Henry Benedict Thomas Edward Maria Clement Francis Xavier Stuart, Cardinal Duke of York (6 March 1725 – 13 July 1807) was a Roman Catholic cardinal, and was the third and final Jacobite heir to publicly claim the thrones of Great Britain and Ireland, as the younger grandson of King James II of England.

His mother was the Princess Maria Klementyna Sobieska, granddaughter of the Polish King and Lithuanian Grand-Duke, John III Sobieski.

Attached to the French Royal Army, he was in nominal command of a cross-channel invasion force of some 10,000 men that never made it out of Dunkirk, and subsequently served under Maurice de Saxe at the siege of Antwerp.

On 30 June 1747 Pope Benedict XIV conferred the tonsure on him and created him Cardinal-Deacon of Santa Maria in Campitelli in a special consistory held on 3 July 1747.

His elder brother Charles, who was in France at the time, was not in favor of the ecclesiastical honors as he believed they would only serve to further religious prejudice against the Stuarts.

His income from abbeys and other pluralities in Flanders, Spain, Naples and France amounted to 40,000 Pounds in British money at the time.

[6]Louis XV of France bestowed on the Cardinal the abbeys of Auchin and St. Amand as compensation for having had to evict his brother pursuant to the terms of the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.

[5] In December 1752 his titular seat was changed to Santi Apostoli; and in 1758 the Pope named him Camerlengo of the Sacred College of Cardinals.

He lived and worked in Frascati for many years, descending each afternoon in his carriage to Rome, where his position as vice-chancellor entitled him to the Palazzo della Cancelleria.

This, in addition to the seizure of his Frascati property by the French, caused him to descend into poverty,[9] which resulted in the sale of the Stuart Sapphire.

Although the British government represented this as an act of charity, Henry and the Jacobites considered it to be a first instalment on the money which was legally owed to him.

[1] Contemporary accounts include the writings of Hester Lynch Thrale[13] (1741–1821), and the diplomat and writer Giuseppe Gorani [it; fr][14] (1740–1819).

Gorani admitted to having gathered evidence insufficient to confirm his suspicions either way, but drew attention to the number of handsome clerics that were to be found in Henry's palace.

Henry reacted by attempting to secure his financial independence, and refused to return to Rome from Bologna without Lercari by his side.

[citation needed] In his will he left the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom to the Prince of Wales, the future George IV.