The British Royals Message Board: Re: Edmund Tudor

Of course if Jane Grey had had a brother he would have been the prospective heir instead of her. Brothers always had preference over sisters (albeit not uncles which is why Victoria succeeded to the throne in 1837 and not her uncle Ernest).
However by 1553 it was clear Jane's parents would have no more offspring and in May of that year the ambitious Duke of Northumberland, head of the Privy Council, arranged for the marriage of Jane Grey to his son Guildford Dudley through whom he hoped to continue wielding power. He then undoubtedly pressured the dying king to make a will naming Jane as his successor contravening his father's Act of Succession. The will was never endorsed by Parliament but the Duke forced the other members of the Privy Council to recognise it . It soon blew up in all their faces as Parliament and the majority of the nobility refused to recognise Jane as the new Queen and Northumberland's attempted coup collapsed after just nine days. The Privy Council quickly changed sides and deposed Northumberland as Lord Protector. He was soon arrested and executed for high treason.

Had Edmund Tudor survived it's quite likely Henry VIII would have arranged a marriage between either him or a son of Edmund with his daughter Mary (he had seriously contemplated such an arrangement with his illegitimate son Henry Richmond had Richmond not died). A son of Edmund would have become King-Consort in the same way Guildford Dudley briefly became but Mary would still have been Queen Regnant just as Jane Grey briefly became. After Mary's death her husband might have gone on to marry her half-sister Elizabeth but if Elizabeth had refused he would have become her Heir Presumptive failing any issue of her own and, as it would have been highly unlikely he would have outlived her, his son or daughter would have succeeded her to continue the Tudor line.

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I was under the impression that Edward VI was actually hoping for male heirs of his cousin Francis and had there been a son or grandson he would have succeeded Edward VI. He only went for Jane because he was dying and there was no time left to wait for a boy to be born.
Yes technically Mary would have been the heiress of her father but female rule had not been really done in England. The fact that Mary did end up reigning is probably because all the potential heirs were female and of all those women her claim was the best. Had there been a male heir she might not have reigned or if Edmund had had a son of the right age she might have become queen-consort rather than queen-regnant.

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If Edmund had survived he would have been Heir Presumptive to his brother until the latter's first legitimate child was born ie. Mary in 1516 (In English Common Law daughters had rights of succession over uncles). No doubt Henry would still have sought to secure a male heir of his own so that his own lineage would succeed him and so would probably have proceeded with the divorce from Catherine.

As for Edward VI, it was not a simple matter for him to alter the legitimate line of succession and certainly not without an Act of Parliament to endorse it. The Lady Jane Grey fiasco quickly bore this out. Interestingly if Edmund had survived and produced heirs of his own he or they would have succeeded the childless Elizabeth I and the Tudor line would have continued. No need for Stuarts.

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Im wondering what would have happened if Edmund Tudor the third and youngest son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York would have survived.

Would Henry VIII have divorced Katherine of Aragon if his younger brother had lived and had one or more sons? Even if Henry VIII would still have ended up with 6 wives im sure Edward VI would have left the throne to his uncle or male cousin over his half-sisters or any female in the family.