Father: Henri IV, King of France
Mother: Maria de' Medici
Husband: Charles I
Married: 1624-1649
Age: 15
Children: Charles James (1629), Charles II, James II,
Mary Henriette, Elizabeth (1635-1650),
Anne (1637-1640), Catherine (1639),
Henry (1640-1660), Henrietta Anne (Minette)
Died: 1669
Age: 60
During the 1630s, the Court of King Charles and Henrietta Maria was admired throughout Europe. The King's impeccable taste in art and his love of formal stateliness gave the court a surface appearance of sophistication, while the Queen's enjoyment of dancing and music added warmth and polite gaiety. Elaborate masques staged by Inigo Jones and Ben Jonson, in which the King and Queen sometimes took part, transformed traditional court pageantry into theatrical displays that emphasised the absolutist ideology of the early Stuart monarchy.
Increasingly, King Charles discussed affairs of state with Henrietta Maria. He valued her opinions and advice, but because she remained a practising Roman Catholic, her influence was viewed with extreme suspicion. When the King needed money to finance the Bishops' Wars of 1639-40, the Queen appealed to the Pope and other foreign powers for help. Her appeals were in vain, but she became the focus for Protestant fears of a Popish conspiracy against England. Rumours that MPs of the Long Parliament were planning to impeach the Queen prompted King Charles to make his disastrous attempt at arresting the Five Members in January 1642.
In February 1642, when civil war looked inevitable, Henrietta Maria set sail for Holland - the King galloping along the cliff tops to keep her ship in sight until the last sail had vanished below the horizon. She spent almost a year at the Hague, raising loans, buying weapons and recruiting troops for the Royalist cause. Using the Crown Jewels as surety, she raised �180,000, as well as several shiploads of weapons and ammunition and a company of distinguished professional soldiers to fight for the King. Braving storms and attack by Parliament's warships, she returned with her convoy to England, landing at Bridlington, Yorkshire, in February 1643. She stayed with the Marquis of Newcastle at York until the summer, when Royalist victories in the Midlands made it relatively safe for her to move south at the head of her army, styling herself "Her She-Majesty, Generalissima". On 13 July she was reunited with the King, who had chosen the site of the battlefield of Edgehill as a suitably dramatic rendezvous. They made a triumphal entry into Oxford the following day.
The Queen remained at Oxford until 1644 when, being pregnant, she decided to withdraw to Exeter for her confinement. She parted from King Charles at Abingdon on 17 April 1644 - the last time they would see one another. On 16 June she gave birth to her ninth child, a daughter, at Exeter. The Earl of Essex was marching into the west country with the intention of taking the Queen hostage. She realised the danger and on 14 July 1644 took ship from Falmouth and escaped to France, where she remained until the Restoration in 1660.
Henrietta Maria visited England in 1660 and again in 1662 but returned to France in 1665. She died in 1669 at Colombes, near Paris. She was the mother of two kings of England, Charles II and James II, and of Henrietta Maria, who became the wife of Philippe, Duc d'Orl�ans, brother of Louis XIV of France.
http://www.skyhook.co.uk/civwar/biog/maria.htm