[1] His nickname "the Rich" is indicative of his fortune in territory and tolls on the Rhine received by his marriage to Anna, daughter and heir of Philipp, the last Count of Katzenelnbogen and his wife Anne of Württemberg.

The result was another agreement at a Diet of the Hessian Landstände in Spieskappel Monastery, on the traditional border between Lower and Upper Hesse, in 1470.

Henry III took over the guardianship of Ludwig II's two sons and ruled over Lower and Upper Hesse until his death in 1483.

Henry also had an illegitimate daughter, Contzel (* before 1471; † before 1508), with a woman named Christina (Steyna), the wife of the painter Johannes Dietz († 1480) of Marburg.

Contzel married Ludwig Orth (about 1460–1523), the several-times mayor of Marburg, and their descendants include Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.