Prince Rupert, the son of Elizabeth, queen of Bohemia, a grandson of James I, and first cousin to Charles II, was a noted German soldier and admiral. Rupert's varied and numerous scientific and administrative interests combined with his considerable artistic skills made him one of the more colourful individuals of the Restoration period.
Background
Prince Rupert, Count Palatine of the Rhine and Duke of Bavaria, was born at Prague, Kingdom of Bohemia (now Czech Republic) on the 17th of December 1619; the third son of the elector palatine and "winter king" of Bohemia, Frederick V, and of Elizabeth, daughter of James I of England,
A year later his father was defeated at the battle of the Weisser-Berg, near Prague, and driven from Bohemia.
Career
In 1633 Rupert was present at the siege of Rheinberg in the suite of the Prince of Orange, and in 1635 he served in this prince's bodyguard.
In 1636 he paid his first visit to England, was entered as an undergraduate, though only nominally, at St John's College, Oxford, and was named as the governor of a proposed English colony in Madagascar.
In 1637 he was again serving in the wars, and in 1638, after displaying conspicuous bravery, he was taken prisoner by the imperialists at the action of Vlotho (17th October) and held in a not very strict captivity for three years.
When the English Civil War broke out in 1642, he at once joined Charles I and was appointed general of horse, with an almost independent command.
He was a dashing cavalry leader in battle, but his rash impetuosity and overconfidence were major reasons why the battle of Edgehill (1642) was indecisive, and why Marston Moor (1644) and Naseby (1645) were defeats for the Royalists.
In 1644 he was made commander-in-chief, a position from which he was dismissed after his surrender at Bristol in 1645.
During 1646-1648 Rupert served as commander of English troops in the French army.
From this point until the close of the first Civil War in 1646 Prince Rupert is the dominant figure of the war.
His battles and campaigns are described in the article Great Rebellion.
In 1649 he commanded a fleet of eight ships sent to relieve the Royalists in Ireland, but he was driven off by a parliamentary fleet under Blake, who pursued him south to Lisbon (1650), and then into the Mediterranean, where Rupert did much damage to merchantmen of the new Commonwealth.
Refitted, his fleet cruised off the Azores in 1651, and a year later reached the West Indies, where several of his ships were lost.
From 1654 to 1660 Rupert was in Germany, but at the Restoration in 1660 he returned to England.
As Admiral of the White Squadron, he was active against the Dutch in the victory at Solebay in 1665, and in association with Monck in other naval actions in 1666.
In the second Dutch war he served with distinction as Vice-Admiral of England.