Lucy Walter: Mistress of Charles II and mother of Duke of Monmouth

Here, we go into more detail about the life of Lucy Walter and her famous son’s brutal ending.

If you ask many people who Lucy Walter was, some may know, but the majority will most likely not. But Lucy – despite only having a short life – became the catalyst for a rebellion against the throne during the 1600s.

Lucy was born in Roch Castle to parents William Walter and Elizabeth Prothero around 1630. Her great-grandfather William Walter bought Roch Castle around 1601 from the de Longuevilles.

Lucy was connected to a number of well-known Pembrokeshire families as her mother Elizabeth Prothero was daughter of John Prothero of Hawksbrook who had married Walter Vaughan’s daughter Eleanor. Walter Vaughan was the brother of John Vaughan, 1st Earl of Carbery.

On her father’s side, the Walter’s were a respected family on their own terms but were also connected to the Laugharne’s as William Walter who bought Roch Castle married Jane Laugharne. Jane’s mother also connected the family to the Picton’s as she – Janet – was the daughter of John Picton.

Lucy had two siblings – Richard and Justus – and their home life wasn’t exactly amazing for nobles. According to biography.wales, their parents William and Elizabeth were involved in a long dispute where in May 1641, Elizabeth complained that she had been deserted by her husband and was given a repossession order on his estate.

Lucy Walter

This order was revoked in 1647 and William was given charge of their three children. The family were also involved in the Civil War as they declared their support for King Charles I and in 1643, the castle was garrisoned for the Royalist movement by Richard Vaughan, 2nd earl of Carbery.

The Walter family spent most of their time during the Civil War in London after fleeing the castle. William alleged that his losses at the castle – which was burned in 1644 - came to £3,000.

Lucy was sent to The Hague and it is believed that she met Charles II, then Prince Charles of Wales, in 1648 there for the first time, although some sources believe that she had previously met him and this meeting was renewing their acquaintance.

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It is widely believed that Lucy was the first mistress of the prince but it is known that she was not his first lover. She was known as Mrs Barlow and was called a ‘brown, beautiful, bold but insipid creature’ by diarist John Evelyn.

Their love affair resulted in the 1649 birth of James Scott. Charles accepted paternity of the child and gave him the title of the Duke of Monmouth. The couple – who never married despite the movement which would aim to get James to the throne (more on this later) – would continue their affair in intervals until the autumn of 1651.

Lucy would have a second child that same year – her daughter Mary. It is believed that her father was Henry Bennet, earl of Arlington.

Lucy would follow the birth of her daughter and the end of her affair with the now King Charles II by leading a life of promiscuity for the final years of her life.

She did return to Britain with her son in 1656 and was arrested and accused of being a spy. She was taken to the Tower of London with her maid Anne Hill. She had said that she returned to London to collect her inheritance of £1,500 left by the recent death of her mother.

She was ordered to be deported and was sent to Flanders with James. In March 1658, James was kidnapped by Edward Progers on behalf of Charles and sent to Paris where he was cared for by the Crofts baronets and he took their surname. His father later entrusted him into the care of his own mother, Queen Henrietta Maria.

Lucy would die in Paris at the age of 28 in 1658. Her son would go on to marry Anne Scott, countess of Buccleuch, which would make him Duke of Buccleuch.

Despite her death more than two decades earlier, when the Exclusion Bill was in discussion between 1679 and 1681, the story of the marriage between Charles and Lucy was being widely circulated, which then would make James – who was an illegitimate child despite Charles acknowledging paternity due to the laws of the land – the rightful heir to the throne.

James Scott, Duke of Monmouth

Charles bestowed a number of titles on his eldest son (Charles had 14 illegitimate children) including the Duke of Monmouth, Earl of Doncaster, Baron Scott of Tindale and a Knight of the Garter. In 1668, he was made captain of the King’s Guard and two years later was admitted to the privy council.

The succession to the throne became a hot topic and Charles II banished his son from the kingdom in September 1679 – making it known that he wanted his brother James to take the throne. He was involved in the Rye House Plot against his father and uncle but after being pardoned for it in 1684, he was banished from court and took refuge in the Netherlands.

The support for Protestant James was increased when – on the death of his father in 1685 – his Catholic uncle became James II.

Following his father’s death, James landed in Lyme Regis with 82 men in June of that year and his army quickly rose to 4,000. The army was defeated on July 6 and James fled but he was later captured as a £5,000 reward was offered.

He was executed in quite a brutal fashion on July 15, 1685. King James II allowed an audience for the execution – a rare occasion as audiences for executions were usually only done when the monarch was intending to issue a pardon, something James II was not going to do.

Many of the approximately 2,000 in the crowd were supporters of the Duke of Monmouth. James tried everything to avoid execution including offering to convert to Catholicism but was told by his uncle to “prepare to die.”

The man with the responsibility of executing the duke was Jack Ketch. Ketch had been known for a previous execution which went wrong, and the duke asked him to make sure it would be done in a single blow.

Unfortunately for the duke and the crowd, this was not the case and depending on the source, it took between five to eight blows for the execution to be complete and for the duke to die but Ketch switched from the axe to a knife to finish the job of severing the head from the shoulder.

The Duke of Monmouth’s execution was the last execution of a duke. He was buried in the Church of St Peter ad Vincula in the Tower of London. The title, Duke of Monmouth, was forfeited.