Assassination: The Royal Family's 1000-Year Curse by David Maislish Read Free Book Online Page B

children.
    Henry had two children with Edith, or Queen Matilda as she came to be known: Matilda and William. There may have been two more children: Euphemia and Richard, both of whom died at an early age. The crown seemed to be destined for William. It was not to be.
    In November 1120, the court was returning to London from Normandy. As King Henry was preparing to board ship, the captain of a new vessel named the White Ship begged Henry to cross the Channel with him, the captain claiming that his father had carried William the Conqueror to England in 1066. Henry was not interested, he wanted to travel on his own ship; but he said that his son, William, would travel on the White Ship. By the time the White Ship started its voyage, it was dark and everyone on board was totally drunk. Shortly after leaving Barfleur,theWhiteShipstruckasubmergedrockandwasholed below the water-line. The story is that William escaped in a small boat, later returning to the sinking vessel to rescue one of his illegitimate half-sisters, the Countess of Perche. Unfortunately, so many other people jumped into the small boat that it sank, and everyone in it drowned, including William.
    Apparently, King Henry’s nephew, Stephen, had been on the White Ship, but had disembarked just before it set sail as he was suffering from diarrhoea. Lucky man; Stephen would take advantage of his ‘luck’.
    William’s death left Matilda as Henry’s heir, and there would be no sons to take priority unless the King remarried, for Queen Matilda had died in 1116. Princess Matilda was a haughty, argumentative woman, but there was a greater problem. At the age of twelve, Matilda had been married off to the 32-year-old Holy Roman Emperor King Henry V, and she had spent most of her life in Germany, having been sent there to prepare for her marriage when she was only nine. If she became Queen of England, the Holy Roman Emperor would become king, and England would in effect become part of Germany. That was unacceptable.
    Desperate for an alternative to Matilda, there was a movement among some of the barons to promote William the Clito to be the next king. To counter this, Henry began to advance the candidacy of another nephew, Stephen, the son of Adela, Henry’s favourite sister. Then, in a frantic effort to provide a new male heir, Henry married Adela of Louvain. It was in vain; despite Henry’s impressive record, there would be no children.
    The situation became less complicated in 1125, when the Holy Roman Emperor died leaving no children. His widow Matilda returned to England, where she was grudgingly accepted as Henry’s heir by the barons. She was then, at the age of 26, forced to marry the 14-year-old Geoffrey, son of the Count of Anjou. That only created a new problem because the Norman barons did not want to be ruled by Angevins, their traditional enemies. But they lost their alternative heir in 1128, when the Clito died of wounds received in battle.
    Next, Matilda quarrelled with her husband and went to live in Normandy. So Henry recalled her to England, where she succeeded in making enemies of just about everyone. Aware of the difficulties with Matilda, Henry continued to assist his nephew Stephen in obtaining land and wealth to compensate for any shortcomings in his entitlement to claim the throne by heredity.
    Then, in 1129, Geoffrey of Anjou succeeded to the title of count, and he demanded the return of his wife. Henry was only too pleased to see Matilda leave, as was the entire court. Matters developed two years later, when Matilda gave birth to a son, Henry Plantagenet. The succession was now assured, although the barons still hated Matilda and objected to her Angevin husband.
    Almost an irrelevance, in 1134 Henry’s oldest brother, Robert, died in Cardiff Castle. As Robert left no surviving legitimate children, it did at least mean that Henry was truly entitled to the crown and Matilda was entitled to succeed him.
    However, nothing ever went smoothly where