If you were to take a look at my (overcrowded ) bookshelves,
you’d find, in amongst all the romance
novels, the detective stories, thrillers, historical novels, there’s a very small separate section that has
three – no four books all on the same subject.
There’s A E W Mason’s Clementina
( A grand Tale of Loyalty and Betrayal).
Then there’s The Escape of The
Princess by Jane Lane. These two are
fiction. There are two other, factual titles. One is The Life of Chevalier Charles
Wogan ,A Soldier of Fortune [1922] by J.M.Flood and another, reproduced in a modern
paperback but that is a copy of the original
dating from 1719. It’s called The Rescue of Princess Clementina (Stuart): A
1719 Adventure of the Irish Brigades – and this one was written by Charles Wogan
himself. I’ve collected these books over
the years and I keep them on my ‘specials’ shelves.
Why?
Well, the answer to that is that
the Charles Wogan that these books are written about – or who writes his own
version of the story in The Rescue of Princess Clementina (Stuart) - is a
long ago ancestor of mine. My mother’s family is descended from the Wogan
family and I’ve grown up with the story of this Irish soldier whose tale is something of a delight for any
romantic novelist – here is a brief summary.
"The Chevalier" (Knight) Charles Wogan was born in
Rathcoffey. Wogan was a staunch
supporter of the Stuarts. He initiated the alliance which led to the marriage
of James Edward Francis Stuart (the Old Pretender), son of Charles II, to
Clementina Sobieski, daughter of John Sobieski, King of Poland. She was
apprehended, however, on her way to marry the Prince in Bologna. She was held
captive in Innsbruck in the Tyrol. Wogan arranged false passports with the
Austrian Ambassador and along with a small group feigning to be a Count,
Countess, the Countess’ brother (Wogan) and her maidservant, managed to gain
access to the princess. Following a quick exchange of clothing between the
princess and the maidservant, the party escaped in high winds and blinding snow
through the Alpine passes into Austria.
It’s rumoured that in fact Charles Wogan and Clementina fell
in love on their journey but that his loyalty to his king meant that he didn’t
press his own claim for marriage.
I always felt it was sad that if Charles and Clementina did
fall in love, that his loyalty and sense of honour meant that they had to be
separated so that he could fulfil his duty to his king. For a long time I’ve
wanted to rewrite the story so that Clementina and Charles could have that
happy ending.
Charles Wogan |
This is the story that was at the back of my mind when I
wrote my current release for Harlequin Presents - A Question of Honor. Instead of Charles, I have Karim who is sent
to bring Clementina home to go through with the marriage that has been arranged
for her ever since she was a child.
Karim thinks that this will be an easy
and quick job - until he meets
Clemmie. That’s when sparks start to
fly. And things get a whole lot more
complicated.
But I was determined that Karim and Clemmie had their happy ending – so if you
want to know how that happened, you’ll need to read the book.
The trouble is that now I’ve been talking about this past story, it’s made me want to go back a reread all the historical stories I have about my great – great- great .. (I don’t know how many greats!) long ago
Clementina Sobieska |
Do you have any interesting stories from your family’s past?
PS I’m so glad that the designers of the cover of A Question
of Honor didn’t ask me for a picture of the original Charles Wogan. He might
have been a hero, but neither he nor his Princess Clementina were exactly
lookers!
A Question of Honor is on sale in Harlequin Presents this month.
You can find out more details about it on my web site and read all my more up to date news about my books and what I'm doing on my blog or my Facebook page.
1 comment:
nothing that's fit to print
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