![Charles IV de Lorraine](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d8/Charles_IV_de_Lorraine.JPG)
Charles IV (5 April 1604,
Nancy – 18 September 1675,
Allenbach) was
Duke of Lorraine
The rulers of Lorraine have held different posts under different governments over different regions, since its creation as the kingdom of Lotharingia by the Treaty of Prüm, in 855. The first rulers of the newly established region were kings of t ...
from 1624 until his death in 1675, with a brief interruption in 1634, when he
abdicated
Abdication is the act of formally relinquishing monarchical authority. Abdications have played various roles in the succession procedures of monarchies. While some cultures have viewed abdication as an extreme abandonment of duty, in other societ ...
under French pressure in favor of his younger brother,
Nicholas Francis.
Life
He came to lose his duchy because of his notionally anti-French policy; in 1633, French troops invaded
Lorraine
Lorraine , also , , ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; german: Lothringen ; lb, Loutrengen; nl, Lotharingen is a cultural and historical region in Northeastern France, now located in the administrative region of Gr ...
in retaliation for Charles's support of
Gaston d'Orléans—who repeatedly plotted against Richelieu's governance of France under the childless
Louis XIII
Louis XIII (; sometimes called the Just; 27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643) was King of France from 1610 until his death in 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown ...
and treated dangerously with its enemies as a young
heir presumptive
An heir presumptive is the person entitled to inherit a throne, peerage, or other hereditary honour, but whose position can be displaced by the birth of an heir apparent or a new heir presumptive with a better claim to the position in question.
...
—and Richelieu's policies were always anti-Habsburg so as to increase the strength and prestige of France at the expense of the two dynasties. Gaston d'Orléans, frequently sided with either branch of the Habsburg family against Richelieu, who was ''
de facto
''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with ''de jure'' ("by la ...
'' ruler of France as its Chief Minister, and had to flee several times to avoid charges and trial for treason. His allies and confederates generally bore the price of these escapades by the young and impetuous heir and Charles IV was one such. On one visit to the ducal court at Nancy, the widowed Gaston fell in love with Charles's 15-year-old sister and married her secretly, which so infuriated the king that he convened the clergy of France and the Parlement of Paris to void the marriage, giving consent only on his death bed.
In that circumstance and sense, Charles was a casualty of the fierce
factional infighting in the French court between the King's brother Gaston d'Orléans, and
Cardinal Richelieu
Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu (; 9 September 1585 – 4 December 1642), known as Cardinal Richelieu, was a French clergyman and statesman. He was also known as ''l'Éminence rouge'', or "the Red Eminence", a term derived from the ...
, even though technically, Lorraine was subject to the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a Polity, political entity in Western Europe, Western, Central Europe, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, dissolution i ...
and the Emperor
Ferdinand II of Austria
Ferdinand II, Archduke of Further Austria (Linz, 14 June 1529 – 24 January 1595, Innsbruck) was ruler of Further Austria and since 1564 Imperial count of Tirol. The son of Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor, he was married to Philippine Welser ...
. Forced to make humiliating concessions to France, he abdicated under the French pressure and invasion in 1634 in favor of his brother,
Nicholas Francis, and entered the
imperial service in the
Thirty Years' War
The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (80 ...
and was victorious at the
Battle of Nördlingen. Shortly thereafter, Nicholas Francis too fled into exile and abdicated his claims, which were now taken up once again by Charles, who remained Duke of Lorraine in exile for the next quarter century.
In 1635, he tried in vain to recapture his duchy together with an Imperial army under
Matthias Gallas
Matthias Gallas, Graf von Campo und Herzog von Lucera (Count of Campo, Duke of Lucera) (Matteo Gallasso; 17 October 1588 in Trento – 25 April 1647 in Vienna) was an Austrian professional soldier during the Thirty Years' War. He distinguished hi ...
. The aggressive Charles and the defensive-minded Gallas did not go along well; while Charles urged to recapture his capital Nancy, Gallas preferred to entrench his troops at the
Seille to give them some rest after a long march from the Rhine. An outbreak of plague ended all hopes of further approaching Nancy. The next year, the Imperials sent Charles to the Spanish
Franche-Comté
Franche-Comté (, ; ; Frainc-Comtou: ''Fraintche-Comtè''; frp, Franche-Comtât; also german: Freigrafschaft; es, Franco Condado; all ) is a cultural and historical region of eastern France. It is composed of the modern departments of Doubs, ...
, where he lifted the French siege of
Dole
Dole may refer to:
Places
* Dole, Ceredigion, Wales
* Dole, Idrija, Slovenia
* Dole, Jura, France
** Arrondissement of Dole
* Dole (Kladanj), a village at the entity line of Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina-Republika Srpska
* Dole, Ljubušk ...
and advanced as far as
Dijon
Dijon (, , ) (dated)
* it, Digione
* la, Diviō or
* lmo, Digion is the prefecture of the Côte-d'Or department and of the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region in northeastern France. the commune had a population of 156,920.
The earlies ...
. Appointed captain general of the troops in Burgundy, Charles defended the core area of the Franche-Comté around
Besançon
Besançon (, , , ; archaic german: Bisanz; la, Vesontio) is the prefecture of the department of Doubs in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. The city is located in Eastern France, close to the Jura Mountains and the border with Switzerl ...
, Dole and
Salins against the French over the next few years. He also made repeated forays into the French heartland or into Lorraine to attack French garrisons. In May 1638, he advanced into
Bassigny, moved from there to Lorraine, recaptured
Épinal
Épinal (; german: Spinal) is a commune in northeastern France and the prefecture of the Vosges department.
Geography
The commune has a land area of . It is situated on the river Moselle, south of Nancy. Épinal station has rail connection ...
in August and besieged
Lunéville
Lunéville ( ; German, obsolete: ''Lünstadt'' ) is a commune in the northeastern French department of Meurthe-et-Moselle.
It is a subprefecture of the department and lies on the river Meurthe at its confluence with the Vezouze.
History
Lun ...
in September. Since in the meantime
Bernard of Saxe-Weimar was besieging the fortress
Breisach
Breisach (formerly Altbreisach; Low Alemannic: ''Alt-Brisach'') is a town with approximately 16,500 inhabitants, situated along the Rhine in the Rhine Valley, in the district Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald, Baden-Württemberg, Germany, about halfway ...
on the Upper Rhine, Charles was called upon to relieve it and attack the besiegers from two sides at the same time, together with the Imperial and Bavarian troops on the right bank of the Rhine. Bernard, however, used the advantage of the inner line and was able to repulse Charles at
Thann on 15 October as well as
Johann von Götzen
Johann von Götzen (1599 – 5 March 1645) was a Lüneburg nobleman and Generalfeldmarschall who fought during the Thirty Years' War. He was married to Elisabeth (d. 1631) of the Falke family, with whom he had two sons: Johann Sigismund, Count o ...
's attack on the siege positions around Breisach a few days later. The fall of Breisach on 17 December largely cut off Franche-Comté from the Empire and the rest of the Habsburg territories. Charles gave up the post of captain general in January 1639, reliefed the besieged castle of his second wife in
Belvoir and went to
Brussels
Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...
, where he hoped for a new command.
After Charles fought in the
Spanish Netherlands
Spanish Netherlands (Spanish: Países Bajos Españoles; Dutch: Spaanse Nederlanden; French: Pays-Bas espagnols; German: Spanische Niederlande.) (historically in Spanish: ''Flandes'', the name "Flanders" was used as a ''pars pro toto'') was the Ha ...
in 1640, where he took part in the
relief attempt of the Spanish army for
Arras
Arras ( , ; pcd, Aro; historical nl, Atrecht ) is the prefecture of the Pas-de-Calais Departments of France, department, which forms part of the regions of France, region of Hauts-de-France; before the regions of France#Reform and mergers of ...
, he re-entered negotiations with France in early 1641, which returned his duchy to him as a French protectorate in the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye of 2 April 1641, on condition that he refrain from alliances detrimental to France. Charles's confidant
Johann Wilhelm von Hunolstein
Johann Wilhelm von Hunolstein (french: Jean-Guillaume de Hunolstein; 24 April 1599 – 29 July 1664), also known as Hunoltstein or Hunoldstein, was a professional soldier in Lorrain, Bavarian and Imperial military service during the Thirty Years' ...
, who was serving in the Bavarian military, announced the Lorraine negotiations with France to Emperor
Ferdinand III and the
Bavarian Elector at the
Regensburg
Regensburg or is a city in eastern Bavaria, at the confluence of the Danube, Naab and Regen rivers. It is capital of the Upper Palatinate subregion of the state in the south of Germany. With more than 150,000 inhabitants, Regensburg is the f ...
Imperial Diet. However, as Charles continued to work against Richelieu and cover up the conspiracy of the
Count of Soissons This is a list of those who bore the title Count of Soissons (french: Comte de Soissons) and ruled Soissons and its '' civitas'' or diocese as a county in the Middle Ages. The title continued in use into modern times, but without ties to the actual ...
, he should be arrested after the Cardinal caught the conspirators. In July 1641, he managed to evade this by fleeing. He re-entered military service, fighting first on the side of the Spanish in Flanders, later in the south-west of the empire, where he took part in the
Battle of Tuttlingen in November 1643, in which he defeated the French together with
Franz von Mercy
Franz Freiherr von Mercy (or Merci), Lord of Mandre and Collenburg (c. 1597 – 3 August 1645), was a German field marshal in the Thirty Years' War who fought for the Imperial side and was commander-in-chief of the Bavarian army from 1643 to 164 ...
and
Johann von Werth
Johann von Werth (1591 – 16 January 1652), also ''Jan von Werth'' or in French ''Jean de Werth'', was a German general of cavalry in the Thirty Years' War.
Biography
Werth was born in 1591 most likely at Büttgen in the Duchy of Jülich ...
.
In 1651 Charles IV was approached by an Irish delegation who were seeking his support to defend Ireland from the
invasion
An invasion is a military offensive in which large numbers of combatants of one geopolitical entity aggressively enter territory owned by another such entity, generally with the objective of either: conquering; liberating or re-establishing con ...
of the
Parliamentarian army of England. Traditional accounts of the Cromwellian wars often dismiss the appeal to Lorraine as an act of desperation, but recently one historian has argued that the stateless Duke was in fact seriously interested in becoming the Protector of Ireland.
[O Siochru, Micheal ''God's Executioner'', p. 162] In the summer of 1652, a number of ships sent by Charles arrived at
Inishbofin island with supplies, one of the last strongholds of the Irish. Unfortunately Charles faced great opposition by the Irish Leaders
Clanricarde
Clanricarde (; ), also known as Mac William Uachtar (Upper Mac William) or the Galway Burkes, were a fully Gaelicised branch of the Hiberno-Norman House of Burgh who were important landowners in Ireland from the 13th to the 20th centuries.
T ...
and
Ormonde Ormonde is a surname occurring in Portugal (mainly Azores), Brazil, England, and United States. It may refer to:
People
* Ann Ormonde (born 1935), an Irish politician
* James Ormond or Ormonde (c. 1418–1497), the illegitimate son of John Butl ...
, both of whom were arch-royalists loyal to
Charles II of England
Charles II (29 May 1630 – 6 February 1685) was King of Scotland from 1649 until 1651, and King of England, Scotland and Ireland from the 1660 Restoration of the monarchy until his death in 1685.
Charles II was the eldest surviving child of ...
. Lorraine eventually concluded that Ireland had been destroyed ''by the jealousy of those who desired the loss of it, than they should be obliged for its recovery to the protection of his said Highness''.
In 1661, the French withdrew from Lorraine, and Charles was able to return to the Duchy for the first time. In 1670, the duchy was again occupied by the French under King
Louis XIV
, house = Bourbon
, father = Louis XIII
, mother = Anne of Austria
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France
, death_date =
, death_place = Palace of Vers ...
. Charles served in the Imperial armies in both the Thirty Years' War and the
Franco-Dutch War
The Franco-Dutch War, also known as the Dutch War (french: Guerre de Hollande; nl, Hollandse Oorlog), was fought between France and the Dutch Republic, supported by its allies the Holy Roman Empire, Spain, Brandenburg-Prussia and Denmark-Nor ...
(1672–1678), both of which secured French dominance on the Continent.
In 1675 he defeated
François de Créquy
François de Blanchefort de Créquy, later Marquis de Marines, 2 October 1629 to 3 February 1687, was a 17th-century French noble and soldier, who served in the wars of Louis XIV of France.
He came from a powerful and well-connected family, hi ...
at
Konzer Brucke, and died the same year in Austrian service.
The duchy was not restored to his family until more than twenty years later.
He is sometimes numbered as ''Charles III of Lorraine''.
Issue
![Charles Henri de Lorraine, Prince of Vaudémont, Sovereign of Commercy, 1708](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Charles_Henri_de_Lorraine%2C_Prince_of_Vaud%C3%A9mont%2C_Sovereign_of_Commercy%2C_1708.jpg)
Charles married first
Nicolette of Lorraine
Nicole (3 October 1608 – 2 February 1657) was reigning Duchess of Lorraine and Bar from 1 August 1624 to 21 November 1625, and duchess consort of Lorraine in 1625–1634. She was born in Nancy, the daughter of Henry II, Duke of Lorraine and Ba ...
, whom he deposed and replaced as monarch of Lorraine in 1625. They had no children and Charles abandoned her.
On 2 April 1637, he married
Béatrice de Cusance, Princess de Cantecroix (1614–1663), daughter and heiress of Claude-François de Cusance, Baron de Belvoir, (1590–1633) and of Ernestine de Witthem, Countess van Walhain, who had become the widow of
Eugene Perrenot de Granvelle ''dit'' d'Oiselet, Prince de Cantecroix, earlier that year; and had three children;
*Francis de Lorraine (1637–1638);
*Anne de Lorraine (1639–1720), married her cousin
François Marie de Lorraine
François () is a French masculine given name and surname, equivalent to the English name Francis.
People with the given name
* Francis I of France, King of France (), known as "the Father and Restorer of Letters"
* Francis II of France, King o ...
(1624–1694), Prince de Lillebonne in 1660, had issue;
*
Charles Henri de Lorraine (1649–1723), Prince of Vaudémont and of
Commercy
Commercy () is a commune in the Meuse department in Grand Est in north-eastern France. The 18th-century Lorraine historian Nicolas Luton Durival (1713–1795) was born in Commercy.
History
Commercy dates back to the 9th century, and at that tim ...
.
His marriage to Béatrice de Cusance was not deemed valid by the Roman Catholic church, which had not authorised his divorce from Nicole. The couple separated in April 1642 following his
excommunication
Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to end or at least regulate the communion of a member of a congregation with other members of the religious institution who are in normal communion with each other. The purpose ...
, which was the consequence of his second marriage; it was also the month in which she bore a son whom Charles recognised. More than 20 years later, on 20 May 1663, Charles married Béatrice de Cusance a second time, to allow
legitimation
Legitimation or legitimisation is the act of providing legitimacy. Legitimation in the social sciences refers to the process whereby an act, process, or ideology becomes legitimate by its attachment to norms and values within a given society. It ...
of their children. She died two weeks after this second marriage.
Charles married a fourth time at the age of 61. The bride was
Marie Louise d'Aspremont (1652–1692), the 18-year-old daughter of Charles d'
Aspremont-
Lynden, Count of
Rekem, and of Marie Françoise de Mailly. They had no children and in 1679, a widow, she married Count
Heinrich Franz von Mansfeld, Prince di
Fondi
Fondi ( la, Fundi; Southern Laziale: ''Fùnn'') is a city and ''comune'' in the province of Latina, Lazio, central Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. I ...
, by whom she had two daughters.
See also
*
Dukes of Lorraine family tree
The House of Lorraine (german: link=no, Haus Lothringen) originated as a cadet branch of the House of Metz. It inherited the Duchy of Lorraine in 1473 after the death without a male heir of Nicholas I, Duke of Lorraine. By the marriage of Fran ...
References
Sources
The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition* Michael O Siochru, God's Executioner: Oliver Cromwell and the Conquest of Ireland, Faber & Faber Ltd, London, 2008
{{DEFAULTSORT:Charles 4, Duke Of Lorraine
1604 births
1675 deaths
17th-century French people
Dukes of Lorraine
Generals of the Holy Roman Empire
French military personnel of the Thirty Years' War
Hereditary Princes of Lorraine
People excommunicated by the Catholic Church
Nobility from Nancy, France
Princes of Lorraine
Military personnel from Nancy, France