General Notes

Ancestral File Number:<AFN> 8XJ0-6V
Name Suffix:<NSFX> 5*
REFN: 19005442
1 NAME Henry I "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

?? Line 6093: (New PAF RIN=11904)
1 NAME Henry I, "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

Line 2410 from GEDCOM File not recognizable or too long:
NAME Henry I "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

?? Line 6093: (New PAF RIN=11904)
1 NAME Henry I, "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

Line 2410 from GEDCOM File not recognizable or too long:
NAME Henry I "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

?? Line 6093: (New PAF RIN=11904)
1 NAME Henry I, "Beauclerc" King Of /ENGLAND/

[2013555.ftw]

1  NAME Henry I King of /England/
1  NAME /Henry/ I
1  BIRT
2  DATE 1068
1 DEAT
2  DATE 1135


BIOGRAPHY: Henry was in reality a usurper. He impris oned his older brother, Robert in Cardiff Castle in Wales, and it is said he ha d Robert's eyes put out. Henry reigned thirty-five years, not only over England , but over one third of France. In 1120 the White Ship went down on a hidden ro ck in the English Channel with the Crown Prince on board and it is said Henry I is never known to have smiled again. He had only one child left, Maude-Matilda , then a widow of the German Emperor Henry V. For political reasons she was nex t married to Geoffrey of Anjou, a boy of sixteen, ten years her junior. After t he death of Henry I there was civil war between Matilda and her nephew Stephen, who got the throne for nineteen years. At one point in this contest Matilda ha d to escape from the Robert Doyley tower of Oxford Castle by sliding down a rop e with gloved hands, the rope held by her favorite knight, Alain. She, with a f ew others dressed in white to avoid detection, crossed in the snowy night over the frozen Thames. The condition of the English people was deplorable during th e reign of Henry I, owing to the blood-curdling cruelty of the Barons. Henry es tablished a vigorous police system to check this, and tried to stop counterfeit ing the money by mutilations. He oppressed his people by taxation.

BIOGRAPH Y: Henry I was born in the year 1068---a factor he himself regarded as highly s ignificant, for he was the only son of the Conqueror born after the conquest of England, and to Henry this meant he was heir to the throne. He was not an attr active proposition: he was dissolute to a degree, producing at least a score of bastards; but far worse he was prone to sadistic cruelty---on one occasion, fo r example, personally punishing a rebellious burgher by throwing him from the w alls of his town.

BIOGRAPHY: At the death of William the Conqueror, Henry wa s left no lands, merely 5,000 pounds of silver. With these he bought lands from his elder brother Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, only to see them taken ba ck again a few years later by Robert, in unholy alliance with his brother Willi am Rufus.

BIOGRAPHY: Henry could do little to avenge such treatment, but in England he found numerous barons who were tired of the exactions and ambitions of their king. He formed alliances with some of these, notably with the import ant De Clare family. He and some of the De Clares were with William Rufus on hi s last hunting expedition, and it is thought that the king's death was the resu lt of Henry's plotting.

BIOGRAPHY: Certainly he moved fast to take advantage of it; leaving Rufus's body unattended in the woods, he swooped down on Winche ster to take control of the treasury. Two days later he was in Westminster, bei ng crowned by the Bishop of London. His speed is understandable when one realis es that his elder brother, Robert [Curthose], was returning from the crusade, a nd claimed, with good reason, to be the true heir.

BIOGRAPHY: Henry showed g reat good sense in his first actions as King. He arrested Ranulph Flambard, Wil liam's tax-gatherer, and recalled Anselm, the exiled Archbishop. Furthermore, h e issued a Charter of Liberties which promised speedy redress of grievances, an d a return to the good government of the Conqueror. P