Princess Anne did not write many letters that changed the course of a country. This one, addressed to her brother-in-law in November 1688, is usually counted as one that did.
The Letter Itself
The document is a single handwritten letter from Princess Anne, second daughter of King James II, to William of Orange. She wrote it on November 18, 1688, from her own apartments, known as the Cockpit, at Whitehall Palace in London. It is now held by The National Archives in the United Kingdom under reference SP 8/2/81, and it appeared in an online feature the Archives published on August 2, 2026. Nothing about the letter’s physical facts is in dispute: one author, one recipient, one date, one shelf mark.
What Anne Actually Wrote
What survives of Anne’s wording is modest but pointed. She tells William she is ready to “show you how very much I am your humble servant.” Of her husband, Prince George of Denmark, who had gone with the king toward Salisbury, she writes that he too will soon join William, adding that George will “do you all the service that lies in his power.” The letter was drafted on the advice of her allies Lord and Lady Churchill, and it amounted, in substance, to a declaration of her approval for William’s invasion. About her own plans she says less: she does not yet know whether she will stay at the Cockpit or move into the city, and says that will depend on what her friends advise.
What Happened Next
The following weeks are documented in sequence, though not always down to the exact day. On November 23, Lieutenant-General John Churchill and Lord Grafton, an illegitimate son of Charles II, deserted James II with about 400 officers and troopers, riding for Crewkerne, roughly 12 miles (19 km) from William’s headquarters. A few days later Prince George deserted his father-in-law at Andover. Anne herself left Whitehall by the backstairs with Lady Churchill at her side, and was escorted by the Bishop of London to Nottingham, where William’s supporters received her. James II, returning to London to find his daughter gone, abandoned his kingdoms not long after. A separate, later account gives the desertions and Anne’s flight specific calendar dates in late November, but that chronology is not confirmed by the Archives’ own narrative, which speaks only of “a few days” passing between events.
The Archives’ Reading
The National Archives does not treat this letter as something needing further inquiry. It presents it as evidence of a wider betrayal: proof that Anne, her husband, and their allies had coordinated against James II both before and during William’s invasion. That reading comes from the wording of the letter and from the sequence of events that followed it. No other document is cited alongside it, and no separate investigation is attached to the file. The conclusion rests on what Anne wrote, and on nothing beyond it.
The Question the Record Won’t Answer
The Archives is careful about one thing in particular: whether Anne felt guilt over betraying her father. Its own answer is that it is “difficult to say.” That is not a mystery being played up for effect. It is a plain statement of what the sources will and will not support. Two smaller gaps sit next to it. Anne corresponded with Mary during the spring of 1688, after James forbade her to visit her sister, but nothing of what the two women actually wrote to each other survives. And there is no document marking the moment Anne decided to break with her father, only this dated letter and the flight that followed weeks later. Both are gaps in the paperwork, not evidence of anything hidden inside them.
After the Fact
One later fact is on record, and it belongs on its own, separate from 1688. During her own reign, Anne publicly acknowledged the existence of her half-brother, James Francis Edward Stuart, later known as the Old Pretender, the same infant whose birth in June 1688 had helped set the whole crisis in motion. The Archives flags this as a possible sign that Anne reflected on her role in later years. It stops short of calling it proof of remorse. The letter she wrote from the Cockpit does not say what she felt either. It says only what she was willing to put in writing to the man about to take her father’s throne.