Maurice of the Palatinate (16 January 1621-1 September 1652) was an English Cavalier general and admiral during the English Civil War.
Biography[]
Maurice of the Palatinate was born in Kustrin, Brandenburg on 16 January 1621, the fourth son of Frederick V of Palatinate and Elizabeth of Bohemia; he was the brother of Prince Rupert of the Rhine and the grandson of James I of England. In 1642, he accompanied his older brother to serve under their uncle Charles I of England during the English Civil War, and he was wounded at the Battle of Powick Bridge before fighting at the Battle of Edgehill. In 1643, he engaged in several battles against William Waller in Gloucestershire, winning the Battle of Roundway Down before taking command of the Cavalier army in Cornwall. In 1644, he failed to take Lyme Regis by siege, and he later served as his brother's deputy at the 1645 Battle of Naseby. In October 1646, following the end of the First English Civil War, he and Rupert were banished, and he served with the French army in Flanders before becoming Vice-Admiral of Rupert's fleet in 1648. He was created a Knight of the Garter in exile in 1649, and he died when his flagship HMS Defiance sunk in a hurricane off the Virgin Islands in 1652.