307) Mary, Queen of Scots

Mary, Queen of Scots (1542 – 1587), also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland. Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced abdication in 1567.

The only surviving legitimate child of James V of Scotland, Mary was six days old when her father died and she acceded to the throne. During her childhood, Scotland was governed by regents, first by the heir to the throne, James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, and then by her mother, Mary of Guise. In 1548, she was betrothed to Francis, the Dauphin of France, and was sent to be brought up in France. Mary married Francis in 1558, becoming queen consort of France

from his accession in 1559 until his death in December 1560. Widowed, Mary returned to Scotland in August 1561.Mary married her half-cousin, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, in 1565, and in June 1566, they had a son, James. In February 1567, Darnley's residence was destroyed by an explosion, and he was found murdered in the garden. James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, was generally believed to have orchestrated Darnley's death, but he was acquitted of the charge in April 1567, and the following month, he married Mary. On 24 July 1567, she was forced to abdicate in favour of her one-year-old son. After an unsuccessful attempt to regain the throne, she fled southward seeking the protection of her first cousin once removed, Elizabeth I of England.

Mary had once claimed Elizabeth's throne as her own and was considered the legitimate sovereign of England by many English Catholics, including participants in a rebellion known as the Rising of the North. Perceiving Mary as a threat, Elizabeth had her confined in various castles and manor houses in the interior of England. After eighteen and a half years in captivity, Mary was found guilty of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth in 1586 and was beheaded the following year at Fotheringhay Castle.



- “The Queen of Scots was considered a beauty by the standards of her own time, though not perhaps to the modern eye. She had her father's dark auburn hair and aquiline nose along with dark, captivating, slanting eyes in a beguiling heart shaped face and the height and build of her Guise mother.” http://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/stewart_8.htm