A History of the Swedish Kings of Britain
123 by Sarthak Panta, on Flickr
"The Marriage of my sister to the King of Sweden is........troublesome." - Queen Anne of Britain
In 1710, Louisa Stuart was betrothed to King Charles XII of Sweden. An unusual acceptance by the Swedish King, but with himself in the Ottoman Empire with the Great Northern War looking lost, Charles XII was eager to secure the succession of the throne. In 1711 as a result, a perfect baby boy known as Karl to his parents was born in Constantinople to the new parents. Louisa who was eager to further the rights of her son and inadvertently, Sweden, most famously declared 'Britain is worth an Anglican Mass' and soon converted to Protestantism from her catholicism just a week after her son was born. This muddled affairs back in Great Britain. As the Swedish Couple and their new child left Constantinople under the auspices of Ahmed III back to Sweden, the British political scene was upended with the conversion of Louisa and the birth of her protestant son. In Britain, with the Spanish War of Succession winding down, the Whigs had collapsed in government and Queen Anne was allied with the Tories under Viscount Bolingbroke. Bolingbroke believed that the birth of a protestant heir so close in the line of succession was a godsend for Britain and asked Queen Anne and Parliament to intercept the Ottoman transport ships that were exiting the Mediterannean to transport the Swedish Royals to Gothenburg. The Whigs refused to allow the Act of the Settlement to be repealed or amended, and this precipitated a constitutional crisis known as the 1711-12 British Succession Crisis. The 1712 General Elections were called as a result, and the Whigs collapsed due to the succession crisis. The 1712 Amendment to the Succession formally amended the Act of the Settlement and formally designated the young Karl as heir to the British Throne.
This news broke to Karl XII when he and his family arrived in Gothenburg on May, 1712. Karl XII, was ecstatic about the chances of his son succeeding the British throne, and knew that the Hanoverians not standing to inherit would secure Swedish rule over Verden. He sent his wife, who was pregnant with his future daughter, and his son to Britain to be safeguarded against the Great Northern War's last phase. In 1713 Karl XII led the Swedish troops into battle once more, and defeated the Russians at the Battle of Vyborg and then pushed into Noteborg, or as the Russians called it - St. Petersburg. The defences of the city were light and most of the Russian troops were in occupied Livonia, and as a result, after a whirlwind assault on the city, St. Petersburg fell to the Swedes. This renewed Swedish offensive put the Russians on the backfoot, and though Karl XII was unable to advance further into Ingria, he managed to take the vital estuary of Noteborg, giving Sweden a much needed economic breather. In 1714, plans for continued war failed, when Queen Anne died. In London, Karl XII's son succeeded Anne as King Charles III of Britain, with Charles Lennox, the Duke of Richmond, and Lennox forming a regency council together with Bolingbroke. Bolingbroke, who was wary of inefficient governance in Britain with a minor at the helm, with authority from the Tory dominated Parliament created the official post of Prime Minister, which became the Head of the Government within Britain in 1714. Karl XII used the ascension of his son to the British throne to ask for British aid against the Anti-Swedish Coalition. Britain, which was tired after 14 years of war with Spain and France, disagreed and told Karl XII that no direct involvement would take place. The British did however begin to fund the Swedish campaigns, and volunteers from Britain were allowed to fight for the Swedes. The Royal Navy joined the Swedish Navy too bolstering Sweden's war effort. In 1715, the Swedish King defeated an army led by Peter I of Russia at the Second Battle of Narva and in the ensuing chaos, the Russian monarch was killed. With the Russian war effort, blunted, the Russians sued for status quo antebellum. Knowing the exhausted nature of his nation, Karl XII very reluctantly agreed, and Swedish rule over Ingria and the Baltic Provinces was restored as Russia exited the Great Northern War.
By 1720, the Poles had been defeated, and though Karl XII did not manage to put his candidate through the Polish Sejm, Poland-Lithuania was forced to cede Courland to the Swedes. In 1720, Karl XII then forced his attention to Denmark-Norway, and though he managed to occupy all the way to Christiania, during the Battle of Christiania he was killed in battle. In Stockholm, his sister Ulrika Eleonora created a regency council, and the young Karl, also known as Charles III of Britain ascended the Swedish throne as King Karl XIII of Sweden, thus starting nearly a century-long personal union between London and Stockholm. And thus, the geopolitical situation in Europe was changed forever.
EDIT: Edward VI is a typo in the wikibox
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