did not get along with his son (again, something of a tradition for the Hanoverians) and never missed an opportunity to insult, belittle and exclude him. Still, in spite of this adversity, he grew up to be a strong and fit young man of sound intelligence if no great curiosity. Until he was four he spoke only French, thereafter learned German and would eventually speak passable English and Italian as well. He was diligent though not devout in his religion but was most interested in genealogy and anything related to the military, which was well enough as he was given a very military-centric education.

After Queen Anne came to the British throne, with no surviving children, the succession laws were altered to ensure that a Catholic could not succeed to the throne, which meant that the rest of the Stuarts were disinherited and Prince George of Hanover suddenly became a future heir to the British throne. In 1705 he was made a British subject and invested with the Order of the Garter the following year and made Duke of Cambridge along with a number of other noble titles. Also in 1705 he married Princess Caroline of Ansbach, a wife of his own choosing. Despite a number of infidelities during his married life, he probably always loved Caroline best and she had a very strong though subtle hold on him from that time forward. She was a big, flirtatious blonde who was very clever, very outgoing and very interested in advancing her own power and influence which she was able to do masterfully. George was so devoted to Caroline that he caught smallpox from her in 1707, after the birth of their first child, when he refused to leave her side. Thankfully, both recovered and, having secured the succession, Prince George had the joy of finally going to war, fighting in the Battle of Oudenarde with the great Marlborough in the War of the Spanish Succession. “Corporal John” gave the Prince high marks for his service in combat though George’s father did nothing but belittle it.

In 1714 the Stuart Queen Anne passed away and the Hanoverians came to England to take up the British throne with the coronation of King George I. As in Hanover, the new Prince of Wales was excluded from the halls of power by his father and not given anything to do of any significant importance. When he proved more popular than his father the situation did not improve and George I actually separated his son from his children, later allowing him to visit his children only once a week. Naturally, Prince George began to associate with the King’s political enemies and the rift between him and his father only widened. They remained bitter and unreconciled until George I died in 1727, in Hanover, and his son became King George II of Great Britain & Ireland. He didn’t even attend his father’s funeral but no one in England seemed to hold it against him. Prior to his accession, George II had become very disgusted with politics and to the extent that he did involve himself in government it was mostly in the directions that Queen Caroline advised. He was more interested in battles, buttons and regimental uniforms than he was in politics.

Like his own father, he carried on the tradition of having a very poor relationship with his son, Frederick, Prince of Wales, who he had left behind in Germany when he came to England and did not see again for more than a decade. When the Prince came to England he was immediately scooped up by the King’s political opposition which did no good for peace in the family. After an intense quarrel broke out when George II refused to give his son more money, the Prince of Wales and his family were banished from court. Not long after, Queen Caroline died which depressed George II greatly. Famously, on her deathbed, the Queen urged her husband to marry again after she was gone to which the sobbing George II replied, “No, I shall only have mistresses!” These mistresses were invariably German and during his reign King George II became ever more focused on German affairs which did nothing to help his popularity in England. The political establishment generally supported him for staying out of their affairs and essentially allowing the masters of Parliament to govern the country but while he might not have been seen as a hated figure, he was increasingly seen as target for mockery and grumbling. What King George II most wished for was a good war and he was finally to have one, though at one point the war spread a little too close to home for his comfort.

The King actually got out in front of his government in supporting the Archduchess of Austria and Queen of Hungary, Maria Theresa, in the War of the Austrian Succession in his capacity as Elector of Hanover. He was convinced that a Hapsburg defeat would allow France to threaten Hanover and possibly dominate Europe though it was a struggle to get the British government to go along. The King had also been thwarted in his efforts to reform and strengthen the British army which Parliament always wanted to downsize. When war came, King George II was in his element and famously led British troops (as part of a wider coalition) to victory over the French at the Battle of Dettingen in 1743. This would be the last time that a reigning British monarch led his troops personally on the battlefield though it did not result in the boost to his popularity that most might have expected. Most viewed it as essentially a war between Prussia and Austria, a German affair that no Englishman should have to risk his life or his pocketbook for. In the end, peace was finally settled but not before an off-shoot of the conflict nearly cost King George II his British throne.

In an effort to bedevil the British on the cheap, the King of France backed another rebellion in Scotland by the Jacobites (loyalists of the House of Stuart) to force George II back to Hanover and restore the (Catholic and pro-French) Stuarts to the British throne. There had been an earlier Jacobite rising in 1715 but it had been crushed in its infancy with little difficulty. The 1745 uprising would be a different matter even after King Louis backed out from sending support. Under the dynamic leadership of “Bonnie Prince Charlie”, grandson of the late King James II, the Jacobites came fairly close to success despite having all of the odds heavily stacked against them. Often portrayed as a war between Scotland and England, it was actually much more complicated than that. The mostly Protestant lowland Scots were firmly Hanoverian in sympathy and while loyalty to the Stuarts was more widespread in the Catholic highlands, it was by no means universal. Likewise, there were Irish and English volunteers who fought for the Stuart cause just as there were Scots who fought for “German Georgie” (as the Jacobites tended to call him).

The Bonnie Prince and his Jacobites, in their plaids and kilts with white roses in their bonnets, occupied Edinburgh, won a surprising victory at Prestonpans over General John Cope and then invaded England, very nearly reaching London where George II had ships prepared to take him to Hanover if the need should arise. However, aside from a few hundred volunteers, England did not rally to the Prince as he had promised his chieftains they would. Most Englishmen neither loved nor hated George II with any great passion and were content to ‘wait and see’ how events would unfold. If the Prince was victorious, they would cheer his arrival and say “good riddance” to George of Hanover but if he should lose, they were content to go on with business as usual and no one wanted to risk backing a loser and being condemned as traitors. With the odds so heavily stacked against the Jacobites, most Englishmen wouldn’t risk backing him until he won another great victory and that chance would never come as the Scottish chieftains overruled their Prince and marched back to Scotland. They won another victory over General Hawley at Falkirk but continued to retreat until their ragged remnant was crushed at the Battle of Culloden by the King’s son the Duke of Cumberland in 1746. King George II and the House of Hanover was secure on the British throne and would never be so troubled again.

With the end of the war, King George II was forced to return to his peacetime routine of family quarrels and political headaches until the outbreak of the French and Indian War in America over control of the Ohio Country. This later merged into what is known in Europe as the Seven Years’ War starting in 1756 between Prussia, Britain, some minor German states and Portugal on one side and France, Austria, Russia, Spain, Sweden and Saxony on the other (with various Native American tribes and the Mughal Empire of India also joining in the contest). This was to prove a critical time for the future of the British Empire and a decisive moment in the long-standing feud with France. However, King George II was not to play a major part in it. The Duke of Cumberland, his favorite son, proved an incompetent commander when faced with professional armies rather than half-starved Scots armed with swords, and while George II was mostly concerned with Hanover and wished to focus on Europe, his government moved to focus on the war in America. The result was a victory that would determine the fate of North America with French Canada falling to the British though at the same time setting the stage for the American War for Independence.

The war was a great victory and made Britain a major imperial power, however, King George II would not live to see the final defeat of his nemesis King Louis XV of France. Half blind and almost deaf, the 76-year old monarch died at Kensington Palace on October 25, 1760 and the throne passed to his grandson King George III. He had never been a very popular monarch. He was certainly more popular as Prince of Wales but even then was seen as something of a foreign oddity and after coming to the throne he seemed to become ever more like his father, ever more hateful toward his children and ever more obsessed with German affairs. His lack of concern for affairs in Britain allowed the grip of Parliament to be strengthened at the expense of the monarchy, a trend which started with the downfall of the Stuarts and coincided with the rise in status of the King’s prime minister and the way the monarch was increasingly seen as an unnecessary part of government. Still, any proud native of the British isles could not say that the reign of King George II had been all that bad with the numerous victories in war and expansion of the British Empire in North America, the Caribbean and India that these brought about. Perhaps it was simply that, at the end of the day, George II was still seen as a German prince who just happened to be King of Great Britain. It was not until the reign of his grandson that the House of Hanover gave Britain a thoroughly British monarch.