James Francis Edward Stuart

James Francis Edward
Prince of Wales
James Francis Edward Stuart, "The Old Pretender"
Jacobite pretender
Pretence	16 September 1701 – 1 January 1766
Predecessor	James II and VII
Successor	Charles "III"
Born	(1688-06-10)10 June 1688 St. James's Palace, London, Kingdom of England
Died	1 January 1766(1766-01-01) (aged 77) Palazzo Muti, Rome, Papal States
Burial	St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City
Spouse	Maria Klementyna Sobieska
Issue	Charles Edward Stuart Henry Benedict Stuart
Full name James Francis Edward Stuart
House	Stuart
Father	James II and VII
Mother	Mary of Modena
Religion	Roman Catholicism

James Francis Edward, Prince of Wales (10 June 1688 – 1 January 1766), nicknamed the Old Pretender, was the son of the deposed James II of England and Ireland, VII of Scotland. As such, he claimed the English, Scottish and Irish thrones (as James III of England and Ireland and James VIII of Scotland) from the death of his father in 1701, when he was recognised as king of England, Scotland and Ireland by his cousin Louis XIV of France. Following his death in 1766, he was succeeded by his son Charles Edward Stuart in the Jacobite Succession. Had his father not been deposed, Great Britain might have had only two monarchs during his lifetime, his father and himself. Instead there were seven: his father, William III, Mary II, Anne, George I, George II and George III. Although the ruling Protestant Stuarts died out with his half-sister, Queen Anne, the last remaining Stuarts were James and his sons, and their endeavours to reclaim the throne while remaining devoted to their Catholic faith made the political situation in England precarious. Their attempts are remembered in history as Jacobitism.

Prince James Francis Edward was born 10 June 1688, at St. James's Palace. He was the son of King James II of England and Ireland (VII of Scotland), and his Roman Catholic second wife, Mary of Modena, and as such was automatically Duke of Cornwall and Duke of Rothesay, among other titles.

The prince's birth was controversial, and coming five years after James's marriage, unanticipated on the part of a number of British Protestants, who had expected his daughter Mary, from his first marriage, to succeed her father. Mary and her younger sister Princess Anne, had been raised as Protestants. As long as there was a possibility of one of them succeeding him, the king's opponents saw his rule as a temporary inconvenience. When people began to fear that James's second wife, Mary, would produce a Catholic son and heir, a movement grew to replace him with his elder daughter Princess Mary and his son-in-law/nephew, William of Orange.