MONMOUTH, JAMES. Duke of 116 PI 85). A natural son of Charles 11. of England by TAtcy Walters or Walter. Charles committed the boy to the care of Lord Crofts., who gave him his own name. On the Monmouth. then Nr. -lames Crofts, came to with the Queen Dowager and was lodged at the royal palaces of lIntopton Court and Whitehall. lie was married in 1603 to Anne, donghter of the Earl of Bue eleneli, and was created Duke of Monmouth, us.
suming as family liaMe wife's name of Scott. ..:Nt the period of Titus Oates's plot (1078), rumors that the 'Protestant Duke' was the King's legitimate son spread far and wide: but the King deplored solemnly before the Privy Council that be had never married Lucy Walters. Mon mouth was sent into Scotland in 1679, for the purpose of quelling the rebellion of the radical Presbyterians. lie defeated the Covenanters at Bothwell Bridge; but his humanity to the fleeing and wounded was so conspicuous and his reeom• mendations to pardon the prisoners were so urgent as to bring upon him the violent censure of the King and Lauderdale. Ile thus became the idol of the English Noncomformists. The return of the Duke of York and the exile of :Monmouth soon followed. In Holland he allied himself to the leaders of the Nonconformist party, exiled like himself, and when lie returned to London he was received with such demonstrations of joy as to convince him that he was the people's choice as successor to his father. In 1080 he made a quasi-royal progress through the west of Eng land with the design probably of courting the Noneonformists, aid two years afterwards he traversed some of the northern counties. The King and his brother were alarmed, and Mon mouth was placed for a short time under arrest.
In 11184 Monmouth went to the Netherlands and remained abroad until the death of Charles, whereupon he returned to England. Landing in 1085, he assumed the title of .lames H. and headed a rebellion against the Government. News of the defeat of Argyle. who at the head of the Seottislt exiles had attempted an insurrection in Scotland, made Monmouth despondent. Never theless on July 6th he attacked a superior royal force which, under the command of the Earl of Feversham, was encamped at Sedgemoor, near Bridgewater. When his ammunition failed the Duke fled and his troops were massacred. Mon mouth was found concealed in a ditch, and was brought to London. Gaining an interview with the King. he made the most humiliating submis sion, hut in vain, even the shortest respite being refused. On July 15, 1655, he was beheaded on Tower 11 ill. In the 'Bloody Assize; under Judge Jeffreys (q.v.), Monmouth's adherents paid a fearful penalty for their part ieipat ion in his rash rebellion. Consult : Roberts, Life. Progress. and Rebellion of James, Duke of Monmouth ( London, 1844) ; Collins, Peerage of England, viii, iii. (3(11 ih., 1779) ; Fergusson, Robert Pergusson. the Plotter, or the Secret of the Rye-House Con spiracy and the Story of a ;Orange career (Edinburgh, 1887); Grey. Seeret History of the Rye-House Plot, and of Monmouth's Rebellion in 1685 (London, 1754); Hyde, Correspondence of Henry of Clarendon and James, Earl of Abingdon, Chiefly Relating to the Ilonmouth Insurrection. 1683-85 (Oxford, 1890) ; Maeaulay. Ilistmw of England (New York, 1858) ; and various other histories of England.