On this day in Tudor history, 10th December 1591, Roman Catholic priest Edmund Gennings and Catholic Swithin Wells were executed on a scaffold set up outside Wells’ house at Holborn.
Gennings had been caught celebrating mass at Wells’ home by the famous Elizabethan priestfinder and torturer, Richard Topcliffe, who punished him by throwing him into the Little Ease.
Find out more about St Edmund Gennings and St Swithin Wells, and their sad ends, in this talk…
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On this day in Tudor history, 10th December 1591, Roman Catholic priest Edmund Gennings and Catholic Swithin Wells were executed on a scaffold set up outside Wells’ house at Holborn.
Gennings had been caught celebrating mass at Wells’ home by the famous Elizabethan priestfinder and torturer, Richard Topcliffe, who punished him by throwing him into the Little Ease.
Find out more about St Edmund Gennings and St Swithin Wells, and their sad ends, in this talk…
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On this day in Tudor history, 1st December 1581, twenty-five-year-old Roman Catholic priest Alexander Briant was hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn, along with Ralph Sherwin and Edmund Campion.
Briant had been imprisoned, starved, racked and tortured in other awful ways, but he claimed that he felt no pain due to God’s help. He refused to give his interrogators the information he wanted, and he was tried for treason and suffered a full traitor’s death.
In this talk, I share Alexander Briant’s story, what led to his arrest, his account of what happened when he was tortured and his fellow prisoner’s account of what was done to him.
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On this day in Tudor history, 10th December 1541, Thomas Culpeper, a gentleman of the privy chamber, and Francis Dereham, a member of the queen’s household, were executed at Tyburn.
They had been found guilty of high treason for intending to do ill with Queen Catherine Howard, i..e intending to commit adultery with her, and had been sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered. Dereham suffered the full traitors’ death, while Culpeper was beheaded.
Find out more about what happened from a primary source account in today’s talk.
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On this day in Tudor history, 1st December 1541, Thomas Culpeper, a member of King Henry VIII’s privy chamber, and Francis Dereham, a secretary to Queen Catherine Howard, were tried for high treason at Guildhall, London. Both men had been linked romantically with the queen.
They were both found guilty of treason and sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered.
But what about Catherine Howard and her lady, Jane Boleyn, Lady Rochford, who had also been arrested. What was happening with them? Find out more about them, and the trial of Dereham and Culpeper, in today’s talk.
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As this week has been the anniversary of the execution of Catherine Howard, I thought I’d look at the bill of attainder against her and also whether she was guilty of high treason.
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