Mary Beatrice d’Este, the first and only Italian to be Queen of Scotland, was born on 25 September 1658 in Modena, a small duchy lying in a fertile plain south of the Alps. Her father, the Duke of Modena, died of tuberculosis when she was two, and her mother, Laura Martinozzi, then ruled as regent for Mary’s two-year-old brother, Francesco. Strictly brought up by their imposing parent, they were given a sternly religious education, and by the time she was nine Mary had decided to follow the example of her much-loved governess and become a nun. Her future, however, lay elsewhere. In 1673 Charles II’s brother and heir, James, Duke of York, was looking for another wife. Anne Hyde, his first Duchess, had died of breast cancer, leaving him with two little girls, Mary and Anne. It was by now generally accepted that Catherine of Braganza would never have children and so James would have to supply the necessary male heirs to the throne. He sent Henry, Earl of Peterborough, to the Continent to find him a bride who was beautiful, so that he would not be tempted to have extra-marital affairs, and a Roman Catholic, since Catholicism was his own religion, although he still

kept his conversion a secret.

 

Peterborough was in the midst of inspecting various possible brides when he was shown a portrait of Mary of Modena. He was enchanted, and although he was warned of her determination to become a nun, he brushed that aside. She would, after all, have no say in the matter. When he travelled to Modena and met her in person, he was even more delighted. Now fourteen, Mary was tall and slim but well-shaped, with black hair, a dazzlingly fair complexion and lustrous dark eyes. He explained his mission, and she told him fiercely that she had vowed to enter a convent. She had never even heard of England let alone the Duke of York, and when her mother told her that she must marry James, she screamed and wept for two whole days, or so she said afterwards. Her proxy wedding took place on 20 September (Old Style) 1673, with Peterborough standing in for the bridegroom. Mary set off for Britain, accompanied by her mother, five days later, on her fifteenth birthday, and they arrived at Dover eight weeks after that.

 

Her husband was waiting to help her from the small boat that brought her ashore. He was forty years old, tall and harsh-featured. When he touched her, she flinched nervously. He took her to the house where he was staying, they were married again in a Church of England service and then they went to bed together. James was an experienced lover but Mary always remembered how, for her first few weeks in England, she wept whenever she saw him. He was charmed with her. They travelled towards London together and met Charles II in his barge off Greenwich. The King was kind to Mary, and she was dazzled by him. He was ‘so truly amiable and good-natured that I loved him very much, even before I became attached to my Lord the Duke of York’.

 

Although deeply upset when Duchess Laura left for home, Mary consoled herself with the thought that her husband was ‘a very good man. He has the holy fear of God and is very kind to me and would do anything to show it’. Indeed, after her mother’s departure, ‘I became very fond of my husband and my affection for him increased with every year that we lived together’. She was also delighted when James’s small daughters came to stay at St James’s Palace with their households. As well as having Italian ladies, cooks and priests, Mary had many British attendants including the young Scottish heiress Anne, Duchess of Buccleuch, who had been married at an early age to the King’s illegitimate son, the Duke of Monmouth.

 

In May 1674, six months after her arrival in Britain, Mary had a miscarriage. The following January, she gave birth to a daughter, Catherine Laura, who died at five months. The very next day, Mary had another miscarriage. Less than a year after that, in August 1676, she had a second daughter, Isabella, and then at last, in November 1677, the much desired son, Charles, Duke of Cambridge. Smallpox was rife at Court that winter and Princess Anne caught the disease. As soon as she felt better, she came to admire the new baby. Not realising that she was still infectious, she kissed him. He too fell ill and died in December. Mary had also lost the company of her much-loved elder stepdaughter, Princess Mary, but for a happier reason. The Princess married her cousin William of Orange, and went to live in Holland. Deeply sympathetic when she had a miscarriage the following autumn, Mary of Modena decided to go to visit her in The Hague, explaining, ‘I love her as if she were my own daughter, and also I have a little curiosity to see that country’. Travelling incognito, she took Anne with her.

 

Despite her own personal losses, Mary of Modena was as happy as she could be for the first five years of her marriage, but by 1678 religious controversy was overshadowing her life. In 1673 James had been forced to resign as Lord High Admiral of England and Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports when he refused to take the Test Act designed to exclude Catholics from public office. An increasing number of Protestant statesmen were set on removing him from the succession, and the Popish Plot of 1678 whipped up anti-Catholic feeling still further. At the height of the crisis, copies of letters Mary had written to the Pope were found among the papers of her secretary, Edward Coleman. He was executed on 3 December 1678 for treason and her confessor, Claude de la Columbie`re, was briefly imprisoned the following March.