Research Paper On Blood Queen Mary

Mary I of England Mary Tudor of England, more commonly known as Bloody Mary, ruled England and Ireland from July 1553 to November 1558. She was the first daughter of King Henry the eighth, who famously broke away from the Catholic Church and formed the Church of England (Edmonds). Henry’s actions lead to the progression of reformation and expanding the protestant religion across England. Mary though, was extremely catholic and was always loyal to her faith; she wanted to restore Papal Supremacy and bring Catholicism back to England (Loach). This is why many people did not support her and did not want her to take over as Queen. Eventually, when she did take over she became the first Queen of England who didn’t reign because of marriage to a king. Bloody Mary had many negatively viewed actions during her reign, including her marriage, failed pregnancy, religion, and war failures.

It started when she married Philip II of Spain, this marriage upset many people and led to a revolt (Stewart). This revolt was led by Sir Thomas Wyatt the Younger who was the son of Thomas Wyatt a famous poet. The rebellion gained much support, but Mary ended it quickly when she sent out a large force to stop it (Gerhardt). She then had Wyatt executed and sent her half sister Elizabeth to the Tower of London due to suspicions of involvement with the rebellion. Mary is also negatively looked upon for her pregnancy issues (Gerhardt). She wanted to have a child to secure that Elizabeth would not succeed her, and in September 1554 she showed all the signs of pregnancy. A few months later in April news spread that she has given birth to a boy, but in reality she had no child. It took her a few more months to accept that she wasn’t pregnant and this lead to her saying that her failed pregnancy was God’s punishment for tolerating Heresy. Her pregnancy was looked at as a laughing stock and it made her look really