Jacobite rising of 1715

The Jacobite rising of 1715 (also referred to as the Fifteen or Lord Mar's Revolt), was the attempt by James Francis Edward Stuart (also called the Old Pretender) to regain the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland for the exiled House of Stuart.

Background

The Glorious Revolution of 1688–89 resulted in the Roman Catholic Stuart king, James II of England and VII of Scotland, fleeing to exile in France under the protection of Louis XIV. James' daughter and her husband, who was also James's nephew, ascended the British throne as joint sovereigns William and Mary. In 1690 Presbyterianism was established as the state religion of Scotland. The Act of Settlement 1701 settled the succession of the English throne on the Protestant House of Hanover. The Act of Union 1707 applied the Act of Settlement to Scotland. With the death of Queen Anne in 1714, the Elector of Hanover, George I, succeeded to the British throne. The accession of George I ushered in the Whig supremacy, with the Tories deprived of all political power. The new Whig regime sought to prosecute members of the 1710–1714 Tory ministry for financial irregularities, with Robert Harley being imprisoned in the Tower of London and Lord Bolingbroke fleeing to France before arrest. Bolingbroke became the Pretender's Secretary of State and accepted an earldom from him.

Jacobitism

Jacobitism (/ˈdʒækəbaɪˌtɪzm/ JAK-ə-beye-TIZ-əm;Irish: Seacaibíteachas, Scottish Gaelic: Seumasachas) was a political movement in Great Britain and Ireland that aimed to restore the Roman Catholic Stuart King James II of England and his heirs to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland. The movement took its name from Jacobus, the Renaissance Latin form of Iacomus, the original Latin form of James. Adherents rebelled against the British government on several occasions between 1688 and 1746.

After James II was deposed in 1688 and replaced by his daughter Mary II, ruling jointly with her husband and first cousin (James's nephew) William III, the Stuarts lived in exile, occasionally attempting to regain the throne. The strongholds of Jacobitism were parts of the Scottish Highlands and the lowland north-east of Scotland, Ireland, and parts of Northern England (mostly within the counties of Northumberland and Lancashire). Significant support also existed in Wales and South-West England.