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Edward I and his wife Eleanor of Castile are known for having a large brood of children. Eleanor is believed to have given birth to sixteen children. However many of these children died young, and it took a long time before they had a surviving male heir. Edward of Carnarvon was the youngest of the sixteen and the fourth boy born to the couple. Had they survived, any of his brothers would have been King of England instead of him.
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Born on 5 August 1103 William Adelin would have been the first Anglo-Norman King, reflecting the changes in English society since the Conquest. While his father was King Henry I of England, the youngest son of William the Conqueror, his mother was Matilda (formerly Edith) of Scotland. Her mother had been a granddaughter of the old Anglo-Saxon kings, and had married King Malcolm III of Scotland in 1070. William Adelin might even have had a claim on the Scottish throne if he had survived.
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Unless he thought about changing his name, as later Kings did on accession, then Britain could have had it's first King Fred in the 18th century. On his birth in 1707 the idea that the Electors of Hanover would become Kings of Great Britain was becoming more obvious. Queen Anne had no surviving children, and Frederick's great-grandmother Sophia was Anne's nearest Protestant relative.
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One of the most famous losses to the English throne, Edward the Black Prince was extremely popular for most of his life, but ended it a sick, bitter man.
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At his birth Eustace of Boulogne couldn't have hoped to become anything more than a nobleman, like his father and grandfather. He was due to inherit his mother's county of Boulogne, Stephen himself was a younger brother who had married the heiress Matilda of Boulogne, and had taken title Count of Boulogne through her. As the eldest son Eustace could look forward to becoming Count Eustace of Boulogne in the future. But in infancy he gained a new title and new future – Prince Eustace, heir to the English throne.
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A potential King Arthur of England, young Arthur of Brittany was the son of Duke Geoffrey of Brittany and his wife Constance, and thus had Royal blood in his veins. Geoffrey was the son of King Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine, while Constance was descended from Scottish kings. Geoffrey died a few months before Arthur's birth, leaving Constance to protect both their son and the Duchy of Brittany. As the grandson of Henry II, baby Arthur was also a potential claimant to the English throne.
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Henry Plantagenet is the only prince in the "Almost Kings" series that actually had a coronation. Known to history with the epithet "the Young King", Henry spent most of his short life feeling very hard-done by.
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If you consider that in the medieval period, the eldest son was the main heir to his father's estate, then you can't help but feel very sorry for poor Robert Curthose. As the eldest son of William, Duke of Normandy and Matilda of Flanders, he was already due to inherit Normandy in the future. In 1066 his father became King of England, and the teenage Robert would have been able to think of himself as the future King Robert I of England.
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At the time of his birth in 1365 little Edward of Angouleme was the prospective King Edward V of England. Son of Edward the Black Prince, grandson of King Edward III, the little boy would have been expected to follow in his forefather's military footsteps – batter the French and help reclaim the lands of the Plantagenets.