Bonnie Prince Charlie: A Biography

The eldest son of James, the Old Pretender, Bonnie Price Charlie was raised to believe that the throne of England and Scotland was his destiny. Born in Italy and used as a pawn of Louis XV against George II, Charles was seen as a promising young man. In his early twenties, he sailed to Scotland and was able to convince several Highland chiefs to support his cause. Numerous victories came swiftly because the English were unprepared for the various attacks. However, once the English determined that the threat was real, Prince Charles and his troops were quickly over run. He returned to France where he was asked to leave and again settled in Italy. With no ambitions left to him, he quickly dissapated into an alcoholic daze. He fathered one child by a Scottish woman and later married a German princess but that marriage quickly soured. His later years were redeemed somewhat as his daughter Charlotte came to his aid. He died, leaving his youngest brother Henry as the last Stuart pretender to the throne. Henry was a Cardinal and therefore fathered no children so with his death the Stuart dynasty came to an end.I enjoyed the book and found it useful for someone with limited knowledge of this time period. Not very detailed with but a good overview of events.

One has to look at the vicissitudes of life in the great tragic figures of history, Cortes, Columbus, Napoleon, etc., to find precedents in the relatively obscure life of Charles Edward Stuart, "The Great Young Pretender," Bonnie Prince Charlie.Although towards the latter part of his life he came to stoop very low, he had, as a young man, decades earlier, reached out very high unto the stars with unwavering courage and determination in his conquest of Scotland and England. His defeat at Culloden in 1746 precipitated tragically what can only be described as the genocide of the Scottish Highlanders.What a life! The life of Bonnie Prince Charlie is a study of human nature at its extreme. Belatedly, devastatingly, he found out the cruel fact that despite his forceful, determined personality, he was not the master of his own destiny. Be that as it may, he came to be vindicated.This is a magnificent book of a great, albeit obscure, tragic figure of history.Miguel A. Faria, Jr., M.D. is Editor-in-Chief of the Medical Sentinel of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), and author of Vandals at the Gates of Medicine (1995) and Medical Warrior: Fighting Corporate Socialized Medicine (1997).