The Truth About Henry VIII And His Six Wives D
almost immediately after Henry VII saw a portrait of the enigmatic ant of cleaves he made her his bride but when they finally met his stomach dropped she was unthinkably ugly or so he claimed an is now Infamous as Henry’s rejected Queen but modern historians suggest a more disturbing reason for his disgust the full story is coming up famous for his many wives and their various Henry VII nearly tore England apart in his quest for a son Henry VII was not supposed to be king his older brother Arthur was the heir to the throne as the next king he got all of his parents attention and Henry was mostly forgotten on November 1501 Henry’s brother Arthur married Catherine of Aragon a Spanish princess then in what seemed like the blink of an eye the strapping 15-year-old Arthur went from
healthy to deceased out of nowhere Henry the spare was now the heir to the throne of England on April 21st 1509 Henry tutor succumbed to tuberculosis and at only 17 Henry VIII became king awkwardly one of his first acts was to marry his brother’s widow Catherine of Aragon immediately after their wedding Henry and Katherine conceived a child the couple was ecstatic but 9 months later grief replaced their Joy the child was stillborn they were inconsolable a few months after the miscarriage Katherine became pregnant again this time she gave birth to a boy but Henry and Katherine’s first son also named Henry passed 7 months after his birth next came two more still births a dark cloud started growing over the Royal household and Henry and Katherine’s relationship grew more and
more more strained not even the birth of a healthy child Princess Mary in 1516 could save them now Henry blamed his wife Catherine for his lack of an heir and the unrest in his kingdom it didn’t take long for Henry to start taking Mistresses he betted all kinds of wealthy and important women but his most famous mistress was Bessie blound the daughter of a smalltime politician in 1519 Bessie Bland gave birth to Henry’s son and named him Henry Fitzroy after his father most of the time if a king SED an illegitimate child they would never admit it but not Henry VII in a move that shocked the country Henry proudly acknowledged the boy as his own people were baffled but Henry had his reasons before Henry Fitzroy came around people were starting to talk about the king he’d been married for a decade and still had no male Heir in
medieval thinking maybe maybe that meant there was something wrong with Henry’s manhood in his mind this illegitimate son was proof that he was a real man and that his lack of an heir was entirely his wife’s fault Henry had three options somehow legitimize Henry Fitzroy marry his daughter marry off ASAP and pray for a grandson or blame it all on Catherine ditch her and find someone new the third option was probably the most most complicated and definitely the cruestv Henry getting a young hot new wife we all know which option he chose so how did Henry pick his future wife easy he was already sleeping with the beautiful Mary bin so Henry made the obvious choice Mary’s younger sister an but he would soon learn Anne Bolin was no easy target an was young intelligent
charismatic and entirely uninterested in becoming yet another of Henry’s floes despite the rund portraits from his later life Henry was actually very attractive in his youth he was tall athletic and Incredibly charismatic women easily succumbed to his charm so while Anne Bolin resisted at first soon enough she fell right into Henry’s arms Henry decided to leave Katherine of Aragon and Mary andne Bolin but there was one giant problem the church Church the pope wasn’t too keen on the idea of a divorce Henry tried to convince Pope Clement II that his marriage to Catherine was invalid but the pontiff wasn’t buying it if the King was going to get a divorce he was going to do it without the church’s permission weirdly enough up to this point Henry was an incredibly devout Catholic he had done a lot for the church and they loved him for it but nothing was going to stop him
from getting what he wanted maybe if Henry had just ignored the pope divorced Catherine married Anne and left it at that things would have been awkward for a bit but then ended up fine but that’s not what Henry did he took it so much further first he formed the Church of England and put himself in charge then he signed the act of Restraint of Appeals which essentially said that Rome had zero to say in English religious Matters from now on the pope could no longer ignore what Henry was doing he officially excommunicated Henry and the break between the Catholic church and the church of England was complete Henry married Anne Bolin and knocked her up before his split from Catherine of Aragon was even official he’d spent a quarter of a century waiting for a son and he was done wasting time finally several months after his wedding to anolin Henry had his marriage to Katherine declared null
and void basically Henry claimed that since Katherine had married his brother for 5 months their marriage was unnatural strange that he didn’t think so all those years ago less than 9 months after their official marriage Henry and Anne welcomed a daughter Henry named her Elizabeth after his mother Elizabeth of York but he couldn’t hide his disappointment after all that work he was stuck with yet another daughter and there was another problem in their marriage Henry the found the gorgeous anolin irresistible when he couldn’t have her turns out married life with her was a different story an was stubborn independent and had a bad temper a far cry from the demure trophy wife he wanted and things continued to go downhill from there the birth of Princess Elizabeth was a huge disappointment for Henry an got pregnant
again soon after but if Elizabeth was disappointing this next pregnancy was a disaster Anne had a miscarriage in 1534 and Henry was not pleased an Bolin wasn’t exactly happy with her marriage either but she was smart enough to know that angering Henry wasn’t in her best interest she was desperate to give him a son and some people believed she was willing to do anything to make it happen many in England didn’t believe that Anne had had a miscarriage at all rather they claimed she lied about the whole pregnancy and her sister Mary was still out there making things a lot more difficult Mary Bolin had fallen in love with a lowborn soldier and secretly married him this erased any chance of Henry using her in a political match both he and Anne were livid and they made Mary pay for it dearly Henry and
Anne banished Mary from Court forever Mary went from a life of luxury to to utter obscurity overnight she never saw her sister again and she passed a few years later completely forgotten in early 1536 anolin was pregnant yet again and aware that if the child was not a son her days were numbered then during a justing tournament a rival knocked Henry off his horse leaving him horribly injured when Anne heard about Henry’s accident it shocked her so much that she suffered another miscarriage and to put salt in the wound doctors revealed that the child had been a boy a boy that could have saved the queen even though his wife recovered from her miscarriage Henry was clearly done with her first he began refusing to Grant political offices to her family then in an unprecedented move he moved his latest mistress the 28-year-old Jane
Seymour into Swanky new rooms in his Palace in the spring of 1536 Henry had Anne her brother and four other men thrown in the Tower of London the courts accused each of the men including her own brother of sleeping with the queen an act of treason Henry accused an of adultery as well along with witchcraft for good measure there was essentially no evidence for any of these accusations the men were executed on May 17th and Anne the Queen of England was beheaded 2 Days Later the 40 5-year-old Henry VII became engaged to the almost 20 years younger Jane Seymour the day after anol Lin’s execution their marriage took place only 10 days later for any other king this would have been a scandal beyond measure but for Henry this was pretty much business as usual Henry VII’s marriage to Jane Seymour got off to the best
possible start on October 12th 1537 Seymour gave birth to a boy the birth of Prince Edward fin finally meant an end to the chaos but it took less than 2 weeks for tragedy to strike throwing Henry’s Court into upheaval once again Jane Seymour had access to the best doctors in England but it was 1537 and Medicine still had a long way to go Edward’s birth was agonizing and the queen suffered a terrible infection the doctors proved helpless and Henry had to watch as his beloved wife the first to give him a healthy son withered away Jane Seymour succumbed to her infection on October 24th Henry was heartbroken but in a way he got what he wanted during her agonizing labor doctors had told the king that it may come down to saving either the child or the queen Henry’s reply was utterly heartless if you cannot save both at
least let the Child live for other wives are easily found Jane Seymour’s demise marked a change in Henry VII he began growing morbidly obese and started suffering from diabetes and gout his mood grew even darker and he became paranoid and irrational there weren’t many people left whom Henry trusted but one of them was his Shifty spy Master Thomas Cromwell Cromwell was one of the most powerful men in England until he suggested Henry Mary the 25-year-old German Duchess an of cleaves it seemed like a perfect match and Anne’s father could prove a vital Ally if religious War happened to break out there was only one problem political marriages were well and good but Henry wasn’t about to marry someone he’d never even seen what if she was ugly but don’t worry Cromwell had the perfect solution he sent one of the best portrait artists in the world to paint
Anne so Henry could judge her for himself when the painting finally made it back to him along with Thomas crl’s assurances that Anne was basically his dream gal Henry was was finally convinced reportedly when they actually met Henry VII took one look at an of cleaves and realized he’d made a horrible mistake whether it was her looks or her personality Henry was already looking for an exit before they’d even tied the knot the marriage lasted a whopping 6 months and according to Henry it was never consummated Henry annuled his marriage to an of cleaves and dubbed her the King’s sister thanks to this awkward title and would end up being one of the rare wives who actually managed to outlive Henry VII an of cleaves just didn’t do it for the now 46-year-old Henry but you know who did the 17-year-old Katherine Howard apparently Henry realized that political
marriages weren’t for him and went back to marrying whoever he had the hots for but not everyone was happy about this latest match Thomas Cromwell made the end of cleaves match happen only to watch it go up in Flames almost immediately then to make things worse Henry started chasing Katherine Howard who was the niece of the Duke of norfol one of cromwell’s biggest political Rivals suddenly Cromwell started to feel the walls closing in around him in the end Henry charged Cromwell with treason and a pile of other trumped up accusations despite everything he’d done for Henry crl met the same fate as everyone else who got in the murderous King’s Way Henry didn’t even bother to show up to the execution he was busy getting married for the fifth time he tied the knot with Katherine Howard the very same day the timing of the nuptuals even allowed
Henry to give his wife a particularly nice wedding present he gave his new Queen all of Thomas cromwell’s lands it’s not like he was using them anymore almost as soon as she married Henry Catherine began an affair with one of his corders a man by the name of Thomas Kul pepper since there were no secrets in a Royal Palace News of the trist soon got back to the king this time though it seems as though Henry was head over heels in a way he hadn’t been in years he refused to believe the rumors and stood by his Queen before she was a queen Katherine Howard had had an affair with another tutor cordier Francis darham strangely Howard hired deham to work for her when she married Henry not the best decision deham confessed to having an affair with Catherine in the past but even worse he outed her relationship with cul pepper
finally Henry had to admit the truth after years of cheating on his wives this time the tables had turned but Catherine Howard didn’t go down without a fight when officials questioned her about Dam’s claims she insisted she never cared for him and that he’d forced her into an adulterous relationship against her will Henry charged Katherine Duram and cul Pepper with treason and sentenced them to beheading of course Katherine Howard did not take the news well the 19-year-old Queen allegedly Broke Free from her guards and ran through the Halls screaming for Henry to show her mercy she never made it to him however in fact she would never see the King again on October 13th 1542 Henry had Catherine and both men beheaded that makes Five Wives down two of them by Henry’s own hand when it came to women Henry VII
just couldn’t help himself in July 1543 Henry VII wed for the last time his latest bride was kathern par and she couldn’t have been more different from Henry’s previous wives first of all she was almost age appropriate at 31 years old she was also remarkably stable compared to his previous wives there were no wild cheating scandals or whispered Rumors in fact Katherine Parr managed to do something none of Henry’s other wives ever did she made a somewhat decent man out of him years earlier Henry had cut his two daughters Mary and Elizabeth out of the line of succession they spent the subsequent years in a tense limbo par made Henry buried the hatchet with his two daughters and he finally brought them back into the line of succession so basically without Katherine par England would have missed out on Queen Elizabeth one of its greatest monarchs ever while the young
Henry VII had been attractive and athletic the old Henry was a different story entirely by this point his waist had ballooned to 54 Ines and he could barely even walk he needed attendance to wheel him around wherever he went the worst part was the gout which left him covered in excruciating pus-filled boils mercifully Henry VIII passed of an illness related to his obesity at the age of 55 with that Katherine par and an of cleaves could at least claim they were the only wives to outlive the murderous King in a surprising request Henry asked his attendants to bury him next to James Seymour after all of his wives he wanted to lay next to the only wife who gave him a son ever wondered what happened to Henry Fitzroy the illegitimate son who caused
such a stir in Henry’s younger days turns out he lived through more scandals than just his birth back before Henry had a legitimate Heir he strongly considered acknowledging Fitzroy this is when a cardinal suggested a twisted solution to the king succession problems Mary Fitzroy to his half-sister Henry and Katherine of Aragon’s daughter Mary in the end they didn’t go through with it Henry VII did a lot of seriously messed up things but thankfully forcing his son and daughter to marry each other was not one of them an of cleaves is now Infamous as Henry’s rejected Queen but was it really as simple as Henry found her ugly and cast her aside modern historian suggest a very different reason for his disgust making their way to London to meet the king an’s party stopped at Rochester suddenly an old
Burly stranger entered her room and everything went horribly wrong you see this stranger was really Henry VII in Disguise he had wanted to creep in and get a sneak peek of his new bride to be he also expected that she would see through his costume somehow spoiler this was not a good idea depending on the account either Henry tried to get an’s attention and she ignored him or he outright tried to kiss her which understandably horrified the young woman either way it was a disaster and Henry left the encounter angry embarrassed and possibly ready to take revenge at the end of the day the most infamous of Henry’s sped wives was an Bolin but her end was even worse than people realize after 4 days in the Tower of London bin gave a letter to her guard it was addressed to Henry in it she pleaded for Mercy writing that never
Prince had wife more loyal in all Duty and in all true affection than you have ever found in Anne Bolin she also made one final heartbreaking request bin begged him to think of their daughter Elizabeth and then she humbly asked Henry to spare the lives of her brother and the other men accused of being her lovers at her core until the very end bin was truly selfless but as we know it didn’t go her way she never stood a chance unfortunately she married Henry VII England’s most murderous King thank you for watching this video I hope you enjoyed it please like And subscribe
