Ernest Augustus I of Hanover

Ernest Augustus was King of Hanover fromJune 1837 until his death. He was the fifth son and eighth child of George III, who eleven years before Ernests birth had inherited the thrones of two kingdoms, Great Britain and Ireland, and also that of the Electorate of Hanover, still part of the Holy Roman Empire. As a fifth son, initially Ernest seemed unlikely to become a monarch, but SemiSalic Law, which barred women from the succession if there was a male descendent, applied to the succession in Hanover, and none of his elder brothers had any legitimate sons. Therefore, when in 1837 his niece, Victoria, became Queen of Britain and Ireland, ending the personal union between the British Isles and Hanover that had existed since 1714, Ernest became King of Hanover, which had been raised to a kingdom after the end of the Holy Roman Empire.

Ernest was born in England but was sent to Hanover in his adolescence for his education and military training. While serving with Hanoverian forces in Wallonia against Revolutionary France, he received a disfiguring facial wound. In 1799, he was created Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale. Although his marriage in 1815 to the twicewidowed Frederica of MecklenburgStrelitz met with the disapproval of his mother, Queen Charlotte, it proved a happy one. By 1817, King George III had only one legitimate grandchild, Princess Charlotte of Wales, and when she died in childbirth, Ernest was the senior son to be both married and not estranged from his wife. This gave him some prospect of succeeding to the British throne. However, both of his unmarried older brothers quickly married, and King Georges fourth son, Edward, Duke of Kent, fathered the eventual British heir, Princess Alexandrina Victoria of Kent, later Queen Victoria.

Source: Wikipedia