Who Would Be King of England Today According to Henry VIII's Will?

Hi. This is Matt Baker and today we're going to discover who the current King of England would be if Henry VIII's last will and testament had been followed. In a previous video, we talked about a theory from the documentary Britain's Real Monarch that put forward the idea that the true King of England is a guy living in Australia. That theory hinges on the idea that Edward IV was illegitimate and that therefore the line should However, in my video, I argued that the entire theory, even if true, falls apart based on the fact that Henry VII obtained the English throne by right of conquest, thus establishing the House of Tudor as the legitimate rulers. Henry VII was, of course, followed by Henry VIII, one of England's most iconic kings. He's famous for having had six wives and for trying really, really hard to produce male heirs, even if that meant breaking ties with the Catholic Church and chopping off a few of his wife's heads. In his will, Henry VIII made his wishes for the succession very clear. However, ultimately, these wishes were not followed. So, in today's video, we're going to explore the question Who would be King of England today according to Henry VIII's will? In 1543, the English Parliament passed a law known as the Third Succession Act in which the line of succession was established as follows. First was Henry's only legitimate son, Edward, born to his beloved third wife, Jane Seymour. Next was any other legitimate sons who Henry might have had in the future – something that, of course, didn't happen. Then came Mary, his daughter by his first wife, Catherine of Aragon. And then finally, Elizabeth, his daughter by his second wife, Anne Boleyn. However, the Third Succession Act also stated that Henry had the right to bequeath the crown to others by his last will and testament. And in his last will and testament, Henry did make one final addition. He stated that, following Elizabeth, the next individuals in the line of succession should be the descendants of his younger sister, Mary, not the descendants of his older sister, Margaret. Okay, so here's what happened after Henry VIII died. First of all, the throne went to his beloved son Edward, who became King Edward VI. He was only 9 years old when he became king but, unfortunately for him, he died at age 15 before he could produce any heirs. This resulted in a crisis because those advising him had convinced him to go against his father's wishes and name Lady Jane Grey as his heir, thus disinheriting his two half-sisters, Mary and Elizabeth. This backfired though and after just 9 days as queen, Lady Jane Grey was executed for treason and was replaced with Mary. But Mary lived for only 5 more years and died childless. Thus, the throne finally settled on Elizabeth, known to history as Queen Elizabeth I. So, at this point, Henry VIII's will was indeed being followed and, according to the will, the next person in line after Elizabeth was Lady Catherine Grey, the younger sister of Lady Jane Grey. In fact, at the time, Elizabeth was considering formally adopting Catherine and publicly naming her as her heir. However, something happened that put a stop to that. Catherine secretly married a man named Edward Seymour. The name Seymour should sound familiar to you because that was the surname of Henry VIII's favourite wife, Jane Seymour, the one who bore him his only son, Edward VI. Edward Seymour was the son of Jane Seymour's older brother, also named Edward Seymour, who, by the way, had served as regent and lord protector of the realm during the first part of the young Edward VI's reign. So, in other words, the Seymours were pretty powerful people. I think you can perhaps see the problem. Catherine's marriage to a man from the Seymour family, combined with the fact that some nobles felt that Elizabeth was illegitimate, combined with the fact that Catherine was next in line anyway, all of this made a strong case for Catherine to replace Elizabeth as queen. Keep in mind that by this point, it had only been a mere seven years since Edward VI died and England had already had three different queens since then. If the throne were to change hands yet again, it wouldn't actually have been all that strange. However, Elizabeth quickly understood the threat and imprisoned Catherine in the infamous Tower of London, declaring her marriage illegitimate. Catherine and Edward did go on to have children though. They named their eldest son Edward and he went on to become known as Lord Beauchamp. As you probably already know, Queen Elizabeth I never married, which is why she became known as the Virgin Queen. Thus, throughout her reign, the question of the royal succession continued to be a hot topic. However, throughout her entire 44-year reign, Elizabeth refused to publicly name anyone as her heir. This was probably due to a fear that, if she did name someone, that someone might decide to get rid of her. Her most famous rival was, of course, Mary, Queen of Scots. Mary had a strong claim to the throne as the granddaughter of Henry VIII's eldest sister, Margaret. The rivalry was strengthened by the fact that Elizabeth was Protestant and Mary, Queen of Scots was Catholic so there ended up being several plots by Catholic supporters to replace Elizabeth with Mary. In the end, one of those failed plots resulted in Mary, Queen of Scots being executed for treason. Eventually, of course, Elizabeth I did die, of natural causes. At that point, there were perhaps around a dozen people with fairly good claims to the throne. However, the four strongest claimants were Edward Seymour, Anne Stanley, James VI of Scotland, and Lady Arbella Stewart. Unlike his mother, James VI was a Protestant so when Queen Elizabeth died, the nobles quickly declared James to be the King of England and nobody really objected. After all, in addition to being the Scottish king, he was also the most senior remaining heir of Henry VII of England, according to the rules of male preference primogeniture. Thus, he became James VI and First. Sixth of Scotland but First of England. From this point on, the crowns of England and Scotland were united, a union that would be made official in 1707 with the creation of Great Britain. However, based on the last will and testament of Henry VIII, the contents of which had legal standing based on the Third Succession Act, James VI was NOT the next person in the English line of succession. Remember, Henry VIII's will quite clearly stated that the descendants of his sister Mary should come before the descendants of his sister Margaret, even though Margaret was older. This means that Edward Seymour, the Lord Beauchamp, should have been made King. And even if one were to claim that he was illegitimate due to his parents' secret marriage, there were still other descendants of Mary Tudor who came before James VI as well. The most senior person in this line was Anne Stanley, daughter of the 5th Earl of Derby, so perhaps she should have been made Queen. Finally, there was Arbella Stewart. She was the first cousin of James VI and the granddaughter of Margaret Douglas, who was the Countess of Lennox. Margaret Douglas was the person that Mary I of England wanted to succeed her, although Parliament never approved of this and therefore it never happened. But, if one were to go by Mary I's wishes and also if one wanted to keep the thrones of England and Scotland separate, the person who should have become Queen was Arbella Stewart. In my opinion, based on the will of Henry VIII, the person with the strongest claim to the throne was Edward Seymour. Therefore, we're going to focus on his line and see who would be King of England today if he had been made King instead of James. If Edward had been made King, he would have reigned for 9 years and then would have been succeeded by his eldest son Edward, who would have reigned for 6 years. Edward died young before having children and thus the throne would have passed next to his younger brother William. And this is where things get quite interesting. In real life, William secretly married Arbella Stewart, thus creating a union between two people who both had strong claims to the throne. When King James found out, he recognized that they posed a very real threat and thus he had them both imprisoned. At one point, they both managed to escape though, in Arbella's case, by dressing as a man. But Arbella was caught and sent to the Tower of London, where she later died for refusing to eat. That put an end to her line's claim. However, the Seymour claim continued. William married again, this time to a woman named Frances Devereaux. They had a son named Henry, who died before his father. Thus, when William died, his titles passed directly to his grandson, also named William. But William died at age 19, prior to marriage, and therefore his claim to the throne passed to his sister, Elizabeth. This means that, in an alternative universe, we may have had a Queen Elizabeth II several centuries before the current one. Although, keep in mind that, if history had gone in a different direction, there likely would have been different marriages and thus different children. But if, for some reason, this alternative Queen Elizabeth II did marry her real-life husband, it would have created an interesting scenario. You'll notice that her husband's last name is Bruce. And if you know your British history, you might be wondering if there's any chance that this fellow is a descendant of the famous Scottish King Robert the Bruce. Well, yes. Yes, he is. Although, he's a descendant of one of King Robert's illegitimate sons. But this means that, in this alternative timeline, we would have eventually gotten an English King from the Scottish House of Bruce. But again, our main goal here is to figure out who the claimant from this line would be today. So, let's keep going. Charles Bruce was pre-deceased by both his only adult son, who didn't have any children, and his eldest daughter and therefore the claim passed directly to his daughter's eldest son, James. From there, it passed to James' daughter Anne Elizabeth, who married Richard Grenville, the first Duke of Buckingham and Chandos. Richard's grandfather, George Grenville, as well as his uncle William Grenville, both served as British Prime Ministers. You may recognize the name Chandos from the famous portrait of Shakespeare known as the Chandos Portrait. It is called that because it was owned by the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos. Anyway, one negative fact about Richard and Anne is that they were major slave owners. Anne had inherited land in Jamaica from her mother's first husband and she passed this on to her son Richard. When slavery was abolished by Britain in 1833, Richard was on record as having owned 379 slaves. After his death, his claim to the throne passed to his son, who was also named Richard, although I should make it clear that, by this point, no one in this family was actually trying to claim the throne. Anyway, this Richard, even though he was not king, did hold many high titles within the British Empire, including Lord President of the Council, Secretary of State for the Colonies, and Governor of Madras. He did not have any sons though so when he died, the Dukedom of Buckingham and Chandos became extinct. However, his claim to the throne, as well as one of his Scottish titles, passed to his eldest daughter Mary, who became known as the Eleventh Lady Kinloss. Her eldest son died childless in World War I and her next eldest son, Lewis, died just a few months before her. Thus, her title and claim passed to her granddaughter, Mary, the Twelfth Lady Kinloss. Mary had one son and two daughters and she actually lived until quite recently, passing away in 2012. Her son Beville died just a few months before her and therefore the claim passed once again to a female, Theresa Freeman Grenville, who is the Thirteenth Lady Kinloss. Theresa is currently 55 years old and lives in North Yorkshire, where she works for a company that keeps track of milk records. However, according to the last will and testament of Henry VIII, she should have a different job. She should be the Queen of England. As a side note, I should make it clear that the title Queen of England currently no longer exists. Queen Elizabeth II is actually not the Queen of England. She's the Queen of the United Kingdom. However, if the throne had passed, according to Henry VIII's wishes, Scotland and England wouldn't have united and thus there would still be a King or Queen of England and that person would be Queen Theresa. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a photo of the Thirteenth Lady Kinloss, although according to Wikipedia and Google Maps, this is what her official residence looks like. Not quite Buckingham Palace but a nice country house nonetheless. Theresa does not have any children so next in line is her sister Hester and then Hester's eldest son Joseph. Now, one last thing before I go. What if you buy the argument that Edward Seymour was in fact illegitimate but that Henry VIII's will should still have been followed? Who would be King then? Well, like I said earlier, that scenario would have resulted in Anne Stanley becoming Queen. However, Anne Stanley's line eventually became extinct. So, if we want to trace a line to today, we actually have to go through one of her sister's lines. If we do that, following the rules of male preference primogeniture, we end up with William Child Villiers, the 10th Earl of Jersey. Now, the interesting thing about William is that he has a very important job. A job that could be argued to be more important for British culture than that of the monarch. You see, William is currently the Director of Intellectual Property for Handmade Films, the company that produces Monty Python. Okay, so that was a look at who would be King or Queen of England today, had Henry VIII's will been followed. Of course, another alternate succession is the one that involves the Jacobite line being chosen over the later Georgian line. If you want to delve into that whole kettle of fish, we've got a video on that topic as well. I'll leave a link to it in the description. Finally, a reminder that if you want a copy of our European Royal Family Tree chart, you can head over to the website, UsefulCharts.com. Thanks for watching.