George III (born George William Frederick, June 4, 1738 – January 29, 1820) was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland from October 25, 1760 until the union of the two countries on January 1, 1801; he then became King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. He was also prince-elector of Hanover within the Holy Roman Empire, then king of Hanover from October 12, 1814.
George III was the third monarch of the House of Hanover, but unlike his two predecessors, he was born in Britain and his mother tongue was English. The reign and life of George III, longer than those of any previous British sovereign, was marked by a series of conflicts which involved his kingdoms, a large part of Europe and territories as far as Africa, America and in Asia. Early in his reign, Britain defeated France in the Seven Years' War and became the dominant power in North America and India. The American colonies subsequently revolted and gained independence in 1783. Successive wars against revolutionary and Napoleonic France from 1793 ended in the defeat of Napoleon I in 1815.
Towards the end of his life, George III suffered from recurrent and then permanent insanity. His doctors did not know the cause of the disease and were unable to help the sovereign; he is now believed to have suffered from a blood disease called porphyria. Following a final relapse in 1810, a regency was established and George III's eldest son, George of Wales, ruled as Prince Regent. When the king died, he ascended the throne as George IV.
Historical assessments of the reign of George III have evolved over time. Very popular during his life, the evaluations of his reign were generally negative until the middle of the 20th century. Modern historians view him with more sympathy due to the events of his reign and his illness.
Youth
George was born at Norfolk House in London on June 4, 17382; he was the second child and first son of Prince Frederick of Wales and Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg. As George was born two months premature and was unlikely to survive, he was baptized the same day by the Bishop of Oxford, Thomas Secker. A month later he was publicly baptized at Norfolk House, again by Secker. His godparents were King Frederick I of Sweden, Duke Frederick III of Saxe-Gotha and Princess Sophie-Dorothée of Hanover.
George had no scars from his premature birth and grew up healthy even though he was a shy and reserved boy. His family settled in Leicester Square where George and his younger brother, Edward Augustus, were educated together by private tutors. Family letters show that he could read and write in English and German and comment on the political events of the time when he was only eight years old. He was the first British monarch to study science including chemistry and physics; in addition to lessons in mathematics, astronomy, French, Latin, history, geography, commerce, agriculture and law, he received lessons in sports, dance, fencing and horse riding. His religious education was exclusively Anglican.
George's grandfather, King George II hated the Prince of Wales and took no interest in his grandchildren. After Frederick's sudden death from a lung disease in 1751, George became the Crown Prince to the British throne. He inherited his father's titles and became Duke of Edinburgh and then Prince of Wales.
In the spring of 1756, as George was approaching his 18th birthday, the king offered him to settle in the royal residence of St. James's Palace but he declined the offer on the advice of his mother and his confidant, John Stuart who became later prime minister. George's mother, then the Dowager Princess of Wales, preferred to keep him with her to instill in him her strict moral values.
Wedding
In 1759 George fell madly in love with Sarah Lennox, sister of the Duke of Richmond, but Stuart expressed his opposition to the union and George abandoned his ideas of marriage, "I am appointed for the happiness and misery of a great people and therefore I must act contrary to my passion”. The king's attempts to marry him to Duchess Sophie-Caroline-Marie of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel were rebuffed by George and his mother; the Duchess would eventually marry Margrave Frederick III of Brandenburg-Bayreuth.
On October 25, 1760, George, then 22 years old, acceded to the throne as George III after the sudden death of George II two weeks before his 77th birthday. The search for a suitable wife then accelerated sharply. On September 8, 1761, he married Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz in the Chapel Royal of St. James's Palace, whom he met for the first time before the ceremony. Two weeks later, the royal couple were crowned in Westminster Abbey. Unlike his predecessors and his sons, he had no extramarital affair and George III and Sophie Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz formed a united couple. They had nine sons and six daughters. In 1762, George purchased Buckingham House (where Buckingham Palace stands today) which served as a second home for his family. His other residences were Kew Palace and Windsor Castle while St. James's Palace retained its official residence status. George III traveled little and spent his entire life in southern England. In the 1790s he took annual vacations to Weymouth which he popularized as one of the first seaside resorts in England.
Beginning of reign
In his accession speech to Parliament, George proclaimed "Born and educated in this country, I find my glory in the name of England". He added this sentence, written by Lord Hardwicke, to demonstrate his desire to break with his German ancestors who were considered more interested in Hanover than in Great Britain.
Although his accession to the throne was initially welcomed by members of all political parties, the first years of his reign were marked by political instability mainly linked to disagreements over the handling of the Seven Years' War. George III was also seen as more favorable to Tory ministers and he was accused by Whigs of being an autocrat. In the 1760s royal estates generated relatively little revenue and most of the monarchy's revenue came from taxes and excise duties. George III ceded control of royal properties to Parliament in return for an annual civil list for the management of his residences and royal expenditure. Rumors that he used the money to reward his supporters and bribe his opponents are dismissed by historians who say they "are based on nothing but lies invented by the disgruntled opposition". Debts accumulated during the reign of George III were settled by Parliament and the Civil List was increased from time to time. He gave large sums of money from his private funds to the Royal Academy and is said to have donated up to half of his personal earnings to charities. He bought many paintings by Giovanni Antonio Canal and Johannes Vermeer, among others, but it is as a book collector that he remains best known. The King's Library (now the British Library) was opened to scholars and the King personally purchased 6,000 books.
In May 1762 the Whig government of Thomas Pelham-Holles was replaced by that of Scottish Tory John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute. Opponents of Lord Bute circulated rumors of an affair with the king's mother and exploited the anti-Scottish bias of English opinion. Whig MP John Wilkes published The North Briton newspaper whose articles concerning Lord Bute and the government were inflammatory and defamatory. Wilkes was eventually arrested for libel of the government but fled to France to avoid conviction; he was expelled from the House of Commons and convicted in absentia of blasphemy and libel. In 1763, after the signing of the Treaty of Paris ending the conflict, Lord Bute resigned and the Whigs returned to power under the leadership of George Grenville.
Later that year, the Royal Proclamation of 1763 placed a limit on the westward expansion of the American colonies to promote the development of territories north and south and ease strained relations with Native Americans. The limit did not bother the majority of settlers who were farmers, but it was unpopular with an influential minority and played a role in the conflict between the settlers and the British government. Since American settlers were generally spared British taxes, the government deemed it appropriate for them to pay some to finance the defense of the colonies against Native American uprisings or possible French incursions. The settlers' opposition was not about paying taxes but about whether Parliament could levy taxes without the agreement of the Americans, who were not represented in Parliament. The British government rejected these requests for representation and in 1765 Grenville introduced the Stamp Act which required the addition of a revenue stamp to all American documents. As newspapers were particularly affected by this taxation, they became the main vectors of the opposition movement. At the same time, the king was angered by Grenville's attempts to reduce the king's prerogatives and he tried unsuccessfully to persuade William Pitt the Elder to accept the post of prime minister. After a brief crisis, which could foreshadow his coming illness, George III asked Charles Watson-Wentworth to form a government and dismissed Grenville.
Watson-Wentworth, with the support of Pitt and the King, overturned Grenville's unpopular Stamp Act but his government was weak and he was replaced by Pitt in 1766. The overturning of the Act by Pitt and George III was so popular in America that statues were erected in their honor in New York. Pitt fell ill in 1767 and Augustus FitzRoy replaced him but did not formally become prime minister until 1768. That same year John Wilkes returned to England and stood in the general election. He came first in Middlesex but was again expelled from Parliament. He was re-elected and expelled two more times before Parliament decided to invalidate his candidacy and choose the runner-up. Fitzroy's government disintegrated in 1770 and the Tories led by Frederick North returned to power.
George III was deeply pious and spent hours in prayer44 but his piety was not shared by his brothers. The king was shocked by what he considered to be loose morals. In 1770 it was revealed that his brother Prince Henry Frederick of Cumberland and Strathearn was adulterous and the following year he married a young widow, Anne Horton. The king did not consider her a suitable royal wife because she was from a lower social class and German law prohibited the couple's children from ascending the throne of Hanover. George III called for the introduction of a law that would prevent members of the royal family from marrying without the sovereign's consent. The legislation was unpopular, including with George's own ministers, but it was passed as the Royal Marriages Act 1772. Soon after, another brother of George III, Prince William Henry of Gloucester and Edinburgh revealed that he was secretly married to Maria of Gloucester and Edinburgh. The affair convinced George III that he had been right to introduce the law and neither woman was received at court.
Lord North's government was primarily occupied with growing discontent in America. To appease American opinion, most customs duties were removed, with the exception of those on tea. In 1773, ships docked in Boston Harbor were boarded by settlers and the bales of tea they were carrying were thrown overboard in an event that came to be called the Boston Tea Party. British public opinion became radicalized and Pitt agreed with North in declaring that the destruction of the goods was "certainly criminal". With the support of Parliament, Lord North introduced legislation that was dubbed the Intolerable Acts by the colonists:Boston Harbor was closed and the charter of the Province of Massachusetts Bay was amended so that the rulers of the colony were directly appointed by the king. Until that time, according to historian Peter Thomas, George III “hoped to obtain a political solution and he always followed the advice of his Cabinet even if he doubted their success. The detailed documents from the years 1763 to 1775 tend to absolve George III of any real responsibility in the American Revolution”. Even if the Americans called George III a tyrant, he was content to act as a constitutional monarch supporting the initiatives of his ministers.
American Revolutionary War
Following the Boston Tea Party, the colonists began to refuse British tutelage and the colonies established self-governments. Tensions grew and British soldiers clashed with American militiamen at the Battle of Lexington and Concord in April 1775. Petitions for a peaceful settlement of the dispute were ignored by the British Parliament and the rebel leaders were branded traitors by the Crown. The colonies declared independence by becoming the United States in July 1776 and listed their grievances against the King and Parliament. The Declaration accused George III of having “abdicated the government of our country…He has pillaged our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns and slaughtered our fellow citizens.” The equestrian statue of the sovereign in New York was dismantled. The British captured the city in 1776 but lost Boston and their plan to invade New England from Canada failed with the defeat of General John Burgoyne in the Battle of Saratoga.
George III is often criticized for having persisted in the war waged against the colonists of America despite the advice of his ministers. For the writer George Trevelyan, the king was determined “never to recognize the independence of the Americans and to punish their rebellion by the indefinite prolongation of a war which promised to be eternal”. The king wanted “to keep the rebels harassed, anxious and poor until the day when, by a natural and inevitable process, discontent and disappointment will have turned into penance and remorse”. More modern studies defend the behavior of George III by arguing that at the time no king would have abandoned such a large territory and argue that his conduct was much less ruthless than that of other European sovereigns54. After the defeat at Saratoga, Parliament and the British favored war; recruitments were numerous and if the opponents were active, they were only a small minority. Because of the reverses in America, Prime Minister North requested that power be transferred to Pitt, whom he considered more capable; George III refused this proposal and asked Pitt to serve North. Pitt declined the offer and died a few months later. At the beginning of 1778, France signed a treaty of alliance with the United States and the conflict became international. France and the United States were soon joined by Spain and the United Provinces while Britain remained isolated. Lord Gower and Lord Weymouth resigned from government and Lord North again asked for the right to resign; he nevertheless remained in office because of the insistence of the sovereign. Public opinion began to turn over the cost of the conflict and this opposition contributed to the anti-Catholic riots in London in June 1780.
Until 1780, the loyalists could believe in a victory because the British troops won many battles like those of Camden and Guilford Court House. However, when news of Charles Cornwallis' defeat at the Battle of Yorktown reached London in late 1781, Lord North resigned as Prime Minister as his parliamentary support eroded. The king wrote a proclamation of abdication that was never delivered and accepted defeat in North America. He authorized peace negotiations which led to the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783 by which Great Britain recognized the independence of the United States. When John Adams was appointed ambassador to London in 1785, George III was resigned to the new relationship between his country and its former colonies. He told Adams, “I was the last to consent to the separation; but the separation having been effected and having become inevitable, I have always said, as I say now, that I will be the first to recognize the United States as an independent power”.
Constitutional struggle
With the fall of North's government in 1782, Lord Rockingham became Prime Minister for the second time but died a few months later. The King then appointed Lord Shelburne to replace him. Charles James Fox nevertheless refused to participate in its administration and he requested the appointment of William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland. In 1783 the House of Commons forced Lord Shelburne to resign and his government was replaced by the Fox-North coalition. Lord Portland became Prime Minister and Fox and North became Foreign Secretary and Home Secretary respectively.
The king deeply hated Fox, both his policies and his personality; he considered Fox to be unscrupulous and a bad influence on the Prince of Wales. George III resented not being able to choose the ministers of his choice, but Portland's government quickly mustered a majority and therefore could not be removed easily. He was further disappointed when the government introduced the India Bill which proposed to reform the administration of India by transferring political power from the British East India Company to Parliamentary Commissioners. Even though the King advocated greater control over the Company, the proposed commissioners were all political allies of Fox. Immediately after the Act was passed by the House of Commons, George III asked George Nugent-Temple-Grenville to inform the House of Lords that he would consider anyone who voted in favor of the legislation an enemy. . The law was rejected by the lords and Lord Portland resigned three days later; he was succeeded by William Pitt the Younger and George Nugent-Temple-Grenville became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. On December 17, 1783, Parliament passed a motion that called the influence of the sovereign in the parliamentary vote a “great crime” and George Nugent-Temple-Grenville was forced to resign. The departure of the Secretary of State destabilized the government for the next three months and he lost his majority. Parliament was dissolved, but the election of 1784 gave Pitt a firm footing.
William Pitt
For George III, Pitt's appointment was a great victory and it proved that he was capable of choosing prime ministers on the basis of what he believed to be public opinion without having to follow the recommendations of the majority at the Communal room. Throughout the tenure of the Pitt administration, George III pursued most of his political aims and created new lords at an unprecedented rate to increase the number of Pitt supporters in the House of Lords. George III was then extremely popular in Great Britain because of his piety and his loyalty to his wife. He adored his children and was devastated by the infant deaths of two of his sons in 1782 and 1783. He nevertheless instituted a rigorous program of education so that they would follow a pious and virtuous life. When his children, when they became adults, departed from these principles, George III was very affected.
The sovereign's health began to deteriorate in the 1780s. He suffered from mental disorders which were possibly linked to a blood disease called porphyria, although this diagnosis has been questioned. A study on strands of George III's hair published in 2005 revealed a high level of arsenic, which may have been the trigger for this disease. Its origin is unknown but it may have been used in medicine or cosmetics. The King may have had a brief bout of the disease in 1765 but a longer episode began in the summer of 1788. At the end of the parliamentary session he traveled to the spa town of Cheltenham to recuperate. This was the farthest place from London (160 km) where he went but his condition worsened. In November, he was seriously ill and sometimes spoke for long hours without stopping. False stories circulated about his illness, such as the one where he wanted to shake hands with a tree he thought was the King of Prussia. The treatment of mental illnesses was then primitive and the king's physicians tried to cure him by forcibly immobilizing him until he was calm or by applying caustic poultices to banish "bad moods".
In November 1788, when Parliament was summoned, Fox and Pitt argued over the establishment of a regency during the monarch's incapacitation. Both men agreed that it would be best for the Prince of Wales, eldest son and heir of George III, to become regent. Nevertheless Fox suggested that the regent be given all the powers of the sovereign while Pitt, who feared he would be sacked if the Prince of Wales ascended the throne, proposed that the regent be appointed by Parliament and his powers be limited. In February 1789, the Regency Act authorizing the Prince of Wales to act as Prince Regent, was passed by the House of Commons but George III recovered before the House of Lords could vote.
French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars
After George III's health improved, his popularity and that of Pitt continued to rise at the expense of those of Fox and the Prince of Wales.
Two demented assailants, Margaret Nicholson and John Frith attempted to assassinate the king in 1786 and 1790 respectively, but George III's humane and understanding treatment of the aggressors was hailed by public opinion. On May 15, 1800, James Hadfield, an equally demented ex-soldier, shot at the royal balcony of the Drury Lane theater where the king was. The shot missed, and George III was so unaffected by the incident that he fell asleep during the intermission.
The French Revolution of 1789 and the abolition of the monarchy in 1792 worried British landowners. When France declared war on Britain in 1793, George III authorized Pitt to raise taxes, create military units, and suspend habeas corpus. The First Coalition which brought together Austria, Prussia and Spain broke up in 1795 with the withdrawal of Prussia and Spain. After the French victory in 1797, a Second Coalition bringing together Austria, Russia and the Ottoman Empire was defeated in 1800. Great Britain was therefore left alone to fight Napoleon Bonaparte, first consul of the First Republic.
A brief lull in hostilities allowed Pitt to concentrate his efforts in Ireland where an uprising took place in 1798 with French support. In 1800, the British and Irish parliaments passed the Act of Union which came into force on January 1, 1801 and united Great Britain and Ireland into a single state called the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. George III took the opportunity to give up the title of "king of France" that English and British sovereigns had claimed since the reign of Edward III. It was suggested that George III adopt the title "Emperor of the British Isles" but he refused. As part of his Irish policy, Pitt considered removing some legal restrictions on Catholics. George III categorically refused, arguing that the emancipation of Catholics would be a violation of his coronation oath which stipulated the maintenance of Protestantism in the kingdom. Faced with the opposition of the sovereign and public opinion to his religious reforms, Pitt threatened to resign. At the same time, the king again began to suffer from mental disorders and he blamed worries about the Catholic question as the cause. Pitt was formally replaced on May 14, 1801 by the Speaker of the House of Commons, Henry Addington. The latter opposed emancipation and, faced with the catastrophic state of finances, signed peace with France in 1802.
George III did not consider peace with France a reality; for him it was an “experiment”. In May 1803 the war began again but public opinion did not trust Addington to lead the war and demanded the return of Pitt. An invasion of England seemed imminent and many volunteers showed up to defend the country. The king's review of 27,000 volunteers on 26 and 28 October 1803 in Hyde Park, at the height of fear of invasion, drew 500,000 spectators. The Times declared that "the enthusiasm of the multitude was beyond description." George III wrote to his friend Bishop Richard Hurd:"We are here daily waiting for Bonaparte to carry out his threat of invasion... If his troops manage to land, I will not fail to put myself at the head of mine, and to my other armed subjects, to repel them”. After Nelson's victory in the naval battle of Trafalgar, the threat of invasion receded.
In 1804, George III was again affected by his intermittent illness; after his recovery, Addington resigned and Pitt returned to power. Pitt considered appointing Fox to his administration but George III refused. William Grenville considered this an injustice to Fox and refused to join the government. Pitt concentrated all his efforts on forming a new coalition with Austria, Russia and Sweden. The Third Coalition failed like the two previous ones and collapsed in 1805. The struggle against France took the toll on the health of William Pitt, who died in 1806. Grenville became Prime Minister and his Ministry of All Talents included Fox. The king was conciliatory with him, but after Fox's death in September 1806, George III and his government came into open conflict. To increase army recruiting, the administration introduced a measure in February 1807 to allow Catholics to serve in all ranks of the armed forces. Not only did George III refuse this proposal, but he had the members of the Grenville government draw up an agreement so that this measure would never be applicable in the future. The ministers agreed to abandon this legislation but refused to comment on the future. They were sacked and William Cavendish-Bentinck nominally became prime minister, although power rested with Chancellor of the Exchequer Spencer Perceval. Parliament was dissolved and the general election of 1807 gave the government a large majority in the House of Commons. George III made no other important decisions during his reign; the replacement of Cavendish-Bentinck by Perceval in 1809 was of little importance.
End of life
In late 1810, at the height of his popularity, George III became gravely ill, nearly blind from cataracts, and suffered from rheumatism. He considered the disease to have been triggered by the death of his youngest and favorite daughter, Princess Amélie. The Princess's nurse reported that "the scenes of distress and daily crying... were sad beyond description". En 1811, George III accepta la loi de Régence et le prince de Galles resta prince-régent jusqu’au décès de son père. Malgré des signes de convalescence en mai 1811, le roi avait sombré dans une aliénation complète et permanente et il vécut isolé dans le château de Windsor jusqu’à sa mort.
Le premier ministre Spencer Perceval fut assassiné en 1812 (il fut le seul Premier ministre britannique victime d’un assassinat) et fut remplacé par Robert Jenkinson. Il présida à la victoire britannique lors des guerres napoléoniennes et le congrès de Vienne accorda d’importants gains territoriaux au Hanovre qui devint un royaume.
Dans le même temps, la santé de George III continua de se dégrader. Il présenta les signes de démence, devint complètement aveugle et de plus en plus sourd. Il fut incapable de comprendre son accession au trône de Hanovre en 1814 ou la mort de son épouse en 1818. Avant Noël 1819, il parla de manière incohérente pendant 58 heures, et dans les dernières semaines de sa vie, il fut incapable de marcher.
George III décéda à 20 h 38 le 29 janvier 1820 au château de Windsor, six jours après le décès de son quatrième fils, le prince Édouard-Auguste de Kent. Son fils préféré le prince Frederick d’York l’accompagna dans ses derniers moments. George III fut inhumé le 16 février dans la chapelle Saint-George du château de Windsor.
Les successeurs de George III, ses fils George IV et Guillaume IV, moururent tous deux sans enfants légitimes. Après leur mort, la seule fille légitime du duc de Kent, Victoria, monta sur le trône et elle devint le dernier monarque de la Maison de Hanovre.
Héritage
Dans A new way to pay the National Debt (1786), James Gillray caricature la reine Charlotte et George III recevant de la part de Pitt de nombreux sacs remplis d’or destinés à couvrir les dépenses royales
George III vécut pendant 81 ans et 239 jours et régna pendant 59 ans et 96 jours. Sa vie et son règne furent plus longs que ceux de tous ses prédécesseurs. Seules Victoria et Élisabeth II ont vécu et régné plus longtemps.
George III fut surnommé « George le fermier » par les satiristes initialement pour moquer son intérêt des sujets prosaïques par rapport aux questions politiques puis pour marquer sa différence par rapport à la grandiloquence de son fils et le représenter comme un homme du peuple. Sous le règne de George III qui était passionné par l’agriculture, la révolution agricole atteignit son apogée et de nombreux progrès furent réalisés dans les domaines scientifiques et industriels. La population rurale augmenta fortement et elle fournit une grande part de la main d’œuvre nécessaire à la révolution industrielle. La collection d’instruments scientifiques et mathématiques de George III est aujourd’hui exposée au Science Museum de Londres; il finança la construction et l’entretien du télescope de 40 pieds (12,2 m) de focale de William Herschel qui était alors le plus grand au monde. Lorsque Herschel découvrit la planète Uranus en 1781 avec ce télescope, il la nomma Sidus Georgium (« étoile de George ») en son honneur.
George III espérait que « les langues malveillantes ne peignent pas [ses] intentions dans les couleurs qu’elle admire ou que les flagorneurs ne [le] louent au-delà de ce [qu’il mérite] » mais dans l’esprit du public, il a été à la fois diabolisé et loué. Bien que populaire au début de son règne, George devint la cible des révolutionnaires américains même si environ la moitié des colons resta loyal à la monarchie. Les griefs listés dans la Déclaration d’indépendance des États-Unis étaient présentés comme des « injustices et des usurpations répétées » qui avaient pour objectif d’établir une « tyrannie absolue » sur les colonies. Les termes de la Déclaration ont contribué à ce que George III soit considéré comme un tyran par l’opinion américaine. Les études contemporaines sur la vie de George III se divisaient en deux camps :l’un décrivant les « opinions dominantes vers la fin de son règne quand le roi était devenu un symbole vénéré de résistance aux idées et au pouvoir français » tandis que l’autre « tire ses vues sur le roi des âpres luttes partisanes dans les deux premières décennies de son règne et exprime l’opinion de l’opposition dans ses travaux ». En s’appuyant sur ce deuxième type d’études, les historiens britanniques du XIXe siècle et du début du XXe siècle comme George Trevelyan et Erskine May défendirent des interprétations hostiles du règne de George III. Néanmoins, les travaux de Lewis Bernstein Namier (en) au milieu du XXe siècle qui considérait que George était « énormément calomnié » entraînèrent une réévaluation de sa personnalité et de son règne. Les historiens de la fin du XXe siècle comme Herbert Butterfield ou Richard Pares tendent ainsi à le traiter avec plus de sympathie en le considérant comme la victime des événements et de la maladie. Ainsi en combattant les colons américains, George III croyait qu’il défendait le droit d’un Parlement élu à lever des taxes et ne cherchait pas particulièrement à étendre son pouvoir ou ses prérogatives. Les historiens considèrent que durant le long règne de George III, la monarchie continua de perdre son pouvoir politique et elle devint l’incarnation de la moralité nationale.
George III a été joué à l’écran par :
Robert Morley dans le film Le Beau Brummel (1954) basé sur la pièce de théâtre de Clyde Fitch
Eric Pohlmann dans le film John Paul Jones, maître des mers (1959)
Eric Pohlmann dans la série L’Épouvantail (1963)
Graham Chapman dans l’épisode The Golden Age of Ballooning de la série Monty Python’s Flying Circus (1974)
Roger Booth dans le film Barry Lyndon (1975) basé sur le roman de William Makepeace Thackeray
Gertan Klauber dans l’épisode Duel et dualisme de la série La Vipère noire (1987)
David Warner dans le docufiction The American Revolution (1994)
Nigel Hawthorne dans le film La Folie du roi George (1994) pour lequel il fut nommé pour l’Oscar du meilleur acteur
Nicholas Rowe dans la série Longitude (2000)
Mark Hadlow dans l’épisode Un opéra mortel de la série Jack, le vengeur masqué (2000)
Charles Shaughnessy (voix) dans la série animée Liberty’s Kids :Est. 1776 (2002)
Tom Hollander dans la série John Adams (2008)
Titres, honneurs
Titres
4 juin 1738 - 31 mars 1751 :Son Altesse royale le prince George115
31 mars 1751 - 20 avril 1751 :Son Altesse royale le duc d’Édimbourg
20 avril 1751 - 25 octobre 1760 :Son Altesse royale le prince de Galles
25 octobre 1760 - 29 janvier 1820 :Sa Majesté le roi
En Grande-Bretagne, George III portait le titre officiel de « George III, par la Grâce de Dieu, roi de Grande-Bretagne, de France et d’Irlande, Défenseur de la Foi, etc. » En 1801, lorsque la Grande-Bretagne s’unit avec l’Irlande, il abandonna le titre de roi de France que tous les souverains anglais et britannique revendiquaient depuis Édouard III. Son titre devint alors « George III, par la Grâce de Dieu, roi du Royaume-Uni de Grande-Bretagne et d’Irlande, Défenseur de la Fo ».
Dans le Saint-Empire, il était duc de Brunswick-Lunebourg, architrésorier et prince-électeur du Saint-Empire romain germanique jusqu’à la dissolution du Saint-Empire en 1806. Il resta alors duc jusqu’à ce que le congrès de Vienne ne le proclame roi de Hanovre en 1814.
Honneurs
1749 :Chevalier du très noble Ordre de la Jarretière
1760 :Souverain du très noble Ordre de la Jarretière
1760 :Chevalier du très ancien et très noble Ordre du Chardon
1760 :Souverain du très noble et très ancien Ordre du Bain
1783 :Souverain du très honorable ordre de Saint-Patrick
1815 :Souverain de l’Ordre royal des Guelfes
1818 :Souverain du très distingué Ordre de Saint-Michel et Saint-Georges