• Simon Fraser

    Simon Fraser, 11th Lord Lovat was born around 1667, the second son of the 10th Lord Lovat. The Barony of Lovat had been titled to the Frasers since around 1460, and also carried their own clan chief status, the MacShimis (sons of Simon). Prior to the Barony, the Frasers were titled Lairds of Lovat, where they held a Tower and fort. The lands of Beauly Abbey in Inverness-shire were granted to the Frasers after the dissolution, where Beauly Castle stands. Simon Fraser’s father, Thomas 10th Lord Lovat was a younger son of a previous Lord (7th), and therefore not originally in the line of succession, however the 9th Lord died…

  • Charles II – The Rocky Road to Rule

    Charles Stuart, second child and second son of King Charles I and Henrietta Maria, sister of King Louis XIII of France, was born on 29th May, 1630. His older brother, born the year before, died after only a few hours, and was named Charles James. As soon as it was apparent that Charles was a healthy baby, his birth was announced and he was taken away at a few hours old, to his own rooms, to begin his raising by a team of maids, nurses and rockers. Charles was a large baby, his mother writing to a friend that at only four months old, Charles was both ‘tall and fat’…

  • Sophia of Hanover

    Sophia of Hanover was born on 14th October 1630, in the Wassaener Hof in The Hague, where her parents were exiled during the thirty years war. Her father, Frederick of Bohemia and mother, Elizabeth Stuart, only surviving daughter of James VI of Scotland and I of England already had eleven children. During her young years, Sophia was courted by her cousin King Charles II in the hope of a betrothal but nothing became of the courtship. Sophia instead married Ernest Augustus of Brunswick at the age of 27, quite late for a woman of the period. The marriage was successful, although Ernest was known to have a bad temper and…

  • The Winter Queen: Elizabeth Stuart

    Born into the royal Stuart family of Scotland, Elizabeth was brought up as a princess and taught to be a future queen. It was on August 19 of 1596 that Elizabeth was brought into this world by her father, King James IV of Scotland (not yet the king of England or Ireland) and mother, Anne of Denmark. She was the second eldest child of 7, only preceded by her elder brother, Henry, Prince of Wales. If only she knew that life would not always be about pampering and extravagance, life as it were for Elizabeth was a struggle. Up until the age of 7 Elizabeth had been placed in the…