Remember, remember, the fifth of November – Guy Fawkes Day is almost here once again. But who is the princess that was at the heart of the Gunpowder Plot? Meet Elizabeth Stuart, the daughter of a king who grew up to be a queen given a romantic title that has echoed through the centuries.
Elizabeth’s story could have been very different. In 1605, a group of English Catholics conspired to overturn King James I and the ruling Protestant nobility by planting a massive amount of gunpowder under the Houses of Parliament. When politicians and the king arrived for the opening, they would ignite the powder and blow up everyone and everything inside.
Their plan was to obliterate the ruling elite in one move and they were ready with a replacement monarch.
Guy Fawkes and his co-conspirators planned to place James I’s daughter, Elizabeth, on the throne as a puppet queen. The second child King James and Queen Anne, they were going to force her to convert to Catholicism and use her as a queen.
The plot was thankfully thwarted and Elizabeth and her family were kept safe. But who was she?
Princess Elizabeth was born in August of 1596 at Dunfermline Palace to the King and Queen of Scots, James VI and his wife, Anne of Denmark. Elizabeth, named in honour of Elizabet I who then still ruled England, was close to her elder brother, Prince Henry Frederick, and was a lively child.
In 1603, her namesake, Elizabeth I, died and left her throne to James. The young Princess Elizabeth moved to England with her parents. Suddenly, she was at the heart of one of the most powerful families in Europe. Just two years later, Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder plotters attempted to put her on the throne.
Their failure led to a far more expected path to a throne for Elizabeth. Like many young princesses, she became a useful tool on the royal marriage market. In 1613, Elizabeth wed Frederick V of the Palatinate, a Protestant ruler.
They eventually became King and Queen of Bohemia but reign for just a year. Elizabeth would always be remembered as the Winter Queen.
Elizabeth’s legacy can be seen in the Royal Family to this day. Her daughter, Sophia, Electress of Hanover, was Parliament’s intended successor to Queen Anne. Sophia died two months before Anne, and Sophia’s son inherited the British throne. He became known as King George I, the founder of the Hanoverian dynasty.
