Original subtitles

VOICEOVER: Georgian Britain.

Across the course of little more than a century,

a nation was transformed from an inward-looking state

that had just emerged from a bitter civil war,

to a global superpower.

But it wasn't English kings who oversaw this change.

It was German nobility shipped in from Hanover.

The Georgian kings were dysfunctional, detested each other,

and were loved and loathed by the public in equal measure.

There are satirical cartoons that depict him as a turnip.

(INDISTINCT SHOUTING) What starts off as a private quarrel becomes a public sensation.

If it looks like your dad has exiled your mum, that probably leads to a certain element

of dysfunction early on in life.

These are the backstabbings, feuds and betrayals

which shaped an entire era of British history.

Britain is continually at war in the 18th century.

The shocking stories of the Georgian kings.

His mother called him a monster.

He was so besotted. It's almost like stalker behaviour.

George goes, "Oh, it's not allowed?

"Well that's interesting. I'm going to do it anyway."

A time when in the monarchy it was mayhem.

George III, a monarch remembered for his madness in later life

and the brutal treatments he endured.

But his reign began with so much promise.

The first Hanoverian king born in Britain,

who would dedicate his life to his country and its people.

A devoted husband who created the modern image of a royal family.

But then his reign was shaken by events both at home and abroad.

The loss of the Americas,

revolution in France,

then finally, his own inescapable decline.

To understand the real impact of George's time on the throne,

you have to go back to a time long before these events,

when George was just a young prince whose future was bright.

On the 4th of June, 1738,

Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of George II

and heir to the British throne,

and his wife Augusta, welcome into the world George,

named after George II, the new-born's grandfather.

Frederick knew that life as an heir came with its unique challenges.

With his father George II in Britain, he had spent his childhood in Germany

without either of his parents,

and as a result, he has a difficult relationship

with his father, the King.

He wanted to make sure that young George's upbringing

would be very different.

Obviously knew that his son was going to become King eventually,

and I think he did the best to prepare him

with George III's education.

MAN: What we have is an heir to the throne,

who's born on British soil,

who is imbued with the values of the British Constitution.

He sees himself and is encouraged to see himself as extremely English.

So Frederick was more present and saw his son,

which is a great, great improvement upon the other kings and their sons.

I think, by all accounts, the relationship between Prince George

and Frederick, the Prince of Wales is pretty good

by Hanoverian standards.

As second in line to the throne, young George is being prepared

to fulfil his destiny to become King of Britain.

But what no-one could have predicted was that fate would intervene

and accelerate George's path to the Crown.

It was assumed that George's father, Prince Frederick,

would take the throne after the death of his father, George II,

but at the age of just 44, Frederick dies unexpectedly.

This was not planned for.

This was not expected in the slightest.

I think it was a great shock for the public, obviously.

Like, they thought they had the succession nicely lined up

and here we have the heir just popping his clogs very early.

What Frederick's death does for George is it changes the game

in a really unexpected way.

He's invited to step up to those responsibilities far sooner

than he would otherwise have been.

Despite his untimely death,

Frederick didn't leave 11-year-old George

entirely without a father's guidance.

He had been writing a book intended for just a single reader....

..his son.

I have a gift from your father.

It's a manual, a book of sorts.

Your father wanted to prepare you to rule,

to learn from the mistakes of the past.

Thank you.

It contains within it, uh, all of the key principles

that Frederick sees as crucial to the kind of continuance

of the Hanoverian dynasty.

In his own life, Frederick has observed his father George II

and his grandfather George I in the role of King,

and he's very aware of some of the mistakes they've made,

not least their ongoing commitment to Hanover and their refusal

to completely shake their German identity.

And Frederick is someone who's very focused on being British,

and it's something that he drums into his own son

in this manual to be a king.

And part of Frederick's duty is to mould him into the man

that he wants him to be, into the ruler that he'll need him

to be one day.

I think also that might have added to the pressure.

He's been given this thing when he was a child

and must have thought, "Oh, my God, I must live up to my father's expectations."

But it isn't only his father's expectations

young George now has to live up to.

George II, the man who had been such a distant father to Frederick,

was now taking a much greater interest

in the boy who would succeed him.

So once Frederick has died and is removed from the picture,

the young George is really thrown into the power of his grandfather,

George II, who is notoriously a little bit difficult.

He's had a very, very difficult relationship

with George's father, Frederick,

and George is expected to overlook this,

and to be obedient to his grandfather and to learn

from him as much as possible.

At the forefront of George II's mind must have been

the successful continuation of the Hanoverian line.

To do that, George must take a wife and sire an heir.

But the 21-year-old prince is in no rush to marry.

His mother decides to intervene.

George III himself, he never really showed a very active interest

in getting a wife.

So there was a bit of political manoeuvring

between George II and Princess Augusta.

Picking a suitable spouse for a monarch

was an incredibly complex process in the 18th century,

and getting it right was absolutely paramount.

You needed someone who not only would be able to provide heirs,

and healthy heirs at that, but also someone who could survive

and enhance court life.

Intelligent, curious, but not too intelligent, not too curious.

They must not overshadow the King.

That's very important.

I suppose you brought me here to talk about who it is

I am to marry.

Your grandfather and I have already selected two choices

befitting of your station.

I see.

Your grandfather suggests Sophie Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel.

and my choice - Fredericka of Saxe-Gotha.

My choice would put you in better stead.

I hear Fredericka has an interest in philosophy.

Yes. She's a very learned girl, by all accounts.

Well, then...

..she can't do.

What?

I am a pious man, Mother.

Marrying a philosopher is a dangerous undertaking for someone

who has faith, don't you think?

Where else to look?

Not in England, it would seem.

He had to look outside the country,

which left you with, how many Protestant princesses were there,

who were they, and how did you actually go about choosing a wife?

Reluctant to have decisions made for him, George decides to take

a more active role in the choosing of his bride.

Given a list of potential suitors, he strikes them all off except one.

There is another possible suitor.

A bit provincial, but not as educated,

if that's what you're worried about.

What's her name?

Princess Charlotte.

From this, the more surprising choice ended up being

Princess Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.

She wasn't necessarily an immediate first choice...

I don't think anyone would have actually

picked her out of the list that was there.

But she filled the bill.

She was 17.

She seemed to be amiable and amenable.

She seemed like she was rational and sensible.

They initially thought,

"Oh, yeah, this is like a really simple country girl.

"This will be, like, perfect for a queen."

With the choice made, Charlotte is summoned from Germany to England

to wed George.

Having never met, the chances of a love match are far from certain.

She speaks some English, not brilliantly.

And she's marrying a man who she's never met.

The first meeting was actually quite awkward.

She couldn't get her words out. She was confused.

There's rumours that she, uh, threw up over him.

She's visibly shaking.

She feels sick, but she goes ahead with it

because she has very little choice, because it's her duty,

because that's the pressure that's placed on her.

These kinds of royal relationships could be absolutely disastrous.

But despite their slightly awkward first meeting,

it is soon clear

that George and Charlotte are in fact a good match.

Come, let me show you around the palace.

DR AMY BOYINGTON: Luckily, their love story

actually took a better turn after their initial meeting.

He wanted to make it a success, but the fact that it then blossomed

into love was just a happy coincidence.

He's looking for a real partner on a human level.

She provides the foundation to his life and the foundation

to a fantastic relationship, and they have at least 25 years

of very happy times together.

ELAINE CHALUS: They were probably the most stable relationship of the Hanoverians.

They had 15 children.

It is all but expected for the monarch to take a mistress.

But George is different.

He not only loves his wife, but he is faithful to her

and never takes a lover.

It was very unusual for a monarch.

Especially when this was so common at the time.

It might have been because he didn't want to emulate his father,

or his grandfather, for that matter.

I suspect it was more because of the fact that he was quite concerned

about respectability,

morality,

sort of doing things by the book.

I think that the public embraced this.

I think he was seen as a bit of a breath of fresh air

in that sense, that he was actually a very moral, upstanding monarch

in comparison to past and present kings.

This notion of the royal family as an institution, I think,

is one of the real legacies that he creates.

But then, in the autumn of 1760,

the same year George and Charlotte meet and wed... (KNOCKS AT DOOR)

..George's grandfather, George II, dies...

Far sooner than he ever expects,

the 22-year-old heir to the throne

is now King of Britain.

DR AMY BOYINGTON: Probably thought

he had so many more years to prepare.

It really shook him to his core, and he took it much to heart.

When he eventually becomes King,

it's as someone who is very aware of duty,

of the weight that he is having to carry,

and he takes that very, very seriously.

He wants to be seen and sees himself

as the patriot king.

In parliament, he emphasises

the fact that he is British.

He says, "Born and educated in this country,

"I glory in the name of Britain."

And that really, I think, in a nutshell explains how he feels.

The old King had been on the throne for some people

more than their lifetime.

And so, consequently, this is a new start.

He's young and he's fresh.

He's a good-looking man.

It's a positive thing.

With the public behind him, George begins to draw

on his private passions to implement his vision for Britain.

George III spends a lot of time on his personal interests.

in a way, because he can make them national interests.

He's very interested in the kind of latest scientific developments.

He's hugely interested in natural science, in agriculture.

He was actually a pretty good architectural draughtsman.

The monarch, therefore, the nation can be identified or defined

through the buildings they're building.

And it's incredibly important to him.

It's very, very personal to him, as is patronage

of the arts and culture.

It's not just a hobby, it's part of his job.

He's a true man of the enlightenment.

But just as George's plans for the nation are set into motion,

and less than five years into his reign,

he is struck by a sudden illness.

So in 1765, George III had what might be considered

his first bout of madness, to use the term that they used

in the 18th century.

And it started with him coughing.

He had a fever.

Headaches, stomach ache and apparently blue urine.

He's sometimes delirious, he's aggressive,

he behaves in an erratic way, he shouts.

(GEORGE SHOUTS) The first period of illness took George III by surprise.

There was no previous indication that he was unwell.

The cause of George's illness has long been debated

by doctors and historians.

Today, it is generally agreed that he was probably suffering

from a form of bipolar disorder with acute mania.

So, medical understandings of mental illness were very narrow

in the 18th century.

Kings are meant to be infallible. They can't be ill.

They certainly can't be mentally ill,

because how can they then rule the country,

or how can we trust their judgement?

This was something that they hadn't necessarily encountered before.

Parliament were actually so concerned

that they very quickly rushed through a Regency Act.

The Regency Act proposed a process for which an individual

could be called upon to rule in place of the king,

should he be unfit to rule.

In this first instance, George stages a quick recovery,

but the knowledge that he might again fall ill sees him eager

to decide for himself who should act in his place.

It is decided Queen Charlotte will act as regent in my absence.

Your Grace, if I may, the Queen is not yet 21.

Only when she comes of age can she be named as regent

and the act enshrined into law.

What about my mother, Princess Augusta?

Well, I don't think...

What?

Maybe we should ruminate a little more.

No, this is to be signed into law immediately.

Your Grace, there's no hurry.

No, you don't understand!

If the next attack of this illness

is to prove more serious,

my country must be protected.

Do you all understand?

Yes, Your Grace.

There is a common conception that King George the Mad King

was always suffering from mental illness,

and it isn't the case.

That's a short bout of being unwell.

This was a very short illness.

He did recover quickly and the act was then repealed.

But what this does show is the immediate panic

that this particular incident caused,

even though it was quite short lasting.

His first bout of illness actually results in a huge rise

in public support.

So the fact that he gets through this illness and he survives,

it's really important to kind of how he's sort of perceived

across the breadth of the British public.

But just as soon as George stages a recovery, political disaster

is looming, not at home, but in Britain's colonies in America.

It's clear that the future of Britain's wealth lies

in this relationship with North America and all the goods

that can come from there.

MADELEINE PELLING: But they feel that they ought to have the right

to govern themselves, and that they're being ruled by a king

who is out of touch with their needs,

with the environment they live and work in.

From George III's perspective,

the Americans are sort of being unruly children.

They're rising up against their father, and that shouldn't be.

The American colonies are starting to grow restless

over their lack of autonomy.

But rather than take this into account,

George takes a roll of the dice

that would prove fatal to Britain's relationship with those colonies.

He increases taxes in America

to help pay for public spending in Britain.

There's a series of policies that are brought in

to try and make money.

The real frustration is that Parliament has decided not

to tax British citizens in mainland Britain,

and they offload that financial burden to the colonists.

The Americans say, "We're not going to pay for that

"if you don't give us representation."

And they're essentially the same as British people.

"Why are we getting taxed for no reason?"

There's growing resentment towards Britain, and specifically

to George III,

who's painted as a tyrant, ruling this colony from afar,

without any real care for the difficulty that people

there might be facing.

That's when the cracks begin to show.

The great surprise

is how quickly that relationship deteriorates.

The taxing of the American colonies is the catalyst that brings about

one of history's most famous acts of rebellion.

There were opportunities to back out,

but neither side was going to.

At that point, there was only going to be escalation.

These are the fuse boxes for what then becomes

the American War of Independence.

So uprisings start happening.

What Britain has to do to try and keep control of the Americas

is send military forces and effectively start to meet

the Americans in military conflict, in physical battles.

By 1775, Britain and America are at war.

In terms of George's third role in this, you know, no monarch

is going to want to lose his colonies.

He might not be riding into battle like a previous George,

but he is in lots of ways more engaged.

(THEY SPEAK INDISTINCTLY)

What are the updates on our troops in the north?

Washington has prevented a breakout in New York City,

while militia forces have conquered western Quebec.

And our response?

The winter has slowed proceedings to a snail's pace.

It is a stalemate, Your Grace.

Stalemate.

And the south?

The colonial forces are undermanned, underfunded

and underequipped.

I need accurate numbers on all of our troops.

How much provisions they need?

Food, supplies, ammunition.

If we are to win this war, we need a full picture of what is happening

on the ground.

And we ARE going to win this war.

Despite George's determination, British forces do not overpower

the fired up American troops, leading to one of the nation's

most significant historical defeats.

That arguably the kind of most modern military of the day

can't secure victory is a real shock.

They overthrow the rule of the British in order to create

a government for their own nation.

And on a global playing field,

Britain is seen as weak by other people

because they couldn't retain what they owned.

The colonies that Britain had spent 100 years or so

laying their foundations in are lost,

and George actually writes the words "America is lost" in his journal.

There is a huge kind of public disappointment,

huge public outrage at the loss of the Americas.

To lose, that, it's not just an economic failure,

not just a political failure,

but also a psychological one for George III,

because he then has to situate himself

in the context of his forebears

as the one who lost.

With Britain both defeated and globally humiliated,

George hits rock bottom.

Such is the depth of his despair that the King even comes close

to throwing in the towel.

He even considers giving up the Crown,

considering abdicating.

His responsibility is the nation.

His responsibility is the British Empire.

Any loss of that is a personal loss,

and that must have had a massive impact.

And for him to lose America is a huge blow that arguably, um,

takes its toll on his physical and mental health as much

as his political health.

The long term impact is a kind of refocusing, and a kind of

reconstituting of perhaps what it means to be British

in the aftermath of the American War of Independence.

To rebuild Britain's reputation and his own popularity

amongst his subjects, George turns to the one thing he thinks

he can count on - family.

DR VICKY RANDALL: For George III,

he has a new level of scrutiny

on him at that very time,

which no previous monarch would have experienced.

He invests really heavily in how he's perceived

and how his family are perceived.

So I think the way in which George starts to position himself

as a sort of...much more as a kind of family man,

one could see that as a kind of, you know, visceral reaction

and response to an unprecedented humiliation

on a global stage.

It is this narrative

George III tries to encourage everyone in the family to uphold,

but his often excessive and reckless first born young George

needs more convincing.

Do you know what I heard today?

Pray tell.

I heard that you enjoy the company of drunkards and gamblers.

And that he also had been cavorting with those

who have dubbed me a tyrant.

Have you called me here to chastise me

for my choice in friends?

No, but we must not be governed by our own desires,

but our sense of duty to our great country.

As such, we must regulate both our public and private life.

Why should this great country care

what I do behind closed doors?

Because if you've been already condemned by the people,

Parliament will not help you to achieve your aims.

Whether you care or not, what they think of you matters.

As soon you understand that, the better.

But it isn't just Prince George who is reluctant to stick

to the rules of his father's PR campaign.

George is really having to manage the family image when,

behind the scenes, it's a little bit of chaos.

His siblings weren't necessarily following in his footsteps.

George III's brother, Prince Henry,

was known as something of an adulterer.

He got into a dispute with Lord Grosvenor because he was caught

in bed with his wife, Lady Grosvenor,

and ended up having to give him around £10,000,

which would be over £2 million compensation in today's money.

And Henry isn't the only sibling disobeying George's rules.

His littlest sister was called Caroline Matilda.

She was married to the future Christian VII of Denmark.

He had a royal physician called Doctor Struensee,

and she fell in love with this amazing man

because he was a man of the enlightenment,

and so they struck up a relationship and got caught out.

Doctor Struensee was executed.

She was divorced and exiled within the country, and she died

never having seen her children ever again.

It's effectively sort of egg on the face of George

and Charlotte, who are trying to keep this extremely moral,

careful, regulated court.

To bring the royal family to order,

George III seeks the help of Parliament

and the Royal Marriage Act is introduced.

Any descendant of George III had to get permission

from the monarch to marry.

This was George III's way of trying to control who was able

to marry into the royal family.

But the challenges of George's reign are beginning to take

a psychological toll.

I think that he found that very hard,

and I think it deeply impacted his mental health

and made him spiral a little more quickly, perhaps.

Then a family catastrophe exposes the true severity

of George's illness.

In the 1780s, he loses two of his younger sons,

called Alfred and Octavius...

MADELEINE PELLING: ..who are one and four, when they die.

They die after smallpox inoculation,

and he's so hard hit

by the deaths of these two little boys

that he hallucinates and sees them.

He thinks that they're still alive, and he's caught,

like, having conversations with his sons.

And when he comes to again,

he remembers that they are dead all over again.

GEORGE III: A bed fit for a prince.

Octavius, my son.

You'll grow up to be a fine young man, I'm sure of it.

Now...

..let me tell you about the time when I met your mother.

No, no, no. Hie. We'll tell him.

It's a lovely story.

George's hallucinations mark the beginning of a prolonged

and severe bout of mental illness.

He goes through a long extended period of, you know, about - what? -

six months, I suppose.

Delusions of paranoia, of violence, of absolute nonstop talking.

And it's these kinds of elements of what they term sort of madness

or insanity that really characterise this

as much more of the madness of King George.

They bring in mad doctors to deal with him.

It's quite a horrendous situation.

And so they're trying to medically cure

his mental illness, but they didn't truly understand it,

so it was almost impossible for them to do it.

And that means subjecting the King to a variety of brutal treatments,

ones his devoted wife, Charlotte, had to watch him suffer through.

King George III was forcibly dunked into water.

He is bled repeatedly.

He was put into straitjackets.

Treatments that, of course, in his delirious state,

he cannot understand.

It was never going to cure him

and actually did more harm than good.

So that poor man went through a terrible time.

Nevertheless, and no thanks to months of quack treatments,

George makes a recovery...

..but only in time for trouble to loom from just over the channel,

in France, where revolution is brewing.

As we enter into the later 18th century,

we begin to see

the dismantling of the uncontested power of kings.

Already, the power of kings in England is limited,

but on the continent this has begun to shift.

By 1788,

France as a state is unable to function because the levels

of debt are so much higher.

You have the first estate, which is the clergy,

the second estate, which is the nobility,

and the third estate, which is everyone else.

All of the money is held

by the first and second estates, who do not pay tax,

and the third estate pay all of the tax.

Marie Antoinette and King Louis XVI

both got this reputation of being, um, these big spenders

and being really out of touch.

AMY FROST: This utter inequality

and lack of power to change those rules

led to the solution.

And the solution is just to remove those people entirely.

At that point, the revolution takes off.

The French Revolution begins with the storming of the Bastille,

the attacks upon the monarchy.

Which leads to the execution of King Louis and his wife

Marie Antoinette, and ultimately the end of the monarchy.

The impact of the French Revolution

is to create these fears in Britain

that the revolutionary fervour is going to spread.

There is a very keen sense

that this is not very far away from home.

That revolution in France was terrifying.

For George, that fear, that terror,

is that another king, Louis XVI, has been executed.

And if it can happen to that king, then it can happen to George.

This fear is only intensified when French revolutionaries decide

that reform in their own country alone isn't enough.

What the new French Republic tries to do

is export the revolution

to other monarchies,

which is essentially a declaration of war

on any constitutional monarchy.

So France declares war on Britain in 1793.

Never before has Britain, indeed, the monarchy itself,

been so in need of a strong and stable king

to lead them through this conflict.

But George suffers another personal loss,

which triggers his final and most extreme bout of illness,

one from which he never recovers.

His favourite daughter is Princess Amelia

and Princess Amelia

is suffering possibly from tuberculosis.

She died very slowly and painfully, and this took a huge toll on George,

and they both declined together.

That seems to be the final triggering point

that precipitates him into this final period

of manic depression, madness, dementia.

Pardon me, Your Majesty.

Your wife expressed that you needed my attention.

Not now! You're interrupting a private conversation.

Who is it you're talking to, sire?

Are you blind?

I'm talking to my daughter.

Your daughter?

Princess Amelia.

I see. She is dead.

I know.

I'm telling her about her funeral.

His last public appearance,

the symptoms of insanity were very obvious.

So he did not appear in public again after that point.

The minute that he is no longer able to even assume this idea

of being a figurehead, let alone have any contribution towards it,

the reliance on those military leaders, those tacticians,

those advisers, all of the people in Parliament that are actually

the people running the British side of the war becomes paramount.

George III isn't aware of any of it.

Given the country's desperate need for a stable ruler, the decision

is finally made that King George III is officially unfit to rule.

The Regency Act is set into motion immediately.

The workings of government

had been prepared

for this eventuality after

the first bout of mental illness,

and they moved very quickly to appoint George IV

as the Prince Regent.

Prince George was very excited to become the Regent.

He was a king in waiting and he wanted more power,

he wanted more money, and he desperately wanted

to be in charge.

Due to the King's health, we are authorised,

as per the terms of the Regency Act,

to name you Prince Regent in his stead.

Fetch me a bottle of brandy!

Brandy, your Grace?

We must celebrate. Celebrate?

Of course. I want a banquet for...

..a party thrown in my honour.

Prince George acts as Regent for nine years,

a period in which the war with France comes to an end,

with Britain victorious at the Battle of Waterloo.

All the while, his father, now having lost almost all grip

on reality, lives out the tortuous, tragic final years

of his life in isolation.

(GEORGE III LAUGHS MANICALLY)

Despite their loyal and loving marriage,

George and Charlotte's life together ends in heartache.

Charlotte spends her final years watching her husband deteriorate,

so much so that he forgets who she is entirely.

He didn't know that Queen Charlotte had died.

He didn't mourn her because he just had no comprehension

at this point,

It was much, much more serious and much more sustained.

Despite nearly a decade hidden away from his people,

and plagued by the depths of his suffering,

George III's death in 1820

marks the end of what still remains today

the longest rule of any male monarch in British history.

The great tragedy of George III is,

when he ascends to the throne, he's 22,

he is young, he is vibrant, he is intelligent,

he is charismatic, he is, you know, everything,

if you wanted to kind of have the idea of a male leader

in people's minds, people would have wanted.

And there is this kind of vitality.

And at the end of his reign, when he's in his 80s,

you have this really tragic kind of ending.

You know, all that intelligence, all of that vitality,

all of that physical health,

just being removed, and having a figure or an idea

of a figure who is dependent entirely on other people.

He cannot protect his people because he is entirely dependent

on other people.

George II's reign has been overshadowed by his madness,

because it was so shocking at the time to have a monarch

unable to rule,

and I think, as a result, it really scarred the public psyche,

and which is why we still remember it today.

But George's reign was so much more than his madness.

What George III offers throughout that period is continuity,

and I think also what he and those around him realise

is that, for the monarchy to endure, for the monarchy to survive,

it has to kind of modernise, it has to shift,

it has to evolve over time.

It's the period and the moment

in which the foundations of, you know,

I would argue kind of all forms of modern life

are thought through and tested and trialled for the first time.

A monarch's legacy is rarely easily defined,

but for George III,

a monarch who wanted nothing more than to succeed,

but who faced such profound personal and public hardship,

the success of his reign is more difficult to measure.

Whilst he may be remembered for his madness,

the changes George oversaw

and the virtues he had held so dear since the beginning of his reign,

undeniably changed Britain and kept him in the public's favour.