Decision Process 1. King Henry: Desire for a male heir (Personal Factor) King Henry had married his brother's widow, Catherine of Aragon, in 1509. Catherine had produced only one surviving child - a girl, Princess Mary, born in 1516. By the end of the 1520s, Catherine was in her forties and he was desperate for a son. The Tudor dynasty had been established by conquest in 1485 and King Henry was only its second monarch. England had not so far had a ruling queen, and the dynasty was not secure enough