Henry the VIII

Born: 28 June 1491
Greenwich Palace

 Died: 28 January 1547
Whitehall Palace

Buried: 16 February 1547
St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle

Henry VIII became king of England when he was seventeen. Henry was very fond of hunting, gambling and dancing and only spent about an hour a day on government business. He relied heavily on his Lord Chancellor and other government ministers to run the country.
It was very important to Henry that his wife, Katherine of Aragon, should give birth to a male child. Without a son to take over from him when he died, Henry feared that the Tudor family would lose control of England. Catherine gave birth to six children but five died within a few weeks of being born. Only one child, Mary, survived into adulthood.
In 1526 Henry got to know Anne Boleyn, Katherine's maid of honour. She was a good musician and a talented singer. She was also extremely intelligent and her time in the French court provided her with a great deal of interesting conversation. Henry had been planning to divorce Katherine. Now he knew who he wanted to replace her with.
In January 1533 Henry discovered that Anne Boleyn was pregnant. As it was important that the child should not be classed as illegitimate, arrangements were made for Henry and Anne to get married. Thomas More, Henry's Lord Chancellor, was opposed to the king's plans to divorce Katherine and resigned from office.
Henry hoped that Anne would provide him with a son. He was therefore disappointed when, in September 1533, Anne gave birth to a daughter called Elizabeth. Henry was furious about having another daughter.
In January 1536, Anne had a son but unfortunately he was born dead. Also, the baby was badly deformed. This was a serious matter because in Tudor times Christians believed that a deformed child was God's way of punishing parents for committing serious sins.
Henry approached Thomas Cromwell about how he could get out of his marriage with Anne. He suggested that one solution to this problem was to claim that he was not the father of this deformed child. On the king's instruction Cromwell was ordered to find out the name of the man who was the true father of the dead child. Anne was charged with having relationships with many men. Anne was beheaded.
Ten days after Anne was beheaded, Henry married Jane Seymour the next year, Jane died giving birth to Edward. Henry now at last had a male heir.
Henry other wives were Ann of Cleaves (marriage annulled) Katherine Howard (executed on grounds of adultery in 1542) and Catherine Parr (who survived Henry to die in 1548).
None produced any children.

 
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