FERDINAND CHARLES III., DUKE OF PARMA.
(Vol. ix., p. 417.)
The late Duke of Parma was not the first lineal representative of the Stuarts, as stated by E. S. S. W. Victor Emanuel, King of Sardinia, who succeeded in 1802, left by his wife Maria Theresa of Austria four daughters. The eldest of these four, Beatrix, born in 1792, married, in 1812, Francis IV., Duke of Modena, and by him (who died on the 21st of January, 1846) had issue two sons and two daughters. The eldest of these sons, Francis V., the present reigning Duke of Modena, is therefore the person who would be now sitting on the English throne had the Stuarts kept the succession. He has no children, I believe, by his wife Adelgonda of Bavaria; and the next person in succession would therefore be Dorothea, the infant daughter of his deceased brother Victor.
Victor Emanuel's second daughter was Maria Theresa, who married Charles Duke of Parma, as stated by E. S. S. W.
The present Countess of Chambord is Maria Theresa Beatrice-Gaëtana, the eldest of the two sisters of Francis V., Duke of Modena. She is therefore wife of the representative of the House of Bourbon, and sister to the representative of the House of Stuart.
S. L. P.
Oxford and Cambridge Club.
Allow me to correct the statement made by your correspondent, that the Duke of Parma represented the Royal House of Stuart. The mother of the late Duke of Parma had an elder sister, Maria Beatrice, who married Francis IV., late Duke of Modena, and upon her death, in 1840, the representation devolved upon her son, Francis V., the present Duke of Modena, who was born in 1819.
P. V.
Allow me to remark on the article of E. S. S. W. (Vol. ix., p. 417.) respecting the House of Stuart, that he is in error in assigning that honour to the late Duke of Parma, and, as a consequence, to his infant son and successor, Robert, now Duke of Parma. The late Duke was undoubtedly a descendant of Charles I. through his mother; but his mother had an elder sister, Beatrice, late Duchess of Modena, whose son, Francis V., now Duke of Modena, born 1st June, 1819, is the unquestionable heir to the House of Stuart, and, as a Jacobite would say, if any such curiosity there be in existence, legitimate King of Great Britain and Ireland.
J. Reynell Wreford.
Bristol.