Erik Visits a Non-American Grave, Part 2,003

This is the grave of King Edward VI of England, a not so spooky Halloween grave unless you consider the state of my shoes standing on this, which are now the new Hokas, but the ancient soiled white Adidas at the bottom.

Does it seem weird to step on a king’s grave? Well, that’s what happens with some of these royals.

Born in 1537 at Hampton Court Palace, Edward was what King Henry VIII had desperately wanted with his marriages–a legitimate male royal heir. He was the daughter of Henry and his third wife, Jane Seymour. Alas, she died of complications from the birth two weeks later and Henry would be up for another round of wives. But while Henry was thrilled that he could have a Protestant heir, he didn’t exactly prepare the young boy to be king. A lot of this had to do with Henry’s own lavish and exceedingly unhealthy lifestyle, which would lead to his death in 1547, when Edward was a mere 9 years old. What this meant was a young king with a regent in a deeply divided country over religion and an outraged Catholic bloc in southern Europe who wanted to go after this apostate state.

Edward wasn’t exactly up to the task, but who would be at that age? The situation was very difficult. There was war with Scotland and France that led to some defeats for the English and their withdrawal from Boulogne-sur-Mer in France. Henry VIII had prepared for this and named a council of 16 regents to govern until Edward reached the age of 18. Having 16 was a good idea since it prevented power easily be trapped by a usurper. But of course the transition was filled with power plays; former top advisors to Henry were sidelined or even executed, new people moved into positions of authority. Edward didn’t have much to do with any of it. The Duke of Somerset was given the role as the functional head of things by the other executors.

And let’s be clear, it was Somerset’s show. He was the one who dealt with the rebellions and the wars. He enjoyed it too–he was basically king, at least for awhile. He expanded the army and tried to raise taxes to fund it, which did not make him popular. Edward’s advisors made sure that Protestantism was as ensconced as possible. Henry VIII had not really done that much to strip Catholicism from the country. Mostly it was just replacing the pope with himself (parallels between Henry VIII and Donald Trump seem worth considering a bit), but most of the doctrine and ceremony were left the same. Under Edward that began to change. Somerset led the institutionalization of Protestantism, which led to the Prayer Book Rebellion in 1549 in Cornwall and Devon and which led to the widespread slaughter of thousands of committed Catholics in the southwest of England. Somerset was then duly tossed from power later in 1549 and was later executed in 1552. He was replaced by the Earl of Warwick, who soon became the Duke of Northumberland.

Northumberland continued in the strong Protestantism vein. Meanwhile, Edward was growing up. No one is honestly sure just how involved with the affairs of government Edward ever really became. It’s clear that this grew under Northumberland. After all, they did have to prepare him to be a functional king and he was getting older. He was encouraged to create his own council when he turned 14 and he chose people he considered trusted advisors. The kid really did believe in Protestantism and he gave courage to those really trying to crush the vestiges of Catholicism in the nation, so there we can say he had a clear influence, though of course he was himself influenced by his advisors. This is a kid after all, however much comfort he had as the king. But this is almost certainly Edward’s biggest actual contribution to the history of England, outside of just being another king and of course remembered for that too. Perhaps the most important bit of this was the Book of Common Prayer, introduced by Thomas Cranmer in 1552, and the confiscation of Catholic properties that had begun on Henry but then was put on hold for awhile until Edward urged it to continue.

Of course, there were already plans to solidify the dynasty around Edward. Some wanted to marry him off to Lady Jane Grey, but the winning plan was to marry him to Elizabeth of Valois, the then 5 year old daughter of King Henry II of France. This would have been interesting. It outraged Pope Julius II, who wanted to keep the English as the enemy so long as Protestantism existed in that country. So when he found out about it–though the whole thing was negotiated in secret–he threatened to excommunicate everyone involved if they went ahead of it. It’s entirely possible the French monarchy knew this was blustering bullshit and that the Vatican might be able to afford losing the faraway English, but losing the French too would be too close to home.

Edward was also not a healthy kid. In 1553, it was clear he was going to die. By this time, he at least had some ability to make his own decisions, but he was still only 15 years old and still under the regents. But of course there was no heir and the next person in line was Mary, who was a devout Catholic, having grown up the daughter of Spanish royalty too before Henry destroyed his marriage and Catholic England. Edward did not have a good relationship with Mary due primarily to her Catholicism. Edward did show some beliefs on his death about succession, which is that only a man could succeed him and also only a Protestant. This disqualified both of his sisters, but he was convinced to accept Lady Jane Grey as his successor, despite her sex. The justification in his succession document is that both his sisters had been declared bastards by their father. Well, in any case, the nation did not accept Grey as Queen and Mary became Queen instead.

Edward died in 1553, at the age of 15. The reason isn’t totally clear–people got sick a lot in these years. The most likely cause is tuberculosis.

Edward VI is buried in Westminster Abbey, London, England.

If you would like this series to visit American royalty, you can donate to cover the required expenses here. What you say? America doesn’t have monarchs!?!?! Ah, the kings and queens of Hawaii are all buried in Honolulu, so you should make that happen. Previous posts in this series are archived here and here.