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Back Lamentation
Chapters (56)
  1. Chapter One
  2. Chapter Two
  3. Chapter Three
  4. Chapter Four
  5. Chapter Five
  6. Chapter Six
  7. Chapter Seven
  8. Chapter Eight
  9. Chapter Nine
  10. Chapter Ten
  11. Chapter Eleven
  12. Chapter Twelve
  13. Chapter Thirteen
  14. Chapter Fourteen
  15. Chapter Fifteen
  16. Chapter Sixteen
  17. Chapter Seventeen
  18. Chapter Eighteen
  19. Chapter Nineteen
  20. Chapter Twenty
  21. Chapter Twenty-one
  22. Chapter Twenty-two
  23. Chapter Twenty-three
  24. Chapter Twenty-four
  25. Chapter Twenty-five
  26. Chapter Twenty-six
  27. Chapter Twenty-seven
  28. Chapter Twenty-eight
  29. Chapter Twenty-nine
  30. Chapter Thirty
  31. Chapter Thirty-one
  32. Chapter Thirty-two
  33. Chapter Thirty-three
  34. Chapter Thirty-four
  35. Chapter Thirty-five
  36. Chapter Thirty-six
  37. Chapter Thirty-seven
  38. Chapter Thirty-eight
  39. Chapter Thirty-nine
  40. Chapter Forty
  41. Chapter Forty-one
  42. Chapter Forty-two
  43. Chapter Forty-three
  44. Chapter Forty-four
  45. Chapter Forty-five
  46. Chapter Forty-six
  47. Chapter Forty-seven
  48. Chapter Forty-eight
  49. Chapter Forty-nine
  50. Chapter Fifty
  51. Chapter Fifty-one
  52. Chapter Fifty-two
  53. Chapter Fifty-three
  54. Epilogue
  55. A CKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  56. H ISTORICAL N OTE

The heresy hunt went on for three months. The spring and early summer of 1546 must have been a desperate time for Catherine, but she seems to have maintained her composure and behaved calmly throughout. Everyone in her circle seems to have stuck loyally together; though this is hardly surprising – if one fell, all fell. It is possible that searches took place within the Queen’s household, and certainly she gave some books (which may have included Lamentation of a Sinner) to her uncle Lord Parr for safekeeping in April.

By July nothing had been found against her. By then the questioning of suspects seems to have been largely over. No evidence had been discovered against anyone within the circle of the court except for Henry’s courtier and friend George Blagge, and nobody from within the Queen’s circle. If Thomas Wriothesley and Richard Rich were actively seeking out heretics on behalf of Bishop Gardiner (and possibly, behind the scenes, the Duke of Norfolk), by July they must have been getting desperate.

THEN, IN LATE JUNE and early July came the extraordinary and gruesome story of Anne Askew, whose memoir, the Examinations of Anne Askew, was smuggled out to Flanders, and published the next year by John Bale. Anne Askew, or to use her married name, Anne Kyme, was the wife of a Lincolnshire gentleman. She was aged around 25. By the standards of the time, her behaviour was extraordinary. A radical Protestant who had openly denied the Real Presence in the Mass, she left her husband, a religious conservative, and their two children to come to London and preach in 1545. She had relatives there, certainly a cousin, and distant connections to low-ranking courtiers. Soon she was brought before the Common Council of London, where she denied she was a heretic. Nonetheless, a year later she was back, and this time, although her initial technique in argument was to hedge, she eventually admitted enough to be found guilty of heresy. She refused to recant, and having been brought before the Privy Council and questioned by Gardiner, among others, she was convicted at the end of June and sentenced to be publicly burned, along with three men, on the 16th of July.