Tea at Trianon: The Remains of Patrick Sarsfield

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

Friday, February 24, 2023

The Remains of Patrick Sarsfield

From The Irish Times:

The remains of Patrick Sarsfield, the Earl of Lucan, have been located and it is hoped to repatriate his remains back to Ireland, researchers have claimed. Sarsfield was one of the Wild Geese who fled Ireland after the defeat of King James II in the Williamite Wars by King William III. He is best known for his rousing defence of Limerick in 1690 after the Battle of the Boyne. He was finally defeated in 1691, but negotiated a treaty to keep the remnants of the Jacobite army together.
Under the terms of the Treaty of Limerick, Sarsfield and 15,000 Jacobite soldiers and their families left for France never to return. Sarsfield was killed in the service of the French king Louis XIV at the Battle of Landen, which took place on July 29th, 1693 during the Nine Years War. He died some days later of his wounds. According to contemporary reports, he was buried “a few days later” on the grounds of St Martin’s Church in the nearby town of Huy in modern-day Belgium. The town is about 30km southwest of Liege. (Read more.)