This “on this day in history” event always makes me see red! Yes, just eleven days after his second wife, Queen Anne Boleyn, was executed at the Tower of London on trumped up charges – I think most people would agree with me on that – King Henry VIII married for the third time.
The marriage took place at Whitehall Palace, formerly known as York Place, the very property that Henry had renovated with Anne Boleyn. The bride was Jane Seymour, daughter of Sir John Seymour of Wulfhall, in Wiltshire, and his wife, Margery Wentworth, and one of his second wife’s ladies. The couple had become betrothed on 20th May 1536, the day after Anne Boleyn’s execution.
It is not clear when Henry VIII started his flirtation with Jane, but it is clear that it was gossip by the end of January 1536 because Eustace Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, mentioned “the treatment shown to a lady of the Court, named Mistress Semel [Seymour], to whom, as many say, he has lately made great presents” in his dispatch to the Emperor regarding court gossip about the reasons for Anne Boleyn’s miscarriage on 29th January 1536. As the king began to doubt his marriage, the flirtation with Jane became more serious. In March 1536 her brother, Edward Seymour, was given an apartment in Greenwich Palace which the king apparently could reach via a private passage. Edward and his wife were obviously meant to play chaperones for Jane and her royal sweetheart.
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