The Sinking of the Mary Rose

When Henry VIII became King of England in 1509 he was a vigorous, well-educated young man of eighteen with a single-mindedness that later matured into obstinacy. He had inherited a small fleet of ships from his father Henry VII but his kingdom was small with a population of scarcely four million and an agricultural policy which depended on the wool trade for economic viability. The last thing England could afford was expensive military campaigns but it was essential that the Channel be kept open, and a foothold on the French coast was necessary not only for royal prestige but also to ensure free passage for English merchant ships. Calais remained under English rule, the last piece of debris left from English territories in France after the Hundred Years War. In Europe two major powers, France and Spain, jostled for control and the Pope backed first one and then the other. Henry allied himself with both by marriage – first his own to Catherine of Aragon, the aunt of Charles V, Emperor of Spain, and then by arranging the marriage of his favourite sister, Mary, to the elderly King of France, Louis XII.