"I am so vexed that I am utterly weary."
186: Katherine Parr
English Queen and the Sixth and Final Wife of Henry VIII
Born: August 1512, London, England (Present-day United Kingdom)
Died: 5 September 1548, Gloucestershire, England (Present-day United Kingdom)
Alternate Spelling: Catherine Parr
She also holds the distinction of being the only of his wives to become Dowager Queen, after Henry’s death and the ascension of his son Edward VI.
Katherine was already twice widowed by the time she married Henry and she would go on to be married a fourth time after him—unfortunately to the disastrously idiotic Thomas Seymour.
Katherine befriended all three of Henry’s surviving children, as well as Jane Grey, and focused on their education. To Jane, Edward, and Elizabeth, she was the only true and steady mother figure they had ever known.
Katherine died from complications of childbirth (and her daughter died soon after as well). Sadly, by the time she died she realized just what an a** her fourth and final husband was, and some reports say she cursed him from her deathbed.
Katherine was deeply religious in the Protestant Faith and wrote A Lamentacion or Complaynt of a Sinner (her spelling) in the final year of her life.
Badges Earned:
Find a Grave Marked
Located In My Personal Library:
The Wives of Henry VIII by Antonia Fraser
The Other Tudors by Philippa Jones
The Children of Henry VIII by Alison Wier
Kings & Queens of England and Scotland by Plantagenet Somerset Fry
Uppity Women Speak Their Minds by Vicki Leon
Nine Days a Queen: The Short Life and Reign of Lady Jane Grey by Ann Rinaldi
Sources: