JAMES II, king of England, second son of Charles I and of Henrietta of France: b. London, 15 Oct. 1633; d. Saint Germain, France, 16 Sept. 1701. He was at once declared Duke of York, though only formally raised to that dignity in 1643. At the Restoration in 1660 he took the command of the fleet as lord high admiral, and was also made warden of the Cinque Ports. He had previously married Anne, daughter of Chancellor Hyde, after ward Lord Clarendon (q.v.). In March 1671 the Duchess of York died. Before her death she declared herself a convert to the Roman Catholic faith, which had been secretly that of the duke for many years, and was now openly avowed by him. This declaration laid the foundation of the opposition which finally drove him from the throne. A test act being soon after passed, to prevent Roman Catholics from holding public employments, the duke was obliged to resign his command. On 21 Nov. 1671 he married Mary Beatrice of Este, daughter of the Duke of Modena, and in 1677 his eldest daughter, Mary, was united to Wil liam, Prince of Orange.
On the death of Charles II, 6 Feb. 1685, the duke succeeded, under the title of James II, and from the time of his ascending the throne seems to have acted with a steady determination to render himself absolute and to restore the Roman Catholic religion. At variance with his Parliament, he was under the necessity of ac cepting a pension from Louis XIV. He sent an agent to Rome to pave the way for a solemn readmission of England into the bosom of that Church, conduct which encouraged the rebellion of the Duke of Monmouth (1685). The un relenting temper of James was again exhibited in the executions on this account. The legal proceedings under Jeffreys were brutal in the extreme; and no fewer than 320 persons were hanged on the western circuit alone, which attained an unenviable notoriety as the Bloody Assize. The New Netherlands (which in eluded the city of New York) had been granted to him by Charles II, and his subserviency to the French King was seen in the Treaty of Neutrality agreed on in 1686 governing the re lations of their American colonies. James gradually proceeded to a direct attack on the Established Church by the formation of an ecclesiastical commission, which cited before it all clergymen who had done anything to dis please the court. Apparently to conciliate the Puritans a declaration of indulgence in matters of religion was ordered to be read by the clergy in all the churches of the kingdom, but its real object, however, was to favor the Roman Catholic element. Seven bishops met
and drew up a loyal and humble petition against this ordinance, and for this act they were sent to the Tower, on a charge of seditious libel. On 29 June 1688, not many days after the birth of his son, the Old Pretender, they were ac quitted amid the most enthusiastic rejoicings of the populace. The innovations, in regard both to the religion and government, gradually united opposing interests, and a large body of nobility and gentry concurred in an application to the Prince of Orange, signed by seven of the most prominent and influential political leaders, to occupy the throne: James, who was long kept in ignorance of these transactions, when informed of them by his minister at The Hague, was struck with terror equal to his former infatuation, and immediately repealing all his obnoxious acts, practised every method to gain popularity. All confidence was, how ever, destroyed between the king and the peo ple. William arrived with his fleet in Torbay 5 Nov. 1688, and landed his forces, amounting to 14,000 men. Several men of rank went over to William, and the royal army began to desert by entire regiments. Incapable of any vigor ous resolution, and finding his overtures of accommodation disregarded, James resolved to quit the country. He repaired to Saint Ger main, where he was received with great kind ness and hospitality by Louis XIV. In the meantime the throne of Great Britain was de clared abdicated, and was occupied, with the national and parliamentary consent, by his eldest daughter, Mary, and her husband, Wil liam, conjointly; Anne, who had equally with her sister been educated a strict Protestant, being declared next in succession, to the ex clusion of her infant brother, known in his tory as the Pretender, who had been born on 10 June of that year. Assisted by Louis XIV, James was enabled, in March 1689, to make an attempt for the recovery of Ireland. The re sult of the battle of the Boyne, fought 1 July 1690, compelled him to return to France. All succeeding projects for his restoration proved equally abortive. Before his death he under went a spiritual transformation, and died in the odor of sanctity. Consult Acton,