Prince Henry, Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn

Infobox British Royalty|royal
name =Prince Henry
title =Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn
spouse =Anne Horton
royal house =House of Hanover
titles ="HRH" The Duke of Cumberland
"HRH" Prince HenryHe is called simply "(His Royal Highness) Prince Henry" in the "London Gazette" [http://www.gazettes-online.co.uk/ViewPDF.aspx?pdf=10138 8 September 1761] ; [http://www.gazettes-online.co.uk/ViewPDF.aspx?pdf=10525 25 May] ; [http://www.gazettes-online.co.uk/ViewPDF.aspx?pdf=10587 28 December 1765] ; [http://www.gazettes-online.co.uk/ViewPDF.aspx?pdf=11205 14 December 1771] ]
full name = Henry Frederick
father =Frederick, Prince of Wales
mother =Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha
date of birth =birth date|1745|11|7|df=y
place of birth =Leicester House, London
date of christening =30 November 1745
place of christening =Leicester House, London
date of death =death date and age|1790|9|18|1745|11|7|df=y
place of death =London|

Prince Henry, Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn (Henry Frederick; 7 November 1745 – 18 September 1790) was the sixth child of Frederick, Prince of Wales and Augusta of Saxe-Gotha, and a younger brother of George III.

Early life

"HRH Prince Henry" was born on 7 November 1745, at Leicester House, London to Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of George II and Caroline of Ansbach, and his wife The Princess of Wales. He was christened at Leicester House twenty-three days later. [ [http://users.uniserve.com/~canyon/christenings.htm#Christenings Yvonne's Royalty Home Page: Royal Christenings] ]

Royal Dukedom

On 22 October 1766 [http://mypage.uniserve.ca/~canyon/peerage_titles.htm#Holders Yvonne's Royalty: Peerage] ] , just prior to his twenty-first birthday, the prince was created Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn and Earl of Dublin.

Allegations

On 4 March 1767 the Duke of Cumberland allegedly married Olive Wilmot (later Mrs Payne), a commoner, in a secret ceremony. There reportedly was one child, Olivia Wilmot (1772-1834) from this relationship, though the duke's parenthood was never proven. A landscape painter and novelist, Olivia Wilmot married John Thomas Serres, 1759-1825, and later, controversially, assumed the style of Princess Olivia of Cumberland.

Royal Navy

In 1768, at the fairly late age of 22, the Duke entered the Royal Navy as a midshipman and was sent to Corsica in HMS Venus. However, he returned in September when the ship was recalled following the French invasion of the Corsican Republic. He was promoted to Rear-Admiral the following year and Vice-Admiral in 1770. [The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography]

Marriage

The Duke's marriage to the commoner Anne Horton (or Houghton) (1743-1808) on 2 October 1771 caused a rift with the King, and was the catalyst for the Royal Marriages Act 1772, which forbids any descendant of George II to marry without the monarch's permission. There were no children from this marriage. Anne, though from a noble family - she was a daughter of the Viscount (later Earl of) Carhampton, and the widow of Christopher Horton of Catton Hall -- seems to have been rather loose with her favors, given one wag's comment that she was "the Duke of Grafton's Mrs Houghton, the Duke of Dorset's Mrs Houghton, everyone's Mrs Houghton."cite book
last = Walpole
first = Horace
authorlink = Horace Walpole
title = Memoirs and Portraits, 195]

The marriage between Anne Horton and Prince Henry Frederick, Duke of Cumberland, was described as a “conquest at Brighthelmstone” (now Brighton) by Mrs. Horton, the widow of one Christopher Horton of Calton Park, Derbyshire, "who", Horace Walpole says, "had for many months been dallying with his passion, till (sic) she had fixed him to more serious views than he had intended."cite book
last = Walpole
first = Horace
authorlink = Horace Walpole
title = Memoirs and Portraits, 244]

Later life

In 1775, the Duke of Cumberland established the Cumberland Fleet, which would later become the Royal Thames Yacht Club. He was promoted Admiral in 1778, though was forbidden from assuming any command [The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography] . The Duke was also instrumental in the development of Brighton (at the time called "Brighthelmstone") as a popular resort; he had first visited in 1771 and in 1783 the Prince of Wales visited his uncle there.The Duke of Cumberland died in London on 18 September 1790. His widow died in 1808.

Titles, styles, honours and arms

Titles

*7 November 1745–22 October 1766: "His Royal Highness" Prince Henry
*22 October 1766–18 December 1790: "His Royal Highness" The Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn

Arms

Henry was granted use of the arms of the kingdom, differenced by a "label argent of five points, the centre bearing a cross gules, the other points each bearing a fleur-de-lys azure". [ [http://www.heraldica.org/topics/britain/cadency.htm Marks of Cadency in the British Royal Family] ]

Ancestors

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1= 1. Prince Henry, Duke of Cumberland and Strathearn
2= 2. Frederick, Prince of Wales
3= 3. Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha
4= 4. George II of Great Britain
5= 5. Margravine Caroline of Brandenburg-Ansbach
6= 6. Frederick II, Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg
7= 7. Princess Magdalena Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst
8= 8. George I of Great Britain
9= 9. Sophia Dorothea of Celle
10= 10. John Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach
11= 11. Eleanor Erdmuthe Louise of Saxe-Eisenach
12= 12. Frederick I, Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg
13= 13. Magdalena Sibylle of Saxe-Weissenfels
14= 14. Charles of Anhalt-Zerbst
15= 15. Sophia of Saxe-Weissenfels
16= 16. Ernest Augustus, Elector of Hanover
17= 17. Sophia, Princess Palatine of the Rhine
18= 18. George William, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg
19= 19. Eleonore d'Esmier d'Olbreuse
20= 20. Albert, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach
21= 21. Sophia Margaret of Oettingen-Oettingen
22= 22. John George I, Duke of Saxe-Eisenach
23= 23. Johanetta of Sayn-Wittgenstein
24= 24. Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Gotha
25= 25. Princess Elisabeth Sophie of Saxe-Altenburg
26= 26. Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels
27= 27. Anna Maria of Mecklenburg-Schwerin
28= 28. John VI, Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst
29= 29. Sophie Augusta, Princess of Holstein-Gottorp
30= 30. Augustus, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels (= 26)
31= 31. Anna Maria of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (= 27)

References

* [http://ftp.cac.psu.edu/~saw/royal/r10.html#I337 Henry Churchyard "Royal Genealogies, Part 10"]
* [http://www.anusha.com/pafg733.htm#24060 Sam Sloan "Big Combined Family Trees (pafg733)"]

Citations

Nancy Parsons

It is, however, notable that the Mrs Houghton to whom Walpole refers may be Nancy (“Anne”) Parsons, the daughter of a Bond Street tailor, a noted prostitute of wit and beauty. According to Walpole, Nancy had been a figurante in the opera when she began supplementing her income by working as a highly-paid prostitute. Her youth and undeniable beauty (as attested by later portraits by Thomas Gainsborough and Joshua Reynolds) subsequently caught the attention of a member of the Haughton dynasty of West Indies slave merchants, who married her and took her to Jamaica. Upon his death she returned to London and resumed her profession.

Ironically, Nancy Parson’s beauty had outlived many of her aristocratic detractors. In addition to a grand-manner portrait by Reynolds, now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, a portrait of Nancy Parsons in Turkish masquerade dress, painted by George Willison in 1769, is held by the Yale Center for British Art in New Haven, Connecticut. Nor was she bereft of attention after she spurned the Duke’s platonic love. At the age of 40, Nancy Parsons turned to the very young and impressionable, 24-year old John Frederick Sackville, Duke of Dorset. In 1776 Parsons captivated and married another young aristocrat, Charles Maynard, second Viscount Maynard. In old age, it is said, Nancy devoted herself to pious good works.

External links

* [http://www.getty.edu/art/collections/objects/o545.html Portrait of the Duchess of Cumberland]