On July 16 1546, Anne Askew along with three other Protestants,
John Lascelles, John Adams and Nicholas Belenian, were burned at the stake at
Smithfield in London for heresy. As we have explored in my previous post Anne
has been so badly racked during her interrogations at the Tower of London that
she could no longer walk. Anne was carried to the stake and was tied to it when
she could not stand. John Foxe, the writer known for working to rehabilitate
the reputation of Anne Boleyn, also took this Anne under his literary wing
writing, “Hitherto we have entreated of
this good woman: now it remaineth that we tough somewhat as touching her end
and martyrdom. She being born of such stock and kindred that she might have
lived in great wealth and prosperity, if she would rather have followed the
world than Christ, but now she was so tormented, that she could neither live long
in so great distress, neither yet by the adversaries be suffered to die in
secret. Wherefore the day of her execution was appointed, and she brought into
Smithfield in a chair, because she could not go on her feed, by means of her
great torments. When she was brought unto the stake she was tied by the middle
with a chain that held up her body. When all things were thus prepared to the
fire, Dr Shaxton, who was then appointment to preach, began his sermon. Anne
Askew, hearing and answering again unto him, where he said well, confirmed the
same; where he said amiss, “There,” said she, “…he missesth and speaketh
without the book.”
The sermon being
finished, the martyrs standing there tied at three several stakes ready to
their martyrdom, began their prayers. The multitude and concourse of the people
was exceeding; the place where their stood being railed about to keep out the
press. Upon the bench under St. Bartholomew’s Church sat Wriothesley,
chancellor of England; the old Duke of Norfolk, the old earl of Bedford, the
lord mayor, with divers others. Before the fire should be set unto them, one of
the bench, hearing that they had gunpowder about them, and being alarmed lest
the faggots, by strength of the gunpowder, would come flying about their ears,
began to be afraid: but the earl of Bedford, declaring unto him how the
gunpowder was not laid under the faggots, but only about their bodies, to rid
them of their pain: which having vent, there was no danger to them of the
faggots, so diminished that fear.
Then Wriothesley, lord
chancellors, sent to Anne Askew letter offering to her the King’s pardon if she
would recant; who refusing once to look upon them made this answer again, that
she came not thither to deny her Lord and Master. Then were the letters like-wise
offered unto the others, who, in like manner, following the constancy of the
woman, denied not only to receive them, but also to look upon the,. Whereupon
the lord mayor, commanding fire to be put to them, cried with a loud voice,
“Fiat justicia.”
And thus the good Anne
Askew, with these blessed martyrs being troubled so many manner of ways, and
having passed through so many torments, having now ended the long course of her
agonies, being compassed in with flames of fire, as a blessed sacrifice unto
God, she slept in the Lord AD 1546, leaving behind her a singular example of
Christian constancy for all men to follow.”
Anne Askew went to her death proudly and with admirable
courage. She became the first woman not only to be racked in England, but also
the first female Protestant Martyr in what would become a long succession of
deaths in England’s bloody religious infighting.
**Passage
taken from The Actes and Monuments of
John Foxe: The Complete Edition
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| The Martyrdom of Mistress Askew by an unknown artist ca. 1869 |
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