King of
Great Britain, born in Osnabruck,
Hanover, May 28, 1660; eldest son of
Ernest Augustus, Elector of
Hanover, and the first sovereign of the Hanoverian line.
His mother was
Sophia, daughter of James I. of
England.
In 1681 he went to
England to seek the hand of his cousin, the Princess Anne (afterwards
Queen), in marriage, but, being ordered by his father not to proceed in the business, he returned, and married his
cousin Sophia Dorothea.
By act of the convention of Parliament in 1689, and by Parliament in 1701, the succession of the
English crown was so fixed that in the event of a failure of heirs by William and Mary, and Anne, it should be limited to the
Electress Sophia, of
Hanover, George's mother, passing over nearer heirs who were Roman Catholics.
By the treaty of union with
Scotland (1707) the same succession was secured for its crown.
By the death of
Sophia three months before Queen Anne died, George became heir-apparent to the throne of the latter because of failure of heirs, and he succeeded her. His son, the
Prince of
Wales, became openly hostile to his father in 1718, and at Leicester House he established a sort of rival court.
This enmity arose from the treatment of the prince's mother, the unfortunate
Sophia Dorothea (to whom he was much attached), who, accused of intrigue with
Count Konigsmarck, was divorced in 1694, and imprisoned from that time until her death in 1726.
George I. was a man of moderate intellectual ability, a cruel husband, a bad father, but not a bad sovereign, for he allowed able men to manage the affairs of the kingdom.
He was taken with a fit in his carriage, while on his way to Osnabruck, and died before he reached that place, June 10, 1727.
His son, George, by the unfortunate
Sophia succeeded him.
