Donald E. Wilkes, Jr. Collection: Queen Anne (1665-1714) [1]

Anne Stuart was born at St. James’s Palace, London, on 6 February 1665.[2]  Her father was James Duke of York, later King James II, her mother Anne Hyde.  James’s brother, Charles II, was the reigning king at the time.  James and Charles II were both sons of Charles I.[3]  Anne Hyde was the daughter of Edward Hyde, First Earl of Clarendon.[4]  The marriage of Anne Stuart’s parents was considered an embarrassment to the royal household, him being “a royal personage”, she the “daughter of a respectable but undistinguished country family” and already pregnant.[5]  Anne was one of eight children born to the marriage, but only she and her elder sister Mary survived to adulthood.[6]  Mary was born three years before Anne on 30 April 1662 in St. James’s Palace.[7]  As a baby, Anne was christened in the rites of the Church of England.[8]  Anne was a “delicate” child.[9]  She suffered from “defluxion” of the eyes, a condition where they watered and watered.[10]  A few months after her third birthday Lady Anne was sent to see a French eye specialist.  In Paris, she stayed with Charles I’s widow, Henrietta Maria, and after her death she stayed with Anne’s aunt, Henrietta Anne, Duchess of Orleans, who died in June 1670. [11]

 Lady Anne returned to England in 1670.  The five year old’s eyes were not cured, but they were much better.[12]  Anne’s eyesight was an issue she dealt with the rest of her life.[13] Nine months after her return Anne’s mother died on 31 March 1671.[14]  This series of deaths “undoubtedly” shaped Anne’s character, “reinforcing the princess’s natural reserve and self-protectiveness; conversely, the removal of all maternal figures undoubtedly inspired her search for authority, whether in friends or in institutions.”[15] Upon her death, the Duchess of York received the last rites of the Roman Catholic Church.  Anne’s father James had already converted to the Catholic Church.[16]  His second marriage to the Catholic Maria Beatrice d’Este, known as Mary of Modena, had been arranged with the help of Louis XIV of France, and proved so unpopular in England that Charles II had to dissuade Parliament from making “addresses against its consummation.”[17]  In contrast, young Anne’s letters show no “antipathy” towards her stepmother, though not much if any affection either.[18]

Anne and Mary grew up surrounded by women, there being six young sisters in the Villiers household where they spent a great deal of their time.  Anne’s education focused on domestic skills to the exclusion of almost all more scholarly endeavors.[19]  The central aspect of Anne’s education was religion.  While James would have undoubtedly have liked his children raised Catholic, Charles II saw the political necessity of raising his two nieces in the Church of England.[20]  Charles II chose Lady Frances Villiers, a “reliable Protestant” to be governess to his nieces.[21]  This proved to be a good move for Charles II as anti-Catholic sentiments strengthened in England.[22]  By the 1670’s Catholicism was the “predominant prejudice of all classes,” a hatred that was political and patriotic, not necessarily religious.[23] 

In July 1675 Henry Compton, then Bishop of Oxford, was appointed Dean of the Chapel Royal and Preceptor to Mary and Anne. Nothing in Anne’s rearing was more important than her religion.  Her devotion to the Church of England stood unwavering throughout her life, including during her twelve-year reign as Queen.[24]  By December 1675 Compton was Bishop of London.  Bishop Compton was the leading influence that guided Anne towards her strong faith in the Anglican Church.[25]  When he determined it was time to have Mary and Anne confirmed Bishop Compton approached James.  James was predicatively unhappy and stated it was against his wishes, but then referred Compton to the King, who ordered that Mary and Anne be confirmed.[26]   The date of Anne’s first Communion is uncertain due to varying accounts, but most likely took place in 1678.[27]  Bishop “Compton provided the spiritual justification for an anti-Catholic bias which, in Lady Anne, remained crude and basic throughout her life.”[28]  In a letter to her sister written in 1686, at a time when Anne felt persecuted for her own religious beliefs, Anne said “God be thanked we were not bred up on that communion, but are of a Church that is pious and sincere, and conformable in all its principles to the Scriptures…the Church of England is, without all doubt, the only true Church.”[29]

Anne’s sister Mary married William Henry, Prince of Orange, her first cousin, 4 November 1677 in Mary’s bedroom at St. James’s Palace.[30]  A month later the couple set out for Holland where they set up residence at The Hague.  James had not wanted Mary wed a Protestant husband, and it further disturbed him that their marriage aligned England with the Dutch , a move that was obviously anti-French (since the republic and Louis XIV were still at war).  However, James was forced to again accept his brother’s wishes for his daughters.[31]  Around the time of their wedding Anne contracted smallpox and was quarantined.  Lady Villiers, the governess, contracted the disease and died shortly thereafter.  Anne felt better by December 3 and visited the Duchess of York.  However, she was still contagious and she passed smallpox on to her infant half-brother, Charles Duke of Cambridge, who died 11 days later.[32]

Lady Anne and her sister kept regular correspondence.  Anne visited Mary at The Hague in 1678, accompanied by her stepmother the Duchess among others. When they returned to London they found that Titus Oates “had altered the entire English political scene and had initiated ten years of terror which were profoundly to affect England’s destiny and the Lady Anne’s life.”[33]  Oates published an anti-Catholic pamphlet describing the fictitious “Popish Plot,” which he said was a conspiracy to murder Charles II to make way for James to invade England with French and Irish armies to force out Protestantism.  This led to a series of events that heightened the English people’s fears about James reigning over them someday as a Catholic king. 

Amid the chaos, Charles II decided to get James out of England for a while and sent the Duke and Duchess of York to the Spanish Netherlands.[34]  Anne and her stepsister Isabella were left behind in England under order of the King.  This separation from her parents at fourteen years of age “is crucial to explaining Lady Anne’s future relations with her close relatives.  She could  hardly have been unaware of the reasons for James’s forced departure…the separation…reinforced the lessons of her youth: the paramount duty of a princess was to follow the interests of the state, and the defence [sic] of the Protestant religion might require great personal sacrifices.”[35]  In early August 1679 Charles agreed to appease James and he allowed Lady Anne to visit her father in Brussels.  If James hoped for some reconciliation with Anne over their religious beliefs, the these two months there were instead enough to affirm her “strong prejudices against popery.”[36]  She stated in a letter to Frances Apsley, her first female confidant, “the more I heare of that Religion, the more I dislike it.”[37]

The Duke and Duchess of York traveled in and out of England several more times under the orders of Charles II.[38]  Lady Anne visited them in Scotland, and while she later referred to the Scots as “a strange people,” her visit there very likely contributed to her support as Queen of uniting England and Scotland.[39]  The Yorks returned to England in May 1682, following the Tory reaction against the Popish Plot favoring the Duke of York.  Anne was rumored several times to have been married off, and upon this return to England Anne was entangled in gossip concerning a potential suitor, Lord Mulgrave.  This affair “marked the flowering of the friendship between Lady Anne and Sarah Jenyns [Jennings], a friendship which influenced the destiny of Europe.”[40]  It is said that Anne first met Sarah Jennings (later Sarah Churchill) when Anne was 5 years old and Sarah was 10.[41]  Sarah’s accounts of their close early friendship are likely inaccurate due to the age difference between the girls and their likely separate interests caused by that gap.[42] 

Early in 1683 secret negotiations began to marry Lady Anne and Prince George of Denmark.  James liked the idea of bringing in another Protestant prince to diminish the Price of Orange’s influence in British politics.  They were married on 28 July (St. Anne’s day) at the Chapel Royal of St. James’s Palace by Bishop Compton.  While Charles II famously said of George’s personality, “I have tried him drunk and I have tried him sober and there is nothing in him,” Anne was devoted to her husband throughout her life, due to the fact that “she was the undisputed head of the household.” [43]  Anne was then able to establish her own household and appointed Sarah Churchill as one of her ladies of the bedchamber over of the objections of her father.  Anne and George established a group of friends known as “the Cockpit circle,” a name derived from the name of the apartments of Whitehall Palace given to Anne by Charles II.  James did not hesitate to interfere with Anne’s selection of the ladies of her household, and it is apparent that she resented her father’s attempts to intrude.[44]  Anne’s marriage resulted in many failed attempts to produce heirs to the throne. If there were to be Stuart heirs, they would likely result from Anne’s marriage because her sister’s marriage appeared barren at this time.[45]   Anne underwent seventeen pregnancies in seventeen years, not including at least one hysterical pregnancy, and eventually carried eighteen children.  Only five of those children were born alive and none lived beyond the age of eleven.[46]

Anne’s father became King on 6 February 1685 upon the death of Charles II, making Anne the highest-raking royal Protestant residing in England.  Anne attended daily services in the Chapel Royal at Whitehall and heard many anti-Catholic sermons from the popular Anglican preachers around London.  Anne and her husband, as well as the Churchills, became increasingly alarmed at James’ pro-Catholic conduct, which signaled to all of them an intent on James’ part to bring Catholicism back as the national religion of England.    While it was rumored that James repeatedly attempted to convert Anne to his religion, James actually chose to broach the subject “slowly and indirectly.”[47]  When papers were found written by Charles II and Anne Hyde explaining their conversions to Catholicism, James personally gave a copy of the letters to the Princess.  However, Anne was not impressed by James’ efforts and said in a letter to Mary that she hoped the publication of the letters would have as little an influence on others in England as it had on her personally.[48]

Princess Anne gave birth to a daughter, Mary, on 1 June 1685 and another daughter, Anne Sophia, on 12 May 1686.  Tensions grew between Anne and her father when he refused to allow her a visit with the Princess of Orange following the deaths of both of Anne’s infant girls to smallpox in 1687. Anne wanted to visit Mary at The Hague while her husband, Prince George, visited Denmark.  Anne thought the decision not to allow her to travel to Holland was influenced by Catholic politicians and thereafter avoided Whitehall and her father as much as possible.[49]  Anne often spent time in homes away from central London claiming illness in her family and/or her pregnancy as a reason. 

James gained a breakthrough in his attempt to extend civil liberties to Catholics in July 1686 in the “collusive case” of Godden v. Hales, which held that the King had the power to dispense with the law in individual cases.  The King wished to do away with the Test Act which precluded Roman Catholics from holding public office.  In a letter to Mary Anne said, “I am very sorry the King encourages the Papists so much; and I think it is very much to be feared that the desire the King has to take off the Test, and all other laws against them, is only a pretence to brining in Popery.”[50]  When the King issued his first Declaration of Indulgence in April 1687, which suspended penal laws against Catholics and Protestant dissenters despite current statutory laws against toleration, Anne was closely watched.  She attended Anglican Church services, sometimes incognito, though never fooling anyone,   but still preserving an excuse if her father had questioned her on it.

From late February to the end of May 1687 Anne engaged in correspondence with Mary and William which she herself said could be deemed treasonous. Anne wrote of her lack of communication with her father, mother in law, and Lord and Lady Sunderland.  The letters were sent via special messenger between the Cockpit and The Hague because regular post could not be trusted. The only strife between the sisters at this time was over Mary’s concerns with Sarah Churchill’s influence over Anne.  Princess Anne defended their friendship, saying that Sarah had a great understanding of religious matters.[51]  James had his own concerns about the Churchills, believing that William had bribed Lady Churchill.  James was also beginning to worry about the close correspondence between his daughters, as he realized their bond was over their opposition to his policies.[52] 

On 22 October 1687 Anne suffered her third miscarriage.  At the same time rumors circulated that the Queen was pregnant.  Anne was confronted with the possibility that if the Queen delivered a son she would lose her current place in the succession.[53]  Princess Anne “was the major perpetrator, and perhaps the originator” of the rumor that the Queen’s pregnancy was false.  She stated in a letter to her sister, “I believe when she [the queen] is brought to bed, nobody will be convinced it is her child, except it prove to be a daughter.  For my part, I declare I shall not, except I see the child and she parted.”[54]  There are two contradictory accounts of Princess Anne’s behavior during the Queen’s pregnancy.  In her letters to Mary, Anne claimed that her stepmother refused to let Anne touch her or see her undressed.  However, when the Earl of Clarendon pressed the issue later Anne admitted that the queen had never allowed such things even during other obviously valid pregnancies.  James II claimed in his own Memoirs that Anne did touch the Queen’s belly and felt the baby move.  This story seems more likely given that when James summoned Anne to testify as to the validity of the birth at a special meeting of the Privy Council devoted to the issue, she declined to attend, citing her poor health.[55]

On 16 April 1688 Anne suffered yet another miscarriage and did not recover well physically for the first time.  She used her illness as an excuse to leave London as soon as possible.[56]  It seemed a strange time for the Princess to leave London, but Anne had nothing to gain from staying to witness the birth of her half brother.[57] She left for Bath on 12 May.  On 10 June the Queen gave birth to James Francis Edward[58], later known as the Old Pretender.  Most Protestants avoided witnessing the birth. The Protestant population of England was convinced that the baby had been smuggled into his mother’s bed in a warming pan used for hot coals.  Upon the return of the Prince and Princess of Denmark to London it was apparent that Anne did not accept the validity of the birth, a belief she held onto both publicly and privately for the rest of her life.[59] 

During this time James’ policies were becoming more intolerable to the Protestants of England.  He commanded that in May and June 1688 his second Declaration of Indulgence be read by all of the Bishops in England during their worship services.  A group of men who came to be called the Seven Bishops refused to read it aloud and were sent to the Tower,[60] although they were soon released after a trial that James unsuccessfully attempted to influence.

The Prince and Princess of Denmark remained in London for a month after their return from Bath.  By the time they left the city they undoubtedly had learned of the plot created by the “Immortal Seven,” a group of men (Bishop Compton one of them) who agreed to invite William of Orange to intervene in English affairs and set up a free Parliament, even if force was necessary to do so.[61]   In her book written years later Sarah Churchill claimed that the actions she and Anne took during the revolution were quick and unexpected, but “it is clear that the Churchills, and with them the princess, were resolved to join the prince of Orange at least three months before he actually invaded England.”[62] 

When Anne’s husband was warned of an impending Dutch invasion led by William he agreed to go with the king as an uncommissioned volunteer but would not accept a formal position with the king. William of Orange landed at Torbay on 5 November 1688.  Twelve days later King James and Prince George left for Salisbury, where they though they would encounter William’s army. Anne wrote to William the day after her husband left with her father, wishing him “success in this so just an undertaking.”[63]  The King’s party reached Salisbury on 19 November.  Five days later Prince George followed Lord Churchill in deserting to William’s camp.  At that point both Prince George and Churchill thought their wives would have left London, but in fact the women were still in Whitehall.  James ordered Sarah Churchill be put under house arrest, but she escaped London before the orders arrived.  Sarah and Lady Anne fled London in the middle of the night, dressed in nightgowns and slippers.[64]  They headed North accompanied by Bishop Compton and another man, and arrived in Nottingham on 1 December.[65] 

James arrived in London the evening after Anne’s escape.  He was “shaken to the core of his being by the desertion of his younger daughter.”[66]  James exclaimed, “God help me!  My own children have forsaken me!”[67]  He was convinced it was Lord Churchill’s fault that Prince George had abandoned him and now he was convinced that the Churchills were also responsible for Anne’s “corruption.”[68]  Anne’s flight from England was critical to the revolution, “from that moment [when James discovered Anne’s absence from London], while publicly negotiating with William of Orange, James II privately intended to send the queen and the Prince of Wales [his young son] to safety in France and to follow them as soon as possible.”[69] 

James made one unsuccessful attempt to flee London, but he accomplished his goal and escaped on the second try.  Anne was reunited with her husband at Oxford on 15 December and they returned to London four days later – the day after James II’s final departure from the city.  Anne wore orange after her return to show her political support for William.  A Convention was called to determine the state of the throne.  They determined that James II had abdicated the crown by fleeing to France and that William and Mary should reign as joint sovereigns.  The succession went first to any of their children, then to Anne and her children, and finally to any children of William by a possible second marriage.  William privately expressed resentment that Princess Anne held a stronger hereditary claim to the English throne than he had.

Anne tried for a time to gather a group which would support her claim to succession directly following Mary.  The Churchills advised against this course of action because they realized in the end William would succeed.  Anne then decided to dedicate herself to making the current arrangement work.  She attended William and Mary’s coronation ceremony on 11 April.  However, tensions again arose between Anne and the King and Queen over her pension.  Anne campaigned in the House of Commons to increase her annual pension.  She had requested 70,000 pounds annually and was granted 50,000 pounds. Despite the decrease in the amount granted, it was still a major victory for Anne and a humiliating defeat for William and Mary.  The dispute also made the tensions between Anne and the King and Queen very public.[70]

In late 1691 Anne and her principal advisors, John Churchill, now Duke of Marlborough and Gadolphin, began using a political tactic they continued throughout their careers.  At the same time that they were doing everything possible to prevent a Jacobite restoration they held out hopes to his supporters that Anne secretly wanted the Prince of Wales restored to power.  Anne wrote a letter to James II in December 1691 expressing regret for her actions and asking for forgiveness, but he continued to distrust the princess and prince.[71]

On 28 December 1694 Queen Mary died of smallpox.  William’s advisors saw the risk of allowing the rift between the King and Anne to continue.  William wrote a letter extending his sympathies to her and soon gave her most of Mary’s jewelry.[72]  However, their reconciliation ultimately proved disingenuous because of William’s underlying jealousy of Anne’s hereditary right of succession.

Anne’s physical health continued to decline, due in part to a false pregnancy in early 1695.  She had rheumatism and by the end of the decade she was unable to walk for any distance without help.  Politically, she continued her tactic of making promises to the Jacobite court, while at the same time supporting the Hanovarian succession that was established by the Act of Settlement of 1701.  In fact, she felt strongly that she did not want a Hanoverian heir living in England during her own lifetime because she did not want to run the risk of having a rival court.[73]  Anne was mourning the death of her 11 year old son, William, Duke of Gloucester, who died of smallpox on 30 July 1700, during the developments that eventually led to the War of the Spanish Succession.  She was not involved at all in the events that led up to the war that would be a major part of her reign as Queen.[74]

On 21 February 1702 King William III was thrown from his horse, breaking his collarbone.  He died on 8 March 1702.  Anne’s accession to the throne was uncontroversial.  Her politics throughout her reign were based on moderation.  This angered some Tories, and would lead to her estrangement from Sarah Churchill.  The Duchess of Marlborough became extreme in her Whigism and continually tried to convince Queen Anne that all tories were secretly Jacobites.  Anne refused to be swayed by Sarah and their friendship dwindled.[75]

Queen Anne’s early reign was focused on political issues involving Parliamentary appointments and bishoprics.  She reached the resolution of a major war during her reign and united two England and Scotland through the Act of Union of 1707.  Her reign was the transition in time between the violence of the 17^th century and the “stability and prosperity” of the 18^th century.[76]  Queen Anne died at Kensington Palace on 1 August 1714.  She died intestate; her fear of death was so strong that she never signed her will. 

The Queen’s reputation as being a weak woman who made political decisions based on her personal relationships was “largely propagated by the Duchess of Marlborough.”[77]  In fact, Anne was her own woman who though highly of her own personal opinions.  She was driven by and dedicated to her religion.  As queen, Anne realized the importance of moderation. She was a constitutional monarch and saw the error in challenging the preeminence of parliamentary or statutory law.  Her moderation caused some political instability in England, but for the most part Anne determined the course of government during her reign. She oversaw the union of two kingdoms. Anne was the last of the Stuarts to reign and she “succeeded in overcoming the demands of being a woman on the throne, together with protracted ill health, to impose her views on the great men of the day, to preserve the protestant constitution, and to provide a real sense of ease for her country and friends.”[78]

Bibliography

David Green, Queen Anne 17 Collins 1970.

Edward Gregg, Anne (1665-1714) queen of Great Britain and Ireland, in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, unpaginated (2004).

Edward Gregg, Queen Anne 1-2 Routledge & Kegan Paul 1980.

W.A. Speck, Queen Mary II, in Oxford Dictionary of National Biographies, unpaginated (2004).

Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, Ch IX 434 England (1848) American Reprint (1879).

Wikipedia, Queen Anne Photograph, available at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Queen_Anne.jpg