Tuesday, February 02, 2016

The Chevalier Wogan...

...was the man who, in the 18th century, succeeded, after various adventures, in securing the hand of Maria Clementina Sobielska, of the Polish royal family, in marriage to James Francis  Edward Stuart, of the British royal family.

The child of that marriage is known to history as Bonnie Prince Charlie.

And the Wogan family cherish their heritage and are proud of their ancestor's adventures and chivalric exploits.

I learned of this from Terry Wogan, with whom I had a fascinating conversation in a BBC radio studio, after an interview on his morning radio show.  I knew about the Chevalier story - my husband is a keen member of the Royal Stuart Society - and asked him about it, wondering if there was a family link...and of course he was keen to talk about it all...

A delightful, genuine, and throroughly nice man: he knew the Jacobite stories and the conversation was fun.  A rare, rare thing among modern broadcasters: a genuine sense of humour, plenty of self-mockery,a good general knowledge and a sense of history. And a Catholic, who attended Mass with his wife even though he claimed to have all sorts of doubts about his faith and was cynical about many aspects of Church life. A good man.

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