Posted on 04/09/2021 7:50:58 AM PDT by CheshireTheCat
Unprincipled, octogenarian Scottish noble Simon Fraser,* Lord Lovat was on this date in 1747 the last to lose his head on Tower Hill.
The Clan Fraser patriarch was an expert double-dealer from his youth in Restoration England — when he recruited a small regiment in nominal service to William and Mary but allegedly plotting to desert to the Stuarts at the opportune moment.
That moment never came … and the Stuarts’ fruitless quest for it in the decades to come would eventually claim the Lord Lovat.
But first up: a long life of opportunistic, frequently reprehensible political maneuvering.
He kidnapped, raped, and forcibly married a woman from a rival clan in order to gain claim on a contested succession (Lovat had to flee the country, a death sentence in absentia at his heels) He expediently converted to Catholicism to get in with the exiled Stuarts and their continental allies He forged incriminating documents in an unsuccessful bid to undermine rival nobles He played both sides of the Hanover-Stuart intrigue, ingratiating himself with both Jacobites and London during the 1715 rising. He did this so adeptly that George I served as Lovat’s son’s godfather When the Jacobites decided to double down on doomed risings in 1745,** this wily knave finally managed to commit himself to the wrong team at the wrong time. Hey, everyone should be allowed one fatal mistake every 80 years or so. (Read all about those years in this public-domain biography.)...
(Excerpt) Read more at executedtoday.com ...
Today’s royals are pantywaists compared to their ancestors.................
"Expert double-dealer" defines many a politician.
Well, it is nice to seem someone who deserved it executed.
Yeah, but I'd say the Kennedys, the Clintons, and the Bidens have been a pretty fair imitation.
All of us Outlander fans are well aware of this guy. I learned a lot of history watching that show.
I would gladly serve as official executor of such a man.
Diana Gabaldon does her homework.
As an aside....I’ve watched Outlander....and after everyone raving about the books I bought the first one. Just couldn’t read it. Not sure why but I just didn’t like it and put it down never to pick up again.
As they were preparing to chop off his head, the grandstand erected for the spectators got so overcrowded that it collapsed. Which so delighted Lord Lovat that he had a hearty belly laugh at the spectators' expense.
Which is how the expression "laugh your head off" came into the English language.
Je Suis Prest
for later
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.