Just twelve days after giving birth to the son and heir that Henry VIII had long sought, Jane Seymour died of puerperal fever.
She had been fine – though understandably exhausted after a labor that lasted for three days – once Edward was born on October 12. She had also been chipper – though of course weak – at Edward’s christening on the 15th. But things quickly fell from there. The afternoon of October 16, Jane suffered a bad attack of diarrhea. Although this worried the people around her, on October 18 she rallied a bit, enough that celebrations resumed. Wrong. She started to grow feverish the next day, and her situation slumped from there. Her last three days were spent almost entirely in delirium. She died on October 24, never really having enjoyed her triumph.
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Hi, I posted about being misdirected when I tried to read this earlier, but clicking on the 2014 link got me here.
It’s so sad and ironic about Jane’s death. To die just at her time of triumph when her future should have been secure, was tragic, not just for her but the women Henry married after this. While I’m pretty sure she must have died of puerperal fever, I’ve also heard it suggested she died of food poisoning (presumably accidental) and wonder what your opinion is about that? Am I also right that this recreation in the Tudor’s is fiction, and that in reality Henry refused to view the body (although custom expected him to) and also did not attend Jane’s funeral (though in that case custom did not expected him to)?
I have heard it go both ways – I think it very like Henry to refuse to see the body…