Months after promising England would help Holland escape the clutches of Catholic Europe, Charles II did a secret deal with France to sell out Holland and England together.
In 1668, Charles II formed the ‘Triple Alliance’ to stop Louis XIV of France from forcing Holland, a Protestant country, into a European league of Catholic states. Just two years later, egged on by his brother James, Duke of York, Charles not only offered to carve up Holland with Louis, but engaged to bring England along too. Barely a soul knew until Sir John Dalrymple broke the story a hundred years later.