from encyclopaedia Britannica: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Anne-queen-of-Great-Britain-and-Ireland
Anne, (born February 6, 1665, London, England—died August 1, 1714, London), queen of Great Britain and Ireland from 1702 to 1714. The last Stuart monarch, she wished to rule independently, but her intellectual limitations and chronic ill health caused her to rely heavily on her ministers, who directed England’s efforts against France and Spain in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–14). The bitter rivalries between Whigs and Tories that characterized her reign were intensified by uncertainty over the succession to her throne.
Anne was the second daughter of James, duke of York (King James II,
1685–88), and Anne Hyde. Although her father was a Roman Catholic, she
was reared a Protestant at the insistence of her uncle, King Charles II. In 1683 Anne was married to the handsome, if uninspiring, Prince George of Denmark (1653–1708), who became her devoted companion. Of greater political consequence was Anne’s intimate relationship with her childhood friend Sarah Jennings Churchill, wife of John Churchill
(later 1st duke of Marlborough). The beautiful, intelligent Sarah
became Anne’s lady of the bedchamber and soon had the princess in her
power.
It was Sarah who persuaded Anne to side with the Protestant ruler William III of Orange, stadtholder of the Netherlands, when William overthrew James II in 1688. By the Bill of Rights (1689), William and his wife, Mary,
Anne’s elder sister, were made king and queen of England, and Anne was
placed in line for the succession to the throne. Anne and Mary had a
bitter falling-out, and after Mary’s death in 1694 William cultivated Anne’s goodwill, but he refused to appoint her regent during his absences from England.
Although
Anne was pregnant 18 times between 1683 and 1700, only five children
were born alive, and, of these, only one, a son, survived infancy. His
death in 1700 ended Anne’s hopes of providing herself and the three
kingdoms (England, Scotland, and Ireland) with a successor. SO she AGREED to the Act of Settlement of 1701, which designated as her successors the HANOVERIAN descendants of King James I of England, through his daughter Elizabeth.
Anne
became queen upon William’s death in March 1702. From the first she was
motivated largely by an intense devotion to the Anglican church. She
detested Roman Catholics and Dissenters
and sympathized with High Church Tories. At the same time, she sought
to be free from the domination of the political parties. The influence of Sarah Churchill (now duchess of Marlborough) over Anne
was slight after 1703, though the duke remained commander of the
British forces.
Anne soon discovered
that she disagreed with the Tories on strategy for the war. The queen,
Marlborough, and the Whigs wanted to commit English troops to
Continental campaigns, while the Tories believed England should engage
the enemy principally at sea.
British Culture and Politics
The queen’s advancing age
and her infirmities made the succession a crucial issue. Leading Tories
were in constant communication with Anne’s exiled Roman Catholic half
brother, James, the Old Pretender,
who had been excluded by law from the succession. Nevertheless, the
suddenness of Anne’s final illness and death frustrated any plans the
Tories might have had for capturing the throne for the Pretender. Her
last act was to secure the Protestant succession by placing the lord
treasurer’s staff in the hands of a capable moderate, Charles Talbot, duke of Shrewsbury, who presided over the peaceful accession of the Hanoverian prince George Louis (King George I, 1714–27).
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