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| 8 | <title>Primary Sources: The execution of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, 1556</title>
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| 20 | <p align="center"> <br>
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| 21 | <p align="center">
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| 22 | <img border="0" src="pcranmer.gif" width="359" height="91"><p align="center"> </td>
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| 29 | <tr>
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| 30 | <td valign="top" width="48%" bgcolor="#FFFFE8"><font size="-1">This
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| 31 | dramatic account of Archbishop Thomas Cranmer's execution was written by
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| 32 | an anonymous bystander. </font>
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| 33 | <p><font size="-1">Cranmer was executed on 21 March 1556. Imprisoned by
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| 34 | the Catholic Queen Mary I, Cranmer wrote a recantation of Protestantism,
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| 35 | but he denied that recantation before he died.</font></p>
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| 36 | <p><font size="-1">Mary had good cause to dislike Cranmer. Not only
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| 37 | was he the premier Protestant in England, he also annulled her parents'
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| 38 | marriage and subsequently married King Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn.</font></p>
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| 39 | <p><br>
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| 40 | <br>
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| 41 | </td>
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| 42 | <td width="4%"></td>
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| 43 | <td valign="top" width="48%">
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| 44 |
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| 45 | But that I know for our great friendships, and long continued love,
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| 46 | you look even of duty that I should signify to you of the truth of such
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| 47 | things as here chanceth among us; I would not at this time have written
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| 48 | to you the unfortunate end, and doubtful tragedy, of Thomas Cranmer late
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| 49 | bishop of Canterbury: because I little pleasure take in beholding of such
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| 50 | heavy sights. And, when they are once overpassed, I like not to rehearse
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| 51 | them again; being but a renewing of my woe, and doubling my grief.
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| 52 | For although his former, and wretched end, deserves a greater misery, (if
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| 53 | any greater might have chanced than chanced unto him), yet, setting aside
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| 54 | his offenses to God and his country, and beholding the man without his
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| 55 | faults, I think there was none that pitied not his case, and bewailed not
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| 56 | his fortune, and feared not his own chance, to see so noble a prelate,
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| 57 | so grave a counsellor, of so long continued honor, after so many dignities,
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| 58 | in his old years to be deprived of his estate, adjudged to die, and in
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| 59 | so painful a death to end his life. I have no delight to increase
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| 60 | it. Alas, it is too much of itself, that ever so heavy a case should
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| 61 | betide to man, and man to deserve it.
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| 62 | <br>But to come to the matter: on Saturday last, being 21 of March, was
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| 63 | his day appointed to die. And because the morning was much rainy,
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| 64 | the sermon appointed by Mr Dr Cole to be made at the stake, was made in
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| 65 | St Mary's church: whither Dr Cranmer was brought by the mayor and aldermen,
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| 66 | and my lord Williams: with whom came divers gentlemen of the shire, sir
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| 67 | T A Bridges, sir John Browne, and others. Where was prepared, over
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| 68 | against the pulpit, a high place for him, that all the people might see
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| 69 | him. And, when he had ascended it, he kneeled him down and prayed,
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| 70 | weeping tenderly: which moved a great number to tears, that had conceived
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| 71 | an assured hope of his conversion and repentance....
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| 72 | <br>When praying was done, he stood up, and, having leave to speak, said,
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| 73 | 'Good people, I had intended indeed to desire you to pray for me; which
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| 74 | because Mr Doctor hath desired, and you have done already, I thank you
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| 75 | most heartily for it. And now will I pray for myself, as I could
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| 76 | best devise for mine own comfort, and say the prayer, word for word, as
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| 77 | I have here written it.' And he read it standing: and after kneeled
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| 78 | down, and said the Lord's Prayer; and all the people on their knees devoutly
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| 79 | praying with him....
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| 80 | <br>And then rising, he said, 'Every man desireth, good people, at the
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| 81 | time of their deaths, to give some good exhortation, that other may remember
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| 82 | after their deaths, and be the better thereby. So I beseech God grant
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| 83 | me grace, that I may speak something, at this my departing, whereby God
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| 84 | may be glorified, and you edified....
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| 85 | <br>And now I come to the great thing that troubleth my conscience more
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| 86 | than nay other thing that ever I said or did in my life: and that is, the
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| 87 | setting abroad of writings contrary to the truth. Which here now
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| 88 | I renounce and refuse, as things written with my hand, contrary to the
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| 89 | truth which I thought in my heart, and written for fear of death, and to
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| 90 | save my life, if it might be: and that is, all such bills, which I have
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| 91 | written or signed with mine own hand since my degradation: wherein I have
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| 92 | written many things untrue. And forasmuch as my hand offended in
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| 93 | writing contrary to my heart, therefore my hand shall first be punished:
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| 94 | for if I may come to the fire, it shall be first burned. And as for
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| 95 | the pope, I refuse him, as Christ's enemy and antichrist, with all his
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| 96 | false doctrine.'
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| 97 | <br>And here, being admonished of his recantation and dissembling, he said,
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| 98 | 'Alas, my lord, I have been a man that all my life loved plainness, and
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| 99 | never dissembled till now against the truth; which I am most sorry for
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| 100 | it.' He added hereunto, that, for the sacrament, he believed as he
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| 101 | had taught in his book against the bishop of Winchester. And here
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| 102 | he was suffered to speak no more....
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| 103 | <br>Then was he carried away; and a great number, that did run to see him
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| 104 | go so wicjedly to his death, ran after him, exhorting him, while time was,
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| 105 | to remember himself. And one Friar John, a godly and well learned
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| 106 | man, all the way traveled with him to reduce him. But it would not
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| 107 | be. What they said in particular I cannot tell, but the effect appeared
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| 108 | in the end: for at the stake he professed, that he died in all such opinions
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| 109 | as he had taught, and oft repented him of his recantation.
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| 110 | <br>Coming to the stake with a cheerful countenance and willing mind, he
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| 111 | put off his garments with haste, and stood upright in his shirt: and bachelor
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| 112 | of divinity, named Elye, of Brazen-nose college, labored to convert him
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| 113 | to his former recantation, with the two Spanish friars. And when
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| 114 | the friars saw his constancy, they said in Latin to one another 'Let us
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| 115 | go from him: we ought not to be nigh him: for the devil is with him.'
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| 116 | But the bachelor of divinity was more earnest with him: unto whom he answered,
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| 117 | that, as concerning his recantation, he repented it right sore, because
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| 118 | he knew it was against the truth; with other words more. Whereby
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| 119 | the Lord Williams cried, 'Make short, make short.' Then the bishop
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| 120 | took certain of his friends by the hand. But the bachelor of divinity
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| 121 | refused to take him by the hand, and blamed all the others that so did,
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| 122 | and said, he was sorry that ever he came in his company. And yet
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| 123 | again he required him to agree to his former recantation. And the
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| 124 | bishop answered, (showing his hand), 'This was the hand that wrote it,
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| 125 | and therefore shall it suffer first punishment.'
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| 126 | <br>Fire being now put to him, he stretched out his right hand, and thrust
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| 127 | it into the flame, and held it there a good space, before the fire came
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| 128 | to any other part of his body; where his hand was seen of every man sensibly
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| 129 | burning, crying with a loud voice, 'This hand hath offended.'
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| 130 | As soon as the fire got up, he was very soon dead, never stirring or crying
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| 131 | all the while.
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| 132 | <br>His patience in the torment, his courage in dying, if it had been taken
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| 133 | either for the glory of God, the wealth of his country, or the testimony
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| 134 | of truth, as it was for a pernicious error, and subversion of true religion,
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| 135 | I could worthily have commended the example, and matched it with the fame
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| 136 | of any father of ancient time: but, seeing that not the death, but cause
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| 137 | and quarrel thereof, commendeth the sufferer, I cannot but much dispraise
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| 138 | his obstinate stubbornness and sturdiness in dying, and specially in so
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| 139 | evil a cause. Surely his death much grieved every man; but not after
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| 140 | one sort. Some pitied to see his body so tormented with the fire
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| 141 | raging upon the silly carcass, that counted not of the folly. Other
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| 142 | that passed not much of the body, lamented to see him spill his soul, wretchedly,
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| 143 | without redemption, to be plagued for ever. His friends sorrowed
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| 144 | for love; his enemies for pity; strangers for a common kind of humanity,
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| 145 | whereby we are bound one to another. Thus I have enforced myself,
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| 146 | for your sake, to discourse this heavy narration, contrary to my mind:
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| 147 | and, being more than half weary, I make a short end, wishing you a quieter
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| 148 | life, with less honor; and easier death, with more praise.<p align="center"> <p align="center"><a href="primary.html">
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| 149 | <font size="2">to Primary Sources</font></a></td>
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