Kingdom of Hanover years of George III's reign and the reigns of kings George IV and William IV from 1816 to 1837, was Adolph Frederick, George III's youngest surviving son. When Queen Victoria succeeded to the British throne in 1837, the 123-year personal union of Great Britain and Hanover ended. Salic law operated in Hanover, excluding accession to the throne by a female while any male of the dynasty survived; thus instead of Victoria, her uncle in the male-line of the House of Hanover, Ernest Augustus, now the eldest surviving son of George III, succeeded to the throne of the new kingdom as
Invasion of Hanover (1757) negotiating table. Since 1714 Britain and the Electorate of Hanover had shared a single monarch. George II was ruler of both states – and the French believed they could exert pressure on him as King of Great Britain by occupying Hanover. In response Britain initially planned to hire 50,000 Russian troops to defend Hanover but later altered the plan by making an alliance with Prussia and forming an Army of Observation composed of Hanoverian, Brunswick and Hessian troops mostly paid for by the British government. A number of British officers, such as Jeffrey Amherst and Guy Carleton, were given commands