LADY JANE GRAY, HER EARLY LIFE.Lady Jane Gray had a most difficult childhood. Her mother Frances Brandon has been depicted as a cruel, abusive and domineering woman, who was a harsh disciplinarian. She considered her daughter to be very weak and therefore in needof the most strict disciplinary regime. Frequent beatings of Jane took place, which her mother thought would harden her. When speaking to Roger Ascham, who was tutor to her cousin Princess Elizabeth, she spoke of her deep unhappiness, telling him, "For when I am in the presence of either Father or Mother, whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand or go, eat, drink, be merry or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or doing anything else, I must do it as it were in such weight, measure and number, even so perfectly as God made the world, or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, yes presently sometimes with pinches, nips and bobs and other ways, that I think myself in hell". With no mother's love whatsoever, Lady Jane Grey looked elsewhere to fill the tremendous void in her life. She found it in books where she was able to learn several languages which included Latin, Greek, Italian and French. With the help of her tutor John Aylmer she became fluent in all of them.
ABOVE: A PORTRAIT OF LADY JANE GRAY. In the year 1546, before her tenth birthday, Jane became the ward of Katherine Parr, the Queen Consort of England, who had married King Henry VIII three years earlier to become his sixth wife. It was during this period of her life that Jane got to know her royal cousins, Edward, Mary Tudor and Elizabeth. These cousins were all to become future rulers of England. King Edward VI, Queen Mary Tudor(also known as Queen Bloody Mary) and Queen Elizabeth I. Katherine Parr was excellent with children and Lady Jane Gray loved her. It was the happiest time of young Jane's life. She found in Katherine all the love and affection which had been missing with her own parents. When Henry VIII died in 1547, his widow Katherine remarried. The following year Katherine died of complications shortly after giving birth to her only child, a baby girl. Her new husband was Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley who tried to persuade Jane's Father to pay enough money for Jane to become his ward. He promised in return, that with his connections at court, he would do everything in his power to marry her to the young King Edward. Jane was the chief mourner at Katherine's funeral. Once again she found herself lacking parental figures. Return To Lady Jane Gray - The Nine Day Queen Return from Lady Jane Gray Her Early Life To A-London-Tourist-Guide Home Page.
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