Michael Abney-Hastings, 14th Earl of Loudoun

The Earl of Loudoun
Pretender
Born	22 July 1942 (1942-07-22) (age 69) Sussex, England[1]
Throne(s) claimed	England
Pretend from	1 November 2002
Monarchy abolished	Complex situation regarding Edward IV's alleged biological illegitimacy.
Last monarch	see above
Connection with	The Duke of Clarence
Royal House	House of York (non-agnatic line)
Father	Captain Walter Strickland Lord
Mother	The Countess of Loudoun

Michael Edward Abney-Hastings, 14th Earl of Loudoun (born 22 July 1942) is a British Australian, who is most noted due to the documentary Britain's Real Monarch, which alleges him to be the rightful monarch of England instead of Queen Elizabeth II. He was born in England and educated at Ampleforth College in Yorkshire, but emigrated to Jerilderie, New South Wales as a teen, where he lives out life as a rice farmer and family man.^[2]

The claim for Abney-Hastings as a pretender to the English throne relates to his descent from George Plantagenet as his heir-general, tied in with the alleged biological illegitimacy of Edward IV of England.

Early life

Abney-Hastings was born in Sussex, England, to Captain Walter Strickland Lord and Barbara Abney-Hastings, 13th Countess of Loudoun. However, he grew up at Ashby-de-la-Zouch in Leicestershire where his mother is from, a town where one of his family's castles is located; Ashby de la Zouch Castle.^[1] As a youth he was educated at Ampleforth College a private Catholic school in North Yorkshire, before moving to Australia when he was 18 years old.^[3]

Claim to the throne of England

See also: Alternative successions of the English crown

In 2004, Britain's Real Monarch, a documentary broadcast on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom repeated the claim, disputed among historians, that King Edward IV of England was biologically illegitimate, and therefore that Abney-Hastings, as the senior descendant of George Plantagenet, 1st Duke of Clarence, is the rightful King of England. Were Edward IV illegitimate, his daughter, Elizabeth of York, from whom the current British royal family is descended, would be excluded from the rightful succession and Michael Abney-Hastings would be the monarch based on an unbroken line of Male Preference Primogeniture leading from William the Conqueror who became king of England by right of conquest in 1066.

Personal views and family

Abney-Hastings is a committed Australian republican and has expressed no interest in pursuing his claim to the throne, although he is amused by it.^[4] Abney-Hastings says he refrains from using his title publicly.^[5]

Abney-Hastings has two sons and three daughters with his wife Noelene Margaret McCormick (they married in 1969).^[6] His eldest son Simon Abney-Hastings holds the courtesy title Lord Mauchline. He is currently one of the seven co-heirs to the Barony of Grey de Ruthyn.

• The Lady Amanda Louise Abney-Hastings (born 1969)
• The Lady Lisa Maree Abney-Hastings (born 1971)
• Simon Abney-Hastings, Lord Mauchline (born 1974)
• The Lady Rebecca Lee Abney-Hastings (born 1974)
• The Hon. Marcus Willian Abney-Hastings (born 1981)

Abney-Hastings is a councillor of the Jerilderie Shire, elected in 2004 and re-elected in 2008.^[7]

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b} "Mike Hastings". Zoominfo.com. 24 October 2007. http://www.zoominfo.com/people/Hastings_Mike_490484571.aspx. 
2. ^ "Ashby Hastings Patron - The Rightful King of England ?". AshbyHastingsCC.HitsCricket.com. 24 October 2007. http://ashbyhastingscc.hitscricket.com/pages/page_291/TheRightfulKing.aspx. 
3. ^ "Getting to Know … Michael Abney-Hastings, 14th Earl of Loudoun". ConnectionNewspapers.com. 24 October 2007. http://www.connectionnewspapers.com/article.asp?article=82386&paper=67&cat=207. 
4. ^ Tibballs, 266
5. ^ Tibballs, 265
6. ^ Hull.ac.uk
7. ^ "Councillor Michael Abney-Hastings". Jerilderie Shire Council. 3 May 2006. http://www.jerilderie.nsw.gov.au/council/1014/1171.html. Retrieved 2009-03-20. 

References

Tibballs, Geoff (2005). Royalty's Strangest Characters: Extraordinary But True Tales from 2,000 Years of Mad Monarchs and Raving Rulers. Anova Books. ISBN 1861058276. 

See also

• Earl of Loudoun, in the Peerage of Scotland

External links

• Channel 4: Britain's Real Monarch

Peerage of Scotland
Preceded by Barbara Abney-Hastings	Earl of Loudoun	Succeeded by Current Incumbent
Preceded by The Rt. Hon. The Earl of Lindsay	United Kingdom Order of Precedence (gentlemen)	Succeeded by The Rt. Hon. The Earl of Kinnoull

Persondata
Name	Loudoun, Michael Abney-Hastings, 14th Earl of
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	22 July 1942
Place of birth	Sussex, England
Date of death
Place of death