Tea at Trianon: A Brief History of St James’s Palace

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Saturday, January 9, 2021

A Brief History of St James’s Palace

From Royal Central:

King Henry VIII had St James’s built as a smaller residence to escape court life’s formality and stresses in Whitehall. Two of Henry’s children died at the palace; first was his illegitimate son Henry FitzRoy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset in 1536, and second was his daughter Queen Mary I, who died at St James’s in 1558. Henry’s other daughter, Queen Elizabeth I was also known to reside there often and is believed to have spent the night there whilst awaiting news on the Spanish Armada’s progress.

During the Stuart era, King Charles I’s mother-in-law, Marie de Medici lived at St James’s Palace for three years. However, as a Catholic former queen of France, her residence in England proved unpopular with Parliament, and she was asked to leave and return to Cologne. In 1649, Charles I spent his final night in the palace before his execution on January 30. (Read more.)

More HERE.