He was the last King of the Two Sicilies as successive invasions by Giuseppe Garibaldi and Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia ultimately brought an end to his rule, as part of Italian unification.

His education had been much neglected and he proved a man of weak character, greatly influenced by his stepmother, Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria, whom he feared, and also by the priests and the camarilla, the reactionary court set.

[1] On 3 February 1859 in Bari, Francis married Duchess Maria Sophie of Bavaria, of the royal Bavarian house of Wittelsbach (a younger sister of Empress Elisabeth "Sissi" of Austria).

For the post of prime minister, he at once appointed Carlo Filangieri, who realised the importance of the Franco-Piedmontese victories in Lombardy and advised Francis II to accept the alliance with the Kingdom of Sardinia proposed by Cavour.

On 7 June, a part of the Swiss Guard mutinied, and while the king mollified them by promising to redress their grievances, General Alessandro Nunziante gathered his troops, who surrounded the mutineers and shot them down.

After long hesitations and even an appeal to Garibaldi himself and on the advice of Romano, Francis II left Naples on 6 September with his wife, Maria Sophie; the court; and the diplomatic corps (except the French and British ministers) and went by sea to Gaeta, where a large part of the army was concentrated.

Francis and Maria Sophie first lived in Rome as guests of the Pope, where they maintained a government in exile that was recognised by some Catholic powers, including France, Spain, Austria-Hungary and Bavaria.