Charles II (King of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 1630-85) Autograph declaration unsigned, relating to the royal succession, autograph manuscript, 4 lines, 1 page, contemporary docket on verso: "His Maties declaration touching the succession", slightly browned, fold, old bookseller's catalogue entry lightly attached on verso, 47 x 195mm., 3rd March 1678/9.

⁂ "For avoid[ance] of any disp[ute] that may happen in time to come in the succession of the Crown I do hereby declare before Almighty God that I never gave any contract nor was married to any wom[an] whatsoever but to my present Wife Queen Kat. now being dat[ed] 3 March 1678/9." - Charles II.

"I never gave any contract nor was married to any wom[an] whatsoever but to my present Wife Queen Kat[herine]." This document, in which the king denies under oath that he has never been married to any woman apart from his queen, Catherine of Braganza, shows every sign of having been written hastily as a draft, perhaps under duress. The emergence of the Exclusion movement to remove the king's brother, James Duke of York from the succession in the wake of the Popish Plot compelled Charles II to declare unambiguously the illegitimacy of the Duke of Monmouth's claim to the throne.

Written three days before the opening of the new parliament in 1679, this document represents a vital part of Charles II's defence against the escalating whig campaign to exclude his brother, the Catholic James, Duke of York, from the succession. Rumours were rife that the king would declare his son, the Duke of Monmouth, legitimate. Earlier in 1679 the king had made a statement to four of his councillors that these rumours were unfounded, and on 3 March he repeated this solemn statement to the entire Privy Council, having written it out in his own hand and signed it. He ordered this signed document to be kept in the Council chest, and is now in the Pierpoint Morgan Library, New York. The present document differs only slightly in its wording (in particular "now being" for "now living" at the end). This could therefore be a draft for the final, signed, version. Despite this declaration, rumours continued to circulate and stories fabricated that Charles II contracted a marriage with Lucy Walter, Monmouth's mother, and that the marriage certificate had been hidden in a black box. This box was never found, but the persistence of the rumours led Charles to order a version of his declaration to the Privy Council to be printed in the London Gazette for June 8 1680.