Short description:

The result of over fifty years? archival research, the book demonstrates the fundamental importance of the Huguenot refugees to the 1688 Glorious Revolution, victory in Ireland, the foundation of the Bank of England, and the subsequent defeat of Louis XIV and the rise of British power in the eighteenth century.

Long description:

The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was enacted within France, but shook all Europe. This was especially true in Britain, by 1700 the home of the largest concentration of Huguenot refugees. Recent historians have dismissed religious persecution as irrelevant to French economic and political decline from the 1680s. This volume, though, shows the refugees played a central role in France?s economic woes and Louis XIV?s eventual defeat as they helped pave the way for William III?s initial success in England in 1688, then assisted in the consolidation of his power.

Using markedly different sets of primary sources, the book establishes three key conclusions. First, the importance of the refugees in relation to the Glorious Revolution in England. Second, the vital contribution of Huguenot soldiers in Ireland, especially at the bloodiest battle of the Irish wars at Aughrim in 1691, which was definitive in a way the better-known battle of the Boyne was not. Third, the significance of the close connections between the French Church of London at Threadneedle Street and the foundation of the Bank of England in 1694 and its survival through its troubled early years.

Without the persecutions in France, William would not have succeeded in his near-bloodless invasion of England, which for the first time enabled a coalition that the French king could not simply browbeat and dominate. Nor could William have thereafter secured his position militarily and financially in time to check Louis and establish the foundations for later English successes. Louis XIV?s treatment of the Huguenots was fundamental both to his eventual defeat, and to Britain?s rising power in the early eighteenth century.

Table of Contents:

List of Maps, Tables and Figures Preface Abbreviations Chronological Table and Note on Dates Glossary of Terms I. Introductory Chapter Part One: Revolution II. The Royal Need, 1687 III. The Crisis of the Age: A Climate of Fear, Developments in the 1680s and the Refugee Presence Part Two: The Irish Wars, 1689-92 IV. 1689: Schomberg in Ireland V. The Irish Campaign, 1690-92 Part Three: Finance VI. The Huguenot Presence at the Birth of the Bank of England (I) VII. The Huguenot Presence at the Birth of the Bank of England (II) Conclusion: The Huguenots and the Defeat of Louis XIV Epilogue Appendices 1. Huguenot Army Officers in the Service of the Crown in the Later Stuart Period 2. Some Rank-and-file Huguenot Soldiers, 1699 3. Elders and Deacons of the French Church of London, Threadneedle Street, 1640-1713 Errata and Corrigenda for Volumes 1 and 2 Selected Consolidated Bibliography (Volumes I-III) Index