Jane Seymour

Jane Seymour was the third wife of Henry VIII, queen of England from May 1536 until her death seventeen months later, and the only one of his six wives to give him a surviving son. She was a daughter of Sir John Seymour of Wulfhall in Wiltshire and Margery Wentworth, and through her mother descended from Edward III, making her and Henry fifth cousins. Her birth year is not recorded and estimates range from 1504 to 1513. She served as a lady-in-waiting to both Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn, and Henry's interest in her became open during Anne's final months. She was betrothed to the king the day after Anne Boleyn's execution and married him ten days later, a sequence that made the charges against Anne look to many observers like a means to an end. As queen she was conservative in religion and worked to reconcile Henry with his elder daughter Mary, who was restored to the succession and to her father's household during Jane's tenure. She interceded with Henry on behalf of the rebels of the Pilgrimage of Grace in 1536 and was sharply rebuked for it, and did not intervene in politics again. In October 1537 she gave birth at Hampton Court to the boy who became Edward VI, securing the male heir on which Henry had staked two annulments and a break with Rome. She died twelve days later of complications following the birth, almost certainly puerperal fever arising from a retained placenta. Henry wore black for three months and she was the only wife given a queen's funeral. Nine years later he was buried beside her at St George's Chapel, Windsor, which is the plainest evidence of how he regarded her among the six.

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