King Henry VI

Name: King Henry VI
Born: December 6, 1421 at Windsor Castle
Parents: Henry V and Catherine of ValoisRelation to Elizabeth II: 14th great-granduncle
House of: Lancaster
Ascended to the throne: September 1, 1422
Crowned: November 6, 1429 at Westminster Abbey, aged 7. St Pauls Cathedral, aged 48. Also crowned Henri II of France, December 1431, Cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, aged 10.
Married: Margaret, Daughter of Count of Anjou
Children: One son
Died: May 21, 1471 at Tower of London (murdered), aged 49 years, 5 months, and 13 days
Buried at: Chertsey, reburied in 1485 when his body was moved to St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.
Reigned for: 39 years, 1 month, and 18 days, Deposed March 4, 1461, Restored Oct 3, 1470
Succeeded by: his distant cousin Edward IV

King of England from 1422, son of Henry V. He assumed royal power 1442 and sided with the party opposed to the continuation of the Hundred Years' War with France. After his marriage 1445, he was dominated by his wife, Margaret of Anjou. He was deposed 1461 in the Wars of the Roses; was captured 1465, temporarily restored 1470, but again imprisoned 1471 and then murdered.

Henry was eight months old when he succeeded to the English throne, and shortly afterwards, by the death in 1422 of his maternal grandfather, Charles VI, he became titular king of France. Unlike his father, Henry was disinclined to warfare, and when Joan of Arc revived French patriotism the English gradually began to lose their French possessions. By 1453 only Calais remained of his father's conquests.

The unpopularity of the government, especially after the loss of the English conquests in France, encouraged Richard, Duke of York, to claim the throne, and though York was killed 1460, his son Edward IV proclaimed himself king 1461.

King Henry VI's Signature