Part #7: The Bloody Year
Section #1: Offender of the Faith
“Let those who stand against my People know Fear. For I am their sovereign king, the will of this Nation and the architect of its Common Good, and for my People I will do whatever need be done without hesitation. For I am born in a rank which recognizes no superior but God, and thus free to sacrifice my soul for this land.”[1]
- King Richard IV & I
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“If one were to merely look upon a timeline of historical events in the British Isles, then the Bloody Year would appear to be a very sudden and confusing tragedy. However, to those who understand the history of the event, the true blessing is that it remained contained within the confines of a single year, and did not begin a lengthy war as the last conflict to ravish England’s shores did. Of course, while the incidents within were brief, no one can deny their impact, as the year of 1687 both created new issues and solved ones that were years in the making.
Let us then examine events prior to this, to better comprehend the setting in which conflict erupted. In the early 1670s, the Test Act was passed, which required that anyone filling any office, civil or military, had to not only make an Oath of Supremacy to the King of England as the supreme governor of the Church of England (although several Catholic officials were allowed to go without the oath under Charles II) but also were required to make a declaration against transubstantiation and receive the sacrament within three months of taking office. James, Duke of York, brother of Charles II, refused to make the declaration, and was thus revealed as a Catholic. This resulted in a great deal of panic amongst certain members of Parliament who realized that, with Charles II then without heir, the next monarch of England would be a Catholic. [2]
Some even reported belief in a conspiracy to murder the king by the Catholics, despite the fact that such a conspiracy would only result in Catholics facing greater persecution for murdering a king, regardless of if James sat upon the throne, and would also create the precedent by which James himself could be murdered in favor of his Protestant daughter Mary, who was wed to William III of Orange.[3] Luckily, these more deranged theorists were unable to gain much traction, and most of England’s populace, while greatly against Catholics, were not of a mind as to upset royal succession by supporting the so called Exclusion Bill, which sought to ‘exclude’ James in the line of succession to prevent a Catholic monarch. The bill thankfully failed, and upon a subsequent elections of Parliament, general concerns over the exaggerated amount and power of ‘Puritan’ criminals due to feeling New English colonists (a region then in the midst of the First Metacom War), as well as outbreaks of fever and flu that accompanied them, and other factors saw a Parliament less and less concerned with voting for the bill whenever it was reintroduced.
Recognizing, however, another solution, the backers of the Exclusion Bill proposed that Charles II’s recognized bastard son James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, popularly known as James Crofts, could be legitimized and made heir, Monmouth being both Protestant and a charismatic individual that had developed a strong influence of his own. It would be their fervent support of him, alongside their opposition’s strong disgust and loathing for actions against the Royal Family such as the Exclusion Bill, that would earn the common names of ‘Croft’ and ‘Abhor’ for the two predominant groups in Parliament for years to come.
What truly killed the bill, however, the aforementioned ‘other factors’, was the announcement of Queen Catherine’s pregnancy in 1680. While there was fear that it would result in another child that would not survive infancy, the hope was enough to sway many politicians that were less radical in their beliefs into at least abstaining until it could be determined if the child would be a viable heir. Some took this as opportunity to abandon the proponents of the bill entirely and vote against it as both unnecessary and disrespectful, while others merely chose to abstain their vote until such a time that the child either survived infancy, or did not, at which point they believed the bill could be reintroduced. Soon enough, Prince Richard was born, and, though sickly for much of his youth, would survive infancy, dashing any hopes of the Exclusion Bill and the precedent of Parliamentary power it would create, but generally all sides gave a sigh of relief that succession was secured. But, when Charles II briefly suffered illness, the Exclusion Bill supporters then realized they had a new problem; if Charles II died, no doubt James would become regent, and even acting as a second father to Richard. That the new heir might be corrupted into a Catholic sent them into a panic.[4]
Thus, they introduced plans to have Monmouth be made regent rather than James (once again cementing Croft as the name for the Opposition), upon the basis that the young Richard would need a Protestant upbringing if he indeed required a regency. This new proposal indeed gained a good deal of support, though never enough to become law. However, with Cromwellian allusions having already been mounting even before Richard’s birth, it was easy for Abhors to twist the idea that Monmouth, a recognized bastard and thus pretender, would have full access the young heir, could then kill the child and claim the throne himself. In response, wilder and wilder stories of James’ supposedly radical Catholicism began to circulate, some claiming he would have the boy tortured to forcibly convert as if he were an Inquisitor of Spain.
To add on to the conflict was a growing third faction of Crofts and Abhors that wished to offer compromise in the invitation of Mary as regent if it were needed, thus not requiring Monmouth be given power, while also ensuring that a Protestant helped the boy guide the realm. However, this group remained fairly small, as general extremization of both main factions saw them ignore possible alternatives, general unease with the Dutch with the Franco-Dutch War still in memory, and Mary had found herself ill relations with her father, as the two had quarreled via correspondence over the situation in England on matters of possible regency. In his letters, James, when prompted by his daughter, wrote that would certainly hope to advocate to Richard, as regent as mere advisor, for religious tolerance and a general weariness towards more radical elements in Parliament. Mary believed that some of James’ were too extreme, and she herself stated that she believed he ought to decline a regency in favor of regency council of himself, Monmouth, a few other other well-liked Protestant lords, and Queen Catherine, who had as of then recently gained a boost in popularity when Abhors circulated her remark that, “[her son was] to be King of England, and head of its Church. He must of course be a member of that Church.” James, however, was against the move, for reasons of a general distaste and distrust for most of whom she mentioned, barring the Queen-consort, and, but of course, a joint regency of himself and her would only make the situation worse. Thus rebuffed, Mary accused her father of lusting for power.[5] While some might assume this would make her all the more eager to agree to replace James as regent when asked, her pride instead made her refuse such offers on the grounds of her refusal to be ‘a pawn in [her] father and cousin’s game’. This route seemingly neutralized, the Marian faction remained but a vocal minority that often sided with the Crofts on most other issues.
And while Abhors remained the majority in Parliament, the population of England found itself increasingly divided, though many did not realize it, as, though each man knew what side of the argument he was on, most firmly believed that their then healthy king--having recovered to full health and famously offering a scolding speech to Parliament for ‘speaking of [him] as though [he] were buried,”--would live long enough to see his son reach his majority, and that the debates were merely hypothetical discussions that showcased general political beliefs, be that anti-Catholic or pro-Monarch. That was, of course, until the winter of 1686, when Charles II would be struck with illness once again. And despite all prayers, at the dawn of 1687, he drew his final breath…”
- History of the British Isles by Arthur Conchobhair, Viscount of Limerick
“[The royal bedroom of Charles II. Snow drifts outside of the window, and the lighting is dim. CHARLES lies pale and sickly, with ragged breath. Around him are CATHERINE, JAMES, RICHARD, and several LORDS. CATHERINE holds RICHARD as he sobs.]
CHARLES: D-do not cry, boy. [cough] You will be a king. And king [cough] kings [cough] kings do not cry. Listen to me, listen to us. We are your father, and we are dying, but we do not cry or moan or beg for life to God. We are the king. And know that we...I...will miss you. Will mourn never seeing you grow while within this mortal coil. But our strength is your strength. And your strength with be your son’s, and his son’s after him, and onwards to the End Times. And that strength too...is that of the nation. A kingdom must have a king, for without it is but a leaderless mob, unable, despite its attempts, to guide itself to anywhere but chaos. You are needed, boy, just we were when our father was killed. Do you… do you understand?
RICHARD: [sniffle] I….we understand.
[CHARLES gives a weak laugh, before breaking into a fit of coughing and CATHERINE’s grip on his hand grows tighter]
CHARLES: J-james!
JAMES: [Leaning in] I am here, my brother.
CHARLES: Guide him James. Help him become a man. You!
[CHARLES points at the LORDS]
CHARLES: Stand witness! Hear in your ear this, as if it were gospel of our Lord: We, Charles II, we...we name James, Duke of...Duke of [cough] We name James as regent for Richard, Prince of Wales! Regent, until he reaches majority. This we decree, despite belief by many that another ought take his place, for we find him best suited to guide this kingdom down a righteous and true path...
[Most of the LORDS nod solemnly, and several begin to write down the decree, verbatim. Focus on a few of them, who look to one another. A cut to the paper, and upon it is written ‘Duke of’. Slowly, they write in ‘Monmouth’. Dramatic tune rises.]”
- Excerpt, Regency (2017)[6]
“Charles II had been dead for only a few hours when the first parts of the Bloody Year started to turn. Despite several lords all bearing witness to his naming of a regent for his son, some of them had written down that James, Duke of York, was regent. But the others had written James, Duke of Monmouth. Which, given that, before Richard was born, one was the king’s Catholic brother Parliament had been fighting to exclude from succession, and the other was the king’s Protestant bastard son Parliament had been fighting to make heir, is a bit of a problem. Now, officially, James the Bastard, as most Abhor historians referred to him, was James Scott, Duke of Monmouth, but given the generally extemporaneous nature of the decree, that wasn’t solid enough evidence to disprove that the king had named him regent over his brother. Especially since made a point to mention that, whoever he had picked, was someone that plenty of people were going to disagree with, but that that person was best to guide England ‘down a righteous and true path’. What the hell does that mean? Nobody knew. Yes, Sarah.”
“But weren’t there other people there to confirm who he meant? Like his brother.”
“Yes, but if you were an anti-Catholic Croft, ‘righteous and true path’ obviously meant the one that wasn’t Catholic. But then, if you were royalist Abhor, ‘righteous and true path’ obviously meant one that wasn’t led by those backstabbing and dastardly Crofts. You are also right, though, that James, as well as the Queen, both stated that Charles had meant his brother. But then, both being Catholics, and one being the guy who would be named, meant most Crofts didn’t want to trust their testimony. But can anyone tell me who had the most support? Gregory?”
“Duke of York.”
“Yes! So, the word is sent that Charles is dead and to be buried some days afterward. After the funeral, James, Duke of York, is named regent officially, but during that process, several people contest it, and present the testimonies that James, Duke of Monmouth was the to be regent. They storm out, and then, just a few weeks later, time they took gathering their men, we get the March on London. A huge gathering of people, some lords, some from the House of Commons, some just commoners who joined up, and a sizeable number of soldiers and and former soldiers, all march through London, demanding that Monmouth be named regent. By all accounts, at least the ones we can prove as being without too much bias, the March was supposed to be peaceful, a major demonstration that they assumed would make James, Duke of York, and I’m going to keep saying it like that so you people remember which is which, concede to them. Their ringleader was the Earl of Shaftesbury, who entered a heated discussion with James outside of Parliament, and eventually James told him and his people to disperse, or be treated as disturbing the peace and face accusations of treason. Now from there things get...muddy. A lot of people say that the group refused to leave, and James angrily gave the order for troops to fire on them, or at least to startle them, and that’s when someone from the march fired back. But then most others say he only threatened the order before some shot from the mob. And then others still say that before he gave any order, a shot rang out. But regardless, someone had fired a gun, and it clipped James, Duke of York, in the ear. Seeing the regent gripping his bloody head and fall to ground was all the needed for chaos to break out.
“The marchers retreated, Shaftesbury and many others with them, fleeing for their lives from vengeful city-dwellers and from the actual military forces. But once they were free from London, they started telling their account of what happened, and very quickly tensions start rising. Now we may be thinking, what was James, Duke of Monmouth, doing during this? Well, he happened to be in London for the funeral, and hadn’t left yet when the march happened. He gave his statement that he was ‘readily willing’ to assume the regency when Shaftesbury and the crowd asked him, but when the fighting broke, he did not flee with them. Instead, he was put under arrest, and raged and moaned that James, Duke of York, was going against the obvious will of both the Lords and Commoners of England. At least until the first Battle of London…”
- Prof. Ernest Valdez, Lecture at the University of New Rubicon
“The first actual battle, if it can be called a such, to be fought in the Bloody Year, if not including the March on London, was the First Battle of London in late February of 1687. The battle was a swift event that lasted only a day, and was less of a grand fight as it was a sudden takeover. Since the March, there had been riots across the city of London as Protestant citizens were torn between loyalties to faith and loyalties to state. There were also numerous members of the criminal element that used the unrest as a means of furthering their own ends. With this chaos growing, the Duke of York was already preparing to flee the city with Prince Richard and find safehaven elsewhere, planning to let things calm down before using the military to round up ringleaders and remove them as a threat. However, in the meanwhile, as word spread of the Duke of York’s regency being contested by the supporters of the Duke of Monmouth, and of the casualties of the march, an army gathered. Beginning as a rally immediately after the march, several defecting officers of the army and members of Parliament began to rile up peasants in the countryside, and soon enough had a formidably large, if untrained, force. Notably, the Earl of Shaftesbury and several other lords that had effectively become the founders of the Croft movement, chose not to lead any form of open rebellion, calling for the group to simply protest rather than fights. When their cries went ignored, they instead invested their resources in attempting to sway more of the nation in their favor peacefully, so that York would be forced to concede, rather than face a rebellion of all of England.
But despite such efforts to prevent furthered conflict, there came upon the city of London, en masse, the army, led by a number of disgruntled officers, as well as Joseph Pride, soldier in the New Model Army and son of parliamentarian commander Thomas Pride, who was almost hanged in place of his father’s corpse. There was also Charles Lambert, who claimed to be the bastard son of Charles Hatton, son of the Christopher, 1st Baron Hatton, and Frances Lambert, daughter of Major-General John Lambert, although the validity of such a claim was never confirmed and greatly denied by the Hatton family.[7] Upon seeing the Monmouthite force approaching, there was an initial attempt by the Duke-regent to defend the city, only for members of its garrison to turn on him. Realizing quickly that many of his forces were traitors, he began an immediate escape, with loyalist forces protecting his flight with the heir. Many historians have ruled the decision overly-cautious, as the number of loyal, well-trained troops could have held London if they had not been covering a retreat, most of the dissention in the ranks being quickly crushed. Thus, while James, the Queen-consort, and Prince Richard had escaped, ultimately it was a blow against their cause, as London was effectively in control of the Protestant forces, despite numerous riots (now against the Monmouthites).
As a counter to this victory for the Protestants, however, Monmouth himself was supposedly appalled to see an outright war being raged in his name. While the rebels themselves claimed he did so under threat of death, Monmouth officially denounced the movement and claimed that their inability to sway the nation meant they must surrender peacefully, admittedly doing so while still in the custody of the Duke of York, but he did not revert his statement upon being freed by defectors some days later, instead taking refuge within loyalist controlled England. His own personal records, and those of his family, have been unclear as to the truth, but most analysts of the period believe that it was a calculated move on Monmouth’s part, for if there was a Jacobite[8] victory, he was to seem innocent, but if the Protestant’s were victorious, he could ‘reveal’ that his condemnation had been coerced, and could thus find himself victory in either case. His actions may very well have doomed his own ambitions, however, greatly hindering the legitimacy of the Monmouthite cause as they were forced to run a Parliamentarian government, creating association with the likes of Cromwell. Many believe then that he simply foresaw a victory for the Duke of York and chose to ensure his own safety…
...Parliament itself was greatly divided, but nearly two-thirds of its membership chose to support the Duke of York, though these men were forced out of London by the so-called ‘Small Parliament’, which declared those not in favor of the Protestant forces to be traitors to the nation. Meeting in York itself, the Jacobite Parliament ironically contained a number of Crofts in its membership, men who, like Shaftesbury, had wanted a peaceful revolution, or felt that Monmouth’s refusal to agree to rebellion meant that its members were little better than a band of resurgent Roundheads. There were also the Marian Crofts, whose role would come later, and a collection of true loyalists who did not wish to see the Abhors use circumstances as a means of empowering the monarchy or restricting civil liberties in the aftermath. Many of these individuals were not ‘Crofts’, in the sense of supporting the Duke of Monmouth politically, before the outbreak of conflict, but were instead branded as Crofts, in the sense of being proponents of minicratic[9] royalism and Protestant prioritization, retroactively as they joined that political faction following the war and advocated against Abhorrist power grabs during. Chief among these individuals was George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, who returned out of retirement following the First Battle of London, and though was not officially a member of the Jacobite Parliament during 1687, he spoke on numerous occasions and was even (perhaps accidentally) counted as a voting member. Buckingham was once a loathed and humiliated figure, but his rational proposals and lack of fear to speak up against the dominating Abhors quickly cemented him in a leadership role for his group--especially given his publicly known taste for both Monmouth and Shaftesbury--and for all Crofts in general as he berated any Abhor who attempted to paint disagreement as treason. It would be his famed quote that would come to define the Crofts after the war: “It is not treason to propose a better idea.”
The Duke of Monmouth himself would eventually take a seat in the Jacobite Parliament, although not until mid-August, when loyalist victory was evident to all but the most fanatical of rebel leadership, and with this act numerous members of the Small Parliament fled London to gain some measure of mercy. The Earl of Shaftesbury would not sit in either Parliament until October, when the Small Parliament had been dissolved entirely and its remaining members arrested...
...Most ensuing skirmishes following the seizure of London were minor, often unmarked in the annals of history. But with the beginning of Scottish involvement, the would be rebellion truly came into fruition. Seizing Glasgow, the Scottish rebels were a mixture of forces, led by Richard and Michael Cameron, Covenanters that had been on the run from Charles II’s government for some time. Within their forces, however, some truly supported Monmouth, others merely despised the Catholic York, and others still fought for a more autonomous or even independent Scotland, utilizing the opportunity to gain the favor of the Small Parliament if they assured Monmouthite victory. Thus, with the Scottish rebels and a growing number of defectors, the Protestants now had the ability to rival the Jacobites in only a few months. But despite this, the leadership did not find itself satisfied, and Joseph Pride eventually began to champion that the ‘Glorious Anti-Papist Revolution’ be ‘spread near and wide like a flame in a field.’ Essentially, he and others in the Small Parliament desired the entire nation to immediately agree with them, not a drawn out series of battles that would slowly hack away at loyalist regions. From both London and Glasgow, the rebellion attempted to spread, sending out their men to aid smaller, fledgeling rebellions and to help organize entirely new ones. In some ways, the succeeded, with strong militias securing much of the Bristol Channel coast and several cities in southern England with minimal bloodshed. In many other cases, however, they failed. In Devon and Cornwall, for instance, while the former would see a successful uprising against garrisoned troops, their attempts to spread their control to the rest of the peninsula saw their defeat, reinforcements from London unable to arrive in time, and similar results occurred at Inverness.
Perhaps their most damning failure was that of the Army of Carlisle. Successfully repulsing a loyalist attack, the rebels in Carlisle were immediately ordered by nervous Richard Cameron to march North to help defeat a gathering of loyalists, despite a lack of supplies and general weariness. Regardless, a combined assault from both Carlisle and Glasgow would be numerically advantaged, and expected to see a victory that would effectively solidify control over Scotland for the Monmouthites. The Battle of Galloway instead ended in a resounding victory for the loyalists, due in large part to superiority in both tactics and morale. This loyalist militia was led by Thomas Fairfax, 5th Lord Fairfax of Cameron, who, a member of the pre-war Yorkshite militia, had been hunting with several friends in Scotland when the rebellion began, having until then been fortified in the Montgomerieston Citadel in Ayr, and taking a leading role in organizing loyalist Scots and members of the military. After Covenanters lines broke, the Army of Glasgow, led by former officers, was able to successfully retreat and fortify their own city, but the Army of Carlisle, mostly of peasant stock, dissolved in a frenzy. As the loyalists marched towards Carlisle, they found it unprotected and easily occupied, and as word of this spread, faith in the rebellion suffered greatly. When the rebels regrouped in the South, Fairfax drove on and was able to trap them at Lancaster, a fairly neutral location. The rebel actions of seizing food and weapons from the local citizens as Fairfax set up a perimeter around the city meant that the remnants of the army were soon enough pushed out of Lancaster by its populace, right in Fairfax’s jaws. Glasgow was soon enough an island in a sea of enemies. However, despite these failures, most in England itself could still remember at least tales of the last Civil War, if not the war itself, and thus many were content to allow the two sides to clash while merely awaiting for a victor to emerge, resulting in a quick loss in recruitment numbers for the rebels after an initial surge. In contrast, more and more men were willing to throw themselves behind the Jacobites in hopes of profiting from what was an ever seemingly assured victory…
...In Wales, the while the southern coast had fallen into Monmouthite hands, transference of this control northward failed, largely in part to the quick thinking of William Herbert, 1st Earl of Powis, who raised an army in defense of the Duke-regent as soon as he had heard of the First battle of London. His zealotry in persecuting and vanquishing the Monmouthites was well justified, having been greatly persecuted by their numbers, being one of the leading Roman Catholics in England, even accused of conspiring to kill the King, an accusation for which he was temporarily arrested for before being released not long after, only to hear that there had been an attempted murder of his wife.[10] Powis was thus given a perfect opportunity for a quest of both vengeance and patriotism. Initially, he and his army marched East in hopes of reclaiming the capital, but he was then informed of the large amount of southern Wales that had risen up in favor of the Protestant rebels. Turning his army back, Powis would engage a numerically superior force at Vyrnwy Valley, and successfully utilized his cavalry to trap the entirely infantry rebel army between his forces, barring them from either entry point. For some months afterwards, Powis’ army, realizing that much of the loyalists forces were focused on Scotland and southern England, attempted to contain the Welsh rebels in the South. The arrival of several loyalists militias, including Fairfax, who had recently received the news of Richard Cameron’s death by infection, and ensuing power struggle in the Covenanters had resulted in an easy conquest of Glasgow by loyalist forces. Together, the two would crush the last of the major Monmouthite holdouts in Wales, most decisively and famously in the Battle of Afon Nyfer.
...By all accounts of the time, the Protestant’s had the clear pull over the average Englishman, at least initially. One of the greatest moves for their legitimacy was their capture of Prince Richard and Queen-consort Catherine in late March, who were being transferred to Alnwick Castle, an large but uninhabited location that would ensure the prince’s safety as few but his guards and the Duke of York would know where he was. Having crossed into Northumberland, one of their escorts betrayed them, resulting in the young prince being held in Scotland before he was sent south to London in early May. This, combined with control of London, resulted in a large recruitment to the Protestant army. However, with the collapse of both the South-Western rebels and the majority of the Scottish ones, and as the Duke of York managed to keep the two main strongholds of rebellion from connecting their zones of control, looting of farmland, collecting of ‘taxes’ by troops, and deserters turning into bandits began to rise in occurrence, greatly building resentment for the Monmouthites. Public opinion swayed further and further towards the loyalists, until the Duke of York was confident enough to begin preparing a proper reclamation of London, gathering his forces in Worcester. This force was then used to decimate the rebels in Gloucester, including Charles Lambert, who drawn and quartered after spitting in the Duke-regent’s face and calling him a ‘putrid papist.’
This battle effectively left the Monmouthites only in London, with their Irish allies soon to be eliminated by the militia led by the aged Lord Burlington and Darragh Conchobhair. In a little over a month’s time, the Duke-regent’s army was preparing for their assault on London. Of course, it was at that moment that the Duke of York received a message that made him pale; his son-in-law was in Norfolk…”
- The Bloody Year, by Dr. Konstantin Ulyanov
“I remember it all very well. At the time I was in punishment for my seventh attempted escape, and thus far my most successful. Thus I was in the tower, but was reasonably accommodated. The sound of battle had only just stirred me when the Scotch thugs had burst in, barricading themselves like idiots. What sort of fools attempt to protect themselves by hiding in a prison-tower? But I digress. They grabbed me, beat me when I began demanding to know what was going on. While I had received ungentlemanly treatment by such fiends before, during my kidnapping and more minorly during my stay in Glasgow, these men were no longer under any such orders to treat me respectfully. They’re last hope, if the battle went as most expected, was to ransom me and pray that, in exchange for my safety, they would earn an oath from my uncle to let them live. That I was covered in bruises was not something they truly cared about...
...From what I could hear and what they said to one another, the loyal soldiers under my uncle were able to quickly punch through the rebel defenses, and had since used the rioting of the commoners to seize much of the city within the first day. By the second day, my captors were forced to fight off others who had a similar idea as them, and I watched as they butchered their once comrades with little hesitation. It was not long after that, when I foolishly made a remark, that one of them cut my cheek. Some say it has become a signature for me, a way by which all know me, and that it adds to my appearance. I suppose I ought to thank the man, and perhaps I would if he were alive…
...On that fourth day, the remaining rebels fled the city, and their false Parliament was captured. Just as they had planned, the Scotch attempted to use me as a hostage in exchange for their safety. And my uncle agreed, promising them that ‘he would give no order for them to come to harm.’ As soon as we had exited the tower, and I was given to him, however, Lord Powis had the men cut down. I still remember his stoic look when my uncle shouted at him, spoke of honor and oathes. Powis had simply responded that he had made no such oath, and that my uncle’s words had been that he would give no order to have the men killed, and indeed that had not happened. Instead, he acted without an order to do what he felt was right, especially upon seeing me, bloodied and bruised…
...Only a few hours of celebration, of joy, of being held by my mother again. And then it was fear once more. The city was pacified with force, the fortifications, luckily spared much damaged, were readied to repel another assault. My cousin was on his way...”
- Personal memoir of King Richard IV & I
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[1] This last sentence (of the first part of it) is a quote from Richard I, who said it to the Holy Roman Emperor after he was accused of crimes committed during the Crusade
[2] This is all from OTL
[3] In OTL, thanks to Titus Oates and company, this spun out of control into the Popish Plot. Since he’s dead TTL, the occasional conspiracy gets popular, but nowhere near to the degree as his did.
[4] This has all been established already in previous posts.
[5] James was famously greedy in OTL.
[6] Being a film, the scene is inherently dramaticized, edited, and given a firm bias for the side supported by makers. In this case, it’s a biopic for James.
[7] This is based on a few references I’ve found to Lambert’s daughter marrying Charles Hatton secretly for a year before his father took away his money and the marriage eventually ended. TTL, this may or may not have happened, but likely Charles Lambert, if he even in Frances Lambert’s son, is not necessarily Hatton’s, merely looking to cause controversy to create a name for himself.
[8] If you couldn’t tell, Jacobite is a term for loyalist in TTL.
[9] In OTL terms this is essential liberalism
[10] In OTL he was arrested for the Popish Plot, and then his wife was nearly arrested for another Catholic conspiracy to kill the king that Oates popularized.