People & Places

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Our hero.  Though born in England, James was raised in France. On the death of his father in 1701, Prince James became King James in the eyes of the Jacobite faithful in Britain and abroad.  At the time, Queen Anne, his half-sister, wore the crown and it wasn't her death in 1714 and  the Hanover succession became a reality were his subjects willing to fight. Our story begins in 1715 with James on his way to join an uprising Scotland.  

Princess Clementina was only sixteen when she left Poland to marry King James. A pretty girl, pious yet often haughty, she wasn’t quite ready for marriage or life in an exiled court. 

She is only one of three women to have a memorial in St. Peter's Rome. 

Just look at that face.  It's not hard believe he had despotic tendencies.   He succeeded his more popular brother, Charles II, and reigned as a rigid Catholic in a staunchly Protestant realm.  But his subjects were disinclined to revolt as long as the succession passed through his daughters (Mary and Anne) from a previous marriage, both raised as Protestants.  Only when young James III appeared in 1688 and it looked as if a Catholic male heir might be next in line did Parliament take action.  They invited Mary's husband, William of Orange over from Holland to seize the throne in any way he saw fit.   Rather than face another Civil war, James II fled the country (abdicated, many said) and finished his life in France.    

More than anyone else, it was Mar who started the 1715 Uprising.  The small band he raised on his estate in Braemar soon became an army.  Too bad Mar was no great military commander.  An indecisive battle against the government forces in late 1715 produced the bleeding stalemate James III found upon his arrival a few months later.   Cunning and devious yet out of his depth, Mar became the most controversial Jacobite at the time. 

A suave and helpful man who is probably entirely invented to allow the passionate nature of James to flourish.

A prelate who did exist, and did house James on numerous occasions.  His character is much as presented in the book.