On 3 December, 1560 François II of France passed away after suffering from a severe inner-ear infection which struck him suddenly following a hunting trip; although, it was rumored that Protestants had poisoned the young king’s wine so that his death would appear to be simply the ill-health that had plagued him most all his life. His grieving widow, the young queen of Scots emerged from the king’s bed-chamber, after remaining unwaveringly by his side and watching him suffer for nearly a week, to announce to her uncles and mother-in-law that she was no longer queen of France before collapsing into the arms of the four Maries from grief. Only five months before she had taken the blow that was the death of her beloved mother, Marie de Guise, and now she had lost her darling François, who had been her beloved most beloved friend and trusted confidant since she was a child of five arriving in a foreign land promised to be its future queen. She walked in procession, garbed in only white, Le Deuil Blanc, as was the tradition of queens of France in mourning, following behind her brother-in-law Charles IX, the new king as they lay “François II, King of France and King Consort of Scots” to rest in the Valois crypt.
Now a dowager queen, and queen regnant with a country that was rapidly turning becoming Protestant more and more with the passage of each day, her position was rather precarious; however, given her youth, wealth, and famed beauty she was one of, if not the most eligible bachelorette on the market, many would argue she surpassed even her cousin the English queen Elizabeth I in this respect. After her forty days of confinement, to assure she was not carrying the child of her late-husband, who would automatically unseat its uncle Charles, granted it were a man-child, Mary emerged barren. The sour-faced Queen Mother wasted no time in requesting Mary return the crown jewels, save for those gifted to her by François, and made it abundantly clear there would be no future hope for marriage to Charles. Catherine de’Mecici was now Queen-Regent and would not once-again be forced to submit to Mary’s Guise uncles in controlling France. This was, however, the match Mary herself would have preferred, but her attempts to secure the match were thwarted by Catherine.
Potential suitors came from near and wide, most of which brought about by the suggestion of the Duc de Guise and the Cardinal de Lorraine. There was Don Carlos, son of King Phillip II and his first wife Maria Mañuela, but Phillip was hesitant to accept the idea, given his current wife, Elisabeth de Valois, was the sister of the late François II. Another offer came, one which had also pursued Mary’s cousin and greatest rival Elizabeth of England, the young Charles Hapsburg, Archduke of Inner-Austria, son of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand I. Reports said Charles’s brother, who was next-in-line to be Emperor, looked less favorably upon the match, preferring Elizabeth as England was a more powerful and valuable conquest than Scotland. Although Mary was not objective to the proposal, she took up correspondence with the Archduke, asking that he allow her a year to mourn her late husband before she said yes or no to his offer. Doing so, she planned to return to Scotland that following August of 1561, and did so strategically showing herself to her people as the highest power in the land upon her homecoming, not simply in the shadow of whatever man she chose to call husband.
The two continued correspondence as Mary began to settle into her new old-home, learning how to maneuver and control the Scots Lairds, who mistrusted her because of her being a papist. Charles cautioned Mary to rally the support of the more powerful and wealthy Catholic lairds before bending to the will of the Protestants, who were ironically led by her half-brother James Stewart, the oldest of her father James V’s nine acknowledged bastards, and by his favorite mistress, the Lady Margaret Erskine. Mary’s mother, Marie de Guise, had opted to allow Mary’s bastard siblings to grow up in the safety of royal court around the young queen before her departure to France, to allow her a “family” instead of doing-away with them for the potential threats many of the Pro-French lords warned her they could be. James had turned his coat to Protestantism under the guidance of John Knox, who fiercely opposed his sister’s right to reign over a nation, given her sex; although, James did not share this belief, given he found his sister’s sex as the opportunity to control Scotland more easily than through a brother. Thus, he cautioned Knox not to speak openly against Mary’s sex, so the minister targeted the queen’s faith, a more popular move with Elizabeth just south of the border who had a general loathing for men who spoke against a woman’s right to rule. Nevertheless, Mary soon showed she was much more cunning than either James, Elizabeth, or even John Knox had expected.
Mary refused to declare Protestantism to be the official religion of Scotland, and she heeded the advice of Charles and her uncles in aligning herself with major Catholic families rather than appeasing the Calvinists. Though a large portion of the Lowland lairds were supporters of the new faith, many of highlanders were more stubborn and not so easily swayed by the words of Martin Luther or John Calvin, remaining deeply entrenched in the Auld Faith of the Holy Mother Church in Rome. Mary took counsel from her personal secretary David Ricccio, who she often used to translate documents for her; however, due to his general lack of popularity, he was never admitted to her private chambers or seen without there also being a fellow Scots Laird present to prevent say that the country was controlled entirely by the presence of outsiders.
At this point Elizabeth certainly felt threatened by the growing power of the Catholic Church in Scotland, and many of Mary’s Protestant Lairds sought her help in ousting the Catholics before they grew too strong. These lairds pressed Mary to wed a supporter of the Protestant faith, but were outraged when Holyrood Palace announced that the queen was to wed Charles II, Archduke of Inner-Austria, which she did by proxy in her private chapel on 12 May 1562, with an agreement reached between Mary and Charles’s father Ferdinand I, HRE. This allowed Charles to travel using the title “King of Scots,” making any attempt on his life an act of treason, punishable by death. In their agreement, Mary and Charles would agree not to lay claim to England while Elizabeth lived, as the Hapsburg Empire benefited from her reign, and did not care to enter into open war with England unless it was from a direct attach led by the English on Scotland or the Scottish Monarchy.
Charles arrived at the port of Leith on 24 July 1562, and was greeted by much pomp and ceremony, contrary to Mary’s own return the previous year. He had arrived with several ships carrying gifts, troops, and Hapsburg gold to ensure that his presence there was well-supported and comfortable. Much to Mary’s pleasure, Charles was an extremely handsome and “long” man, towering over the queen at a height of 6’5,” who typically towered over all the men at Scottish court with her own height of 5’11.” The two were wed at the Cathedral at Edinburgh Castle on 30 July 1562, and Charles was crowned three days later; although, he was not granted the crown-matrimonial, but he voiced no objection and never pressed the issue. Communication between the couple was in French or Spanish, given Charles couldn’t speak Scots and Mary couldn’t speak German; furthermore, interpreters were used to communicate officially between Charles and the Scots Lairds that couldn’t speak French, Spanish, or Latin and for all matters to do with parliament which took place in Scots.
Elizabeth was unnerved at the match between Mary and an imperial foreigner, one who had not long ago traveled to England to discuss marriage with herself, and found little relief in Mary’s agreeing not to pursue the English throne so long as Elizabeth reigned. Not to mention, Charles had been considerably successful in driving out Protestants in his own realm by way of Jesuit reform of the Roman Church. Much to her dismay, he had taken it upon himself to bring in Jesuit priests to further the same reform in Scotland, which had begun to soften in respect to conversion to Catholicism under Mary’s recent pushing for the church to partake in charitable works and the spread of alms among the poor. The priests were appointed to high positions in the Church, replacing those who had fallen against those who rebelled against Mary’s mother, Marie de Guise, and soon found favor in the eyes of many Scots. Holyrood Cathedral was also rebuilt, to act as a symbol for all to see. All this served only to further agitate the “Lords of the Congregation,” who lead an uprising against Charles, accusing him of treason and misleading their sovereign into turning against her subjects. Several skirmishes took place between December and February 1563, but were soon stomped out by the combined forces of those loyal to Mary and her husband’s own military forces.
The Lords of the congregation were rounded up, among them Mary’s own half-brother James Stewart, Earl of Moray and the Reverend John Knox. These men were placed on trial and stripped of all their titles and holdings, which would go to either Catholic family members or those who fought alongside the royalist supporters in battle. Many of the men were sentenced to death by beheading; although, Mary could not bring herself to execute her own brother, so James was condemned to exile. Knox, however, was to be made an example of, and was burned at the stake in Edinburgh on the Royal Mile. On 18 February, the heavily pregnant Mary and her husband issued the Edict of Stirling, where the queen had been taken to weather the rebellion in safety and under heavy guard, outlawing the practice of Protestantism in Scotland and declaring the Catholic faith the official religion of Scotland. Anyone who wished to continue the practice of their faith would be granted a year to leave Scotland, Elizabeth offered to arrange safe-passage for these people to the colonies in the New Land. Approximately 3,500 Scots were unwilling to convert and fled from Scotland into England or to the New World.
Due to Scotland now having a largely female population, lacking in men, Charles commissioned several thousand young men from his own realm to travel to Scotland to help rebuild a land that had been ravaged under several hundred years of war, granted they would be willing to stay and marry local women, or bring their own families to grow the populace. Many of the young men were prisoners convicted of minor offenses who were being offered a second chance with the threat of serious reprimand should they repeat their previous transgressions, or men who needed work and a fresh start.
Early into the evening of 14 March 1563 Mary began to feel the pains of labor, which lasted into the early hours of the following morning, and on the Ides of March she gave birth to a son which she called “Charles James,” for his father and maternal-grandfather. He was christened in the newly-rebuilt Cathedral of Holyrood. Parliament did however demand that the surname of any male royal offspring produced retain the ‘Stuart’ surname in place of ‘Hapsburg,’ while females would be ‘Stuart-Hapsburg’.
· Prince Charles James Stuart, Duke of Rothesay and Archduke of Austria (later “James VI”); Born: 15 March 1563
- Married Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, daughter of Philip II and Elisabeth de Valois
· Prince Robert Maximillian Stuart, Duke of Albany and Archduke of Austria; Born: 24 September 1565 (identical-twin of Alexander)
· Prince Alexander James Stuart, Duke of Orkney and Archduke of Austria (identical-twin of Robert) Born: 24 September 1565
· Princess Margaret Stuart-Hapsburg of Scotland, The Princess Royal and Archduchess of Austria; Born: 10 November 1567
· Princess Elisabeth Stuart-Habsburg of Scotland, Archduchess of Austria; Born/Died: 11 October 1568 (Stillborn)
· Princess Mary Stuart-Hapsburg of Scotland, Archduchess of Austria; Born: 17 September 1569
· Prince Edward James Stuart, Earl of Inverness and Archduke of Austria Born: 14 April 1575