Lucy Walter had almost as bad a reputation as the prince himself, and it is not at all certain that Charles was the natural father of James. There were rumours that Charles and Lucy did marry, secretly, which would have made James the true and legitimate heir to the throne. Whatever the truth, Charles recognised James as his son, but did not make him his heir. After succeeding to the throne, Charles married the Portuguese princess,
Catherine of Braganza; by this time Lucy Walter was dead.
In
1663, at the age of 14, shortly after having been brought to England, James was created Duke of
Monmouth with the subsidiary titles of
Earl of Doncaster and
Baron Scott of Tynedale, all three in the
Peerage of England, and married off to the wealthy
Anne Scott, 4th Countess of Buccleuch. The day after his marriage, they were made
Duke and Duchess of Buccleuch. Although he showed no aptitude for government, James was popular, particularly since he was a
Protestant, whereas the official heir to the throne, the brother of Charles II,
James, Duke of York, was a
Catholic.
In
1665, at the age of 16, Monmouth served in the English fleet under his uncle the Duke of York in the
Second Anglo-Dutch War. Later in the war, he returned to England to assume his first military command as commander of a troop of cavalry. In
1669 he was made colonel of the King's Life Guards, one of the most senior appointments in the army. When the Captain General of the army,
George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle, died in
1670, Monmouth became the senior officer in the army at the age of 21. At the outbreak of the
Third Anglo-Dutch War in
1672, a brigade of 6,000 British troops was sent to serve as part of the French army (in return for money paid to King Charles), with Monmouth as its commander. In the campaign of
1673 and in particular at the
Siege of Maastricht, Monmouth gained a considerable reputation as one of Britain's finest soldiers.
In
1678 Monmouth was commander of the Anglo-Dutch brigade, now fighting for the
United Provinces against the French. He distinguished himself at the
battle of St Denis, further increasing his reputation. The following year, after his return to Britain, he commanded the small army raised to put down the rebellion of the
Scottish Covenanters. Despite being heavily outnumbered, he decisively defeated the (admittedly poorly equipped) Covenanter rebels at the
Battle of Bothwell Bridge on
June 22 1679. By this time it was becoming apparent that Charles II would have no legitimate heir, and Monmouth was regarded by many as preferable to the Duke of York.
Following the discovery of the so-called
Rye House Plot in
1683, Monmouth was obliged to go into exile in the Dutch
United Provinces. On his father's death Monmouth led the "
Monmouth Rebellion", an attempt to take the throne from his uncle. He declared himself King on
June 20, 1685 at
Taunton. On
July 6, 1685 the two armies met at the
Battle of Sedgemoor, the second last to be fought on
English soil. Monmouth's makeshift force could not compete with the regular army, and was soundly defeated. Monmouth himself was captured and arrested in Dorset. Following this,
Parliament passed an
Act of Attainder, 1 Ja. II c. 2. Despite begging for mercy, he was
executed by
Jack Ketch on
July 15, 1685, on
Tower Hill. It is said that it took eight blows of the axe to sever his head.
His dukedoms of Monmouth and Buccleuch were forfeited, but the subsidiary titles of the dukedom of Monmouth were restored to the
Duke of Buccleuch.
According to legend, a portrait was painted of Monmouth after his execution. The tradition states that it was realised after the execution that there was no official
portrait of the Duke -- for a son of a King, and someone who had claimed the throne, albeit in vain, this was unheard of. So his body was exhumed, the head stitched back on the body, and it was sat for its portrait to be painted. However, there is at least one formal portrait of Monmouth tentatively dated to before his death currently in the
National Portrait Gallery in London, and another painting once identified with Monmouth that shows a sleeping or dead man that could have given rise to the story.
The theory that the Duke of Monmouth was in fact
The Man in the Iron Mask seems to be based on the reasoning that James II would not execute his own nephew; someone else was executed instead; and James II arranged for Monmouth to be taken to France and put in the custody of his cousin
Louis XIV of France.
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