WhenHenry VIIIpassed away in1547at age 55 , he left behind afew childrenand a splendidly bloodstained chronicle of fail marriage . To be sightly , not all six of his couplings culminate in cataclysm . He stayed close friends withAnne of Cleves , for example , following their divorce in 1540 ; and his pairing withCatherine Parronly ended because he die .
But theTudorruler ’s family relationship withAnne Boleynwas dramatic from start to finish . Henry had become infatuate with Anne during her stint as a lady - in - waiting to his first wife , Catherine of Aragon , in the mid-1520s . All but one of Catherine and Henry ’s minor — the future Queen Mary I — choke in infancy or originally , and it began to seem highly unbelievable that they ’d succeed in raise a healthy male successor . So in 1527 , hoping for serious luck with Anne , Henrysoughtan annulment from Catherine on thegroundsthat because she ’d previously been married to his ( now - deceased ) brother , his own union with her was invalid . Catherine ’s childbearing difficulties could even have been the result of their infernal matrimony , if a sure Bible rhyme was to be believe .
Whatever Pope Clement VII ’s personal feelings about the validity of that statement , they took a backseat to the international affairs at frolic when the claim came in ; namely , that Charles V — Holy Roman Emperor , King of Spain , and Catherine ’s nephew — was in the process oftaking over Rome . With that situation coloring his decision , the popedeniedthe annulment request and instead informed Henry that he ’d be excommunicated should he marry Anne anyway .
In 1533 , Henry VIIImarried Anne anyway , breaking off from the Catholic Church and changing the course of British history in the cognitive process .
Unfortunately , Henry and Anne ’s honeymoon stage was unawares - lived . After three years of marriage , Anne , too , had go to raise a surviving male person successor ( though she had given giving birth to the futureQueen Elizabeth I ) . Possibly promote by adviser keen to drum out Anne , Henry VIII begin to conceive that she had been faithless to him . In 1536 , she was imprisoned in theTower of Londononchargesof criminal conversation and treason , ground guilty , andbeheadedon May 19 . Anne ’s self - made widower quickly we d one of her lady - in - waiting , Jane Seymour — already his schoolma’am — and seemingly put his second wife out of his mind for good .
But if ever there were a time for Henry VIII to express remorse over the downfall of Anne Boleyn , it probably would have been on his deathbed . And there is some grounds suggest he did just that .
The Friar’s Report
In 1575 , Gallic Internet Explorer and Franciscan friar André Thevetpublisheda sweeping creation account calledLa Cosmographie Universelle , which include a abbreviated account of Henry ’s death .
“ Several English gentlemen have secure me that he had okay repentance of the discourtesy dedicate by him , being at the point of last : & among other thing , of the injustice & crime intrust against the aforementioned Queen Anne Boleyn , incorrectly trounce & accused of what was imposed on her , ” Thevetwrote , translate from French .
Though Thevet did n’t mention any impinging by name , sixteenth - century Protestant historian John Foxe suffer the assertion that Henry VIII did indeed do some repenting during his final hours . In his bookActes and Monuments(also know as theBook of Martyrs ) , Foxe explicate that as Henry VIII ’s health deteriorate , Privy CouncillorSir Anthony Dennybravely broke the news to the king that he ’d likely die before long — a labor nobody else hadwantedto do . Denny then “ urge him to prepare himself to death , calling himself to remembrance of his former lifespan , and to call upon God in Christ betimes for grace and mercy , as becometh every good Christian man to do ” [ PDF ] . fit in to Foxe , the trouble crowned head then proceeded to “ deliberate his life past . ”
“ ‘ Yet , ’ said he , ‘ is the mercifulness of Christ able to pardon me all my Sin , though they were greater than they be , ’ ” Foxe wrote .
If Henry hash out Anne at any head during his demise , Denny or some other attendant could have easily heard it . “ Doctors , close-fitting assistants who provide personal care , etc . Even possibly spiritual advisors ( extra to [ Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas ] Cranmer ) with whom he ’d become close over the class , ” historian Sandra Vasoli , generator ofAnne Boleyn ’s Letter from the Tower , tells Mental Floss . “ I ’m certain , as well , that since he was rest there knowing he was n’t acquire good , there must have been conversation about his sprightliness ’s reflexion . Did word get around about any statements Henry made about biography regrets ? Did he , in a personal second , unburden himself to one of the doctors or friends who attend to him ? Of course that is very possible , even probable . ”
But Vasoli does n’t cogitate “ several English gentlemen ” imply that Henry VIII ’s deathbed regret over Anne ’s carrying into action was just a rumour Thevet piece up somewhere . “ Hey , people talk , but Anne was a sensitive subject field — and not one to be bandied about light , ” she explains . Moreover , being a well - connected writer from a well-thought-of spiritual social club , Thevet likely had better sources for his cosmography than the grapevine . Vasoli thinks he could even have pass time in thefriaryatGreenwich Palace , where Henry was born and populate for years .
Historians Weigh In
Though the news show of Henry VIII ’s purport self-reproach scarce became common cognition afterLa Cosmographie Universellewas publish , more than one historianalluded to it in later yr . Among them wasWhite Kennett , an early 18th - century English archaist and bishop who mentioned it in his own report , which Vasolicame acrossduring her own inquiry . Agnes Strickland also brought it up in a volume of her 1840s seriesLives of the Queens of England .
In Strickland ’s opinion , the fact that the Franciscans as a whole “ had suffered so much for their [ steadfast ] support ” of Catherine of Aragon over Anne Boleyn lent acceptance to Thevet ’s claim . Since he had tacitly move against the party line by publish “ a testimonial in favour ” of her , his statement “ ought to be regarded as impartial history . ”
It ’s also not difficult to conceive of that Henry VIII would have truly felt sorry for killing someone he once bind so dear . He had , after all , written her more than a dozenlove letters(not to mention that whole business of wrenching the Church of England from Roman Catholic bureau in club to be with her ) .
“ I remember Henry was an enormously complex man with wide veering emotion and impulses . I utterly know that he had adored Anne , and that she loved him back with an implausibly strong connection . Theirs was without uncertainty a passionate , superb , worked up affair , ” Vasoli says . As death loomed , he may have revisit their love affair and lamented his own role in rather headlong snuffing it — and Anne ’s spirit — out . So while Vasoli accept that “ nothing is certain here , by any mean , ” she , for one , believe that Thevet ’s account annulus true .
“ Yes , I remember Henry had great grief over his speedy capital punishment of Anne , who , I finger certain , was the love of his animation , ” she says .
