Henrietta Anne Stuart

Infobox British Royalty|royal
name = Henrietta Anne of England
title = Duchess of Orléans


imgw = 284
caption = Portrait by Pierre Mignard
spouse = Philippe de France, duc d'Orléans
issue = Marie Louise
Anne Marie
issue-link =
issue-pipe =
titles = The Duchess of Orléans
Henrietta Anne of England
Henrietta of England
royal house = House of Stuart
father = Charles I of England
mother = Henrietta Maria of France
date of birth = 16 June or 26 June 1644
place of birth = Bedford House, Exeter
date of death = Death date and age|1670|6|30|1644|6|16|df=yes
place of death = Château de Saint-Cloud, France|

Henrietta Anne of England, duchesse d'Orléans (born Henrietta 16 June (Old Style) 26 June (New Style) 1644 – 30 June 1670), in French "Henriette d'Angleterre", known familiarly as Minette, was the youngest daughter of King Charles I of England and Henrietta Maria of France. The Jacobite claims to the throne following the death of Henry Benedict Stuart descend from her.

After her marriage to "Monsieur", Philippe d'Orléans, brother of king Louis XIV, she became known as "Madame" at court.

Life

Henrietta was born at Bedford House, Exeter, at a time when the English Civil War was raging across the land. Two weeks after Henrietta's birth, her mother, the Queen, fled the country leaving her in the care of Lady Villiers. Henrietta Anne (the "Anne" was added after she was baptized into the Catholic Church) was not reunited with her mother until she was two years old. After her father, Charles I, was beheaded in 1649, and a republic was proclaimed in England, her mother brought her to France to live at the court of her nephew, King Louis XIV.

France

At the age of seventeen, Princess Henrietta married her first cousin, Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, who was the younger son of her maternal uncle Louis XIII and the only brother of Louis XIV. The wedding was held at the Palais Royal chapel in Paris on 31 March 1661. The marriage was unhappy, and her husband preferred the affections of his gentlemen, who vied with Henrietta for powerFact|date=September 2008.

Louis XIV was very close to his sister-in-law, and the two were possibly loversFact|date=June 2008. Louis' mourning of her after her tragic death was even greater than that of Philippe, her husband, lending credence to that theoryFact|date=June 2008. However, Philippe was extremely jealous of his wife, possibly abusive , and paraded a succession of male lovers before her .

Popular at court, much to Philippe's annoyance, Henriette was known as a pretty, good-natured girl who enjoyed flirting. She soon attracted the attention of her husband's older brother. In order to hide their attraction from the king's mother and wife, Henriette and Louis invented the story that he was constantly in Henriette's company in order to be close to one of her ladies-in-waiting, Louise de la Vallière. Only later did Henriette realize that the ruse had been so successful that Louis had indeed begun an affair with Louise [cite book | last = Hartmann | first = Cyril Hughes | title = The King, my brother | publisher = William Heinemann | year = 1954 | location =London | pages = | url = | id = [http://www.worldcatlibraries.org/oclc/2292261 OCLC: 2292261] [http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000GBX3JS ASIN: B000GBX3JS] ] .

Reluctantly and somewhat bitterly, Henriette stepped aside. Later, she seems to have taken one of her husband's earlier conquests, the comte de Guiche, as a lover [Barker, Nancy Nichols, "Brother to the Sun king: Philippe, Duke of Orléans", Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989.] . This caused all sorts of arguments at the Palais Royal, the Orléans residence in Paris.

Children

Despite the marital dissension between "Monsieur" and "Madame", several children were born of the union. Some believed at the time that the King was the real father of Henrietta's two daughtersFact|date=September 2008:
*Marie Louise d'Orléans (27 March 1662 – 12 February 1689)
**She was the first wife of Charles II of Spain.
*Philippe Charles, duc de Valois [http://nygaard.howards.net/files/4/4031.htm Title of "Valois"] , (July 16 1664 – 8 December 1666)
*A daughter born July 9 1665 ; died soon after.
*Anne Marie d'Orléans (27 August 1669 [http://nygaard.howards.net/files/4/4031.htm Date of birth] – 26 August 1728)
**First wife of Victor Amadeus II of Savoy, first King of Sardinia, whom she wed in 1684.
**ancestress of the Kings of Sardinia and Kings of Italy
**through her derives the post-Stuart legitimist claim of the Jacobites to the English and Scottish thrones.

Henriette had four miscarriages, in 1663, 1666, 1667, 1668. [ [http://www3.dcs.hull.ac.uk/cgi-bin/gedlkup/n=royal?royal00749 Royal Genealogy, Information on Stuart, Henrietta Anne] ]

By the time of the birth of Anne Marie, the couple was notorious for their constant arguing at court and at home in the Palais Royal. [ib. Barker, Nancy Nichols, "Brother to the Sun king: Philippe, Duke of Orléans".] Philippe now had a new lover, and many were aware of the great influence this man had over Philippe.

The Chevalier de Lorraine

The favorites of "Monsieur", invariably younger, handsome men, would dominate contemporary and historical commentary about his role at court, particularly with one man who shared his princely rank and much of his life:

Philip of Lorraine-Armagnac was three years younger than Philip of Orléans. Insinuating, brutal and devoid of scruple, he was the great love of the life of "Monsieur". He was also the worst enemy of the latter's two wives. As greedy as a vulture, this cadet of the French branch of the House of Lorraine had, by the end of the 1650s, hooked Monsieur like a harpooned whale. The young prince loved him with a passion that worried "Madame" Henrietta and the court bishop, Cosnac, but it was plain to the King that, thanks to the attractive face and sharp mind of the good-looking cavalier, he would have his way with his brother. [cite book| last = Van der Cruysse| first = Dirk| title = "Madame Palatine, princesse européenne"| publisher = Fayard| year = 1988| pages = page 165| language = French| id = ISBN 2213022003| quote= "Philippe de Lorraine-Armagnac était de trois ans le cadet de Philippe d'Orléans. Séduisant, brutal et dénué de scrupules, il fut le grand amour de la vie de Monsieur. Il fut aussi le pire ennemi des deux épouses de celui-ci... Rapace comme un vautour, ce cadet de la branche française de la maison de Lorraine avait mis dès la fin des années 1650 le grappin sur Monsieur comme on harponne une baleine. Le jeune prince l'aimait avec une fougue qui inquiétait Madame Henriette et Cosnac, mais qui fit comprendre au Roi que, grâce à la figure charmante et la tête bien organisée du joli chevalier, il aurait barre sur son frère.]

Under these circumstances, it is no surprise that "Monsieur's" first marriage was not a happy one. In January 1670, his wife prevailed upon the King to imprison the chevalier, first near Lyon, then in the Mediterranean island-fortress of the Château d'If, and finally he was banished to Rome. But by February "Monsieur's" protests and pleas persuaded the King to restore him to his brother's entourage.

Later life

Today, Henrietta is best known through her correspondence with her brother King Charles II of England, with whom she was very close. With her brother, she helped to negotiate the "Secret Treaty of Dover" (1670), which was an offensive and defensive alliance between England and France. She died at the Château de Saint-Cloud, near Paris on June 30, 1670, just two weeks after the treaty was signed. At the time of her death, it was widely believed that Henrietta-Anne had been poisoned by friends of her husband’s jealous lover and exiled favourite, the Chevalier de Lorraine. An autopsy was performed, however, and it was reported that Henrietta-Anne had died of peritonitis caused by a perforated ulcer. [Robinson, James, "The History of Gastric Surgery, chapter 20, page 239. "The History of Gastroenterology."] At her funeral, the well-known orator Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet conducted her eulogy, the famous "Oraison funèbre d'Henriette d'Angleterre".

*Her eldest daughter died without issue.
*Through her youngest daughter, Anne Marie, she is a direct ancestor of Louis XV and his descendants, the last Bourbon Kings of France before the reign of Louis Philippe, King of the French, a descendant of her husband and his second wife.

Gallery

Ancestors

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1= 1. Princess Henreitta-Anne of England
2= 2. Charles I of England
3= 3. Henrietta Maria of France
4= 4. James I of England
5= 5. Anne of Denmark
6= 6. Henry IV of France
7= 7. Marie de' Medici
8= 8. Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
9= 9. Mary I of Scotland
10= 10. Frederick II of Denmark
11= 11. Sofie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin
12= 12. Antoine of Navarre
13= 13. Jeanne III of Navarre
14= 14. Francesco I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
15= 15. Johanna of Austria
16= 16. Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox
17= 17. Margaret Douglas
18= 18. James V of Scotland
19= 19. Mary of Guise
20= 20. Christian III of Denmark
21= 21. Dorothea of Saxe-Lauenburg
22= 22. Ulrich III of Mecklenburg-Schwerin
23= 23. Elizabeth of Denmark
24= 24. Charles de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme
25= 25. Francoise d'Alencon
26= 26. Henry II of Navarre
27= 27. Marguerite de Navarre
28= 28. Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
29= 29. Eleonora di Toledo
30= 30. Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor
31= 31. Anna of Bohemia and Hungary

References

Titles

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succession box|title=duchesse d'Orléans | before= Marguerite de Lorraine | after= Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate| years=1661–1670