The story of the last Stuart: The man who would not be king

The last Stuart “king” was Henry Benedict Stuart, who died in this week of 1807, unmarried and certainly not with any legitimate children. That’s because at the age of 22, he became a Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and later a priest and bishop – they did things differently in those days – who apparently stuck to his vow of celibacy until his death at the age of 82.

It was Mary, Queen of Scots, who was responsible for changing the name of the royal house from Stewart to Stuart due to her years in France, and it’s a historical fact that from King Robert II in 1371 to Queen Anne in 1714, and even when Oliver Cromwell conquered the Scots in the 1650s, the Stewart/Stuarts were the monarchs of Scotland.

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Now the Jacobites among you will already be up in arms – what about James Francis Edward Stuart (1688-1766), or Charles Edward Louis John Casimir Sylvester Severino Maria Stuart (1720-1788) or Henry Benedict Thomas Edward Maria Clement Francis Xavier Stuart (1725-1807).

In Jacobite lore the first named was James VIII and III, but is better known as the Old Pretender, while Charles was of course the Bonnie Prince and Young Pretender, or Charles III, while Henry Benedict Stuart, Charles’s brother, was Henry I of Scotland and Henry IX of England. Henry was the last of his family and the last male who could lay direct claim to the thrones of England and Scotland.

It may distress some people who pine for Jacobitism, but when Henry died, the direct line of kings and queens descended from Robert II, and therefore any legitimate Stuart claim to the thrones, died with him. Yes, the two Queens, Mary II and Anne, were Stuarts, but the unarguable fact is that Mary and her husband William were usurpers, given the crowns of England and Scotland in 1689 because they were Protestants, and the rightful king, James VII and II, was a Roman Catholic who had a Catholic baby son, James Francis Edward.

A goodly number of those went on to vote for the Act of Union 18 years later. A parcel of rogues, indeed

It can be called the glorious or bloodless revolution, but the fact is that the removal of James VII and II from his thrones was an act largely of anti-Catholic sectarian bigotry and the UK remains an institutionally bigoted state to this day – no Catholic can ever sit on the throne. Oh, and that sectarianism is in the Act of Union, too, right at the top. Nor was it bloodless, because thousands died at the battles of Killiecrankie, Dunkeld and the Boyne, to name but three, which followed the usurpation of James’s throne.

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And just as a by-the-way, a goodly number of those who voted in the Scottish Parliament to give the crown of Scotland to William and Mary after the enforced exile of James VII went on to vote for the Act of Union 18 years later. A parcel of rogues, indeed. Henry Benedict Stuart realised early in life that he was not easily going to be King of Scotland, England and Ireland. He was born in 1725 in the Palazzo Muti in Rome to where his family had retreated from their exile in France following the death of James VII.

The Pope recognised James Francis Edward as James III, King of Scotland, England and Ireland after James VII and II died in 1701, as did King Louis XIV of France, but hardly anybody else did.

There have been allegations that he was gay but it’s more likely he was genuinely celibate

The failure of the risings in 1715 and 1745 meant that Henry would never gain the crowns – he tried to help his brother in 1745 but his French force could not cross to Scotland, and in any case he appears to have had a genuine vocation to enter Holy Orders. He declined all of the marriages arranged for him – there have been allegations that he was gay but it’s more likely he was genuinely celibate – and it helped that Pope Benedict XIV was a supporter of the Stuarts in exile and he consecrated Henry as Cardinal-deacon of Santa Maria in Campitelli in the summer of 1747. It was a rank rather than a priesthood, it should be stated. Though his father supported Henry, Charles disagreed with his decision to join the church as it was sure to damage any support the Stuarts could raise among Protestants.

Henry, who was said to be much more intelligent than Charles, followed through with his vocation and was ordained a priest in September 1748 and made Cardinal-priest a month later. It was a final break for him from any real chance of gaining a throne back in Britain, but it’s a fact that he never renounced his claim to the throne after Charles’s death in 1788, even though he knew full well that the laws of the UK would stop him gaining what was rightfully his.

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Becoming a cleric did not stop Henry accumulating considerable wealth from various sources, mostly lands and benefices from abbeys in France. He made a small fortune investing in Latin America, but lost almost all his wealth in the French Revolution of 1789. Something curious then happened – King George III organised for the Westminster Parliament to give Henry a pension of £5000. Guilt money or just a bribe to keep Henry from raising an army against him?

Henry made his home in Frascati, one of the Castelli hill towns south of Rome which is renowned for its delicious white wine.

He had to leave once when the French revolutionary army occupied Rome in 1798, fleeing to Naples where legend has it that he dined with Lord Nelson and Lady Hamilton.

Known to the Jacobites as the Cardinal Duke of York, Henry lived quietly in Frascati where he died on July 13, 1807. His will named Charles Emmanuel IV, King of Sardinia, as his heir and thus heir to the Stuart throne.

He signed the will Henry R. No descendant of Charles Emmanuel has ever claimed the Scottish throne, including Franz, Duke of Bavaria, who would be the current Stuart pretender.