Bishop John Fisher Executed - The Anne Boleyn Files

Thank you my friend SGT (Join to see) for making us aware that on June 22, 1535, the Bishop of Rochester, England John Fisher was beheaded by order of King Henry VIII. He "was executed for treason, for refusing to take the Oath of Succession and accept Henry as the Supreme Head of the Church of England."

Death of Saint John Fisher, Tudor and English Martyr
Death of John Fisher, his last hour in the Tower of London and escorted to Tower Hill where he was beheaded for the Catholic Faith in England by order of King Henry VIII.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRbsvscCm5c

Images:
1. John Fisher Sculpture
2. The Field of the Cloth of Gold filled Bishop John Fisher with distaste
3. The Beheading of John Fisher and Countess of Salisbury June 22, 1535
4. Thomas More, Lord Chancellor and St John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, 1535, depicted in a victorian stained glass window in Fleetwood, Lancashire

Biographies
1. thehistoryofengland.co.uk/resource/bishop-john-fisher
2. newadvent.org/cathen/08462b.htm

1. Background from {[https://thehistoryofengland.co.uk/resource/bishop-john-fisher/]}
"Bishop John Fisher By David Crowther
Bishop John Fisher, 1469-1535
John Fisher was to his Catholic contemporaries, a straightforward hero, with none of the complexities and compromises of Thomas More. A Chancellor of Cambridge University, a brilliant theologian, reformer, preacher, a fine bishop who carried out his pastoral duties with great care. But most of all a man who clearly understood the consequences of Henry VIII’s divorce in a way that his boss, Archbishop William Warham, did not, until it was too late. And who with absolute integrity defied absolute power and paid for it with his life.
Fisher was born in Beverley, Yorkshire in 1469, to a wealthy Mercer. He followed therefore a similar path as did John Morton, and Thomas Wolsey – though education to Cambridge University, where he progressed to MA and was ordained in 1491. He rose in the service of the university as a Proctor, and would later become Chancellor.

Mutual inspiration – Fisher and Margaret Beaufort
His life was changed in 1495 when his work took him to court, and he met Margaret Beaufort. The two of them formed a strong attachment that would last until Margaret’s death; at the very first meeting, Margaret resolved that she would add him to her household. By 1498 Fisher was her household Chaplain, and by 1500 was her principle confessor. Fisher would write of her:
Once she had adopted me as her confessor and her moral and spiritual guide, learned more of what leads to an upright life from her rare virtues that I ever taught her in return.
Margaret was a generous patron as well as a pious one. One of Fisher’s achievements was to persuade her to use some of her money to found colleges in Cambridge; and so Christ’s College Cambridge was transformed from a rather run down grammar school, and St John’s College would be founded after her death, though Fisher would have to fight tooth and nail with her grandson Henry VIII to get those projects implemented. Fisher would speak admiringly of Margaret at her funeral.
Bishop of Rochester
In 1504 Fisher profited from one of Henry VII’s bouts of illness and subsequent desire to please God, and was made Bishop of Rochester, an appointment made on his theological talents rather than a political appointment – Rochester was too poor a see for that!
Even his evangelist enemies would concede that he was a model bishop. He ensured an active programme of visitations in his diocese; and even more unusually, carried out those visitations in person. He was from the start an enthusiastic and active preacher. The statutes he drafted for St John’s College made the training of preachers one of its express aims.
This was partly because Fisher disliked the secular political world of pomp and ceremony, and avoided it as much as possible. On occasion he couldn’t avoid it, and when that happened he moaned.
Sundry times when I have settled and fully bent myself to the care of my flock…straightway hath come a messenger for one cause or other sent from higher authority by which I have been called to other business
…by tossing and going his way and that way, time hath passed and the in meanwhile nothing done but attending after triumphs, receiving of ambassadors, haunting of Princes’ courts and such like: whereby great expenses rise that might better be spent other ways

Never before was seen in England such an excess of apparelment
And hated court:
Great money was spent, many great mens’ coffers were emptied & many were brought to the great ebb of poverty
And anyway
Take away the glistering garment, take away the cloth of gold & what difference is there betwixt and Emperor and another poor man?
Fisher and the Reformation
This kind of attitude did not make him Henry VIII’s natural companion, but as a theologian of genuinely European reputation and standing, Henry was keen to have him around. He played an essential in supporting the king’s Assertio Septem Sacramentorum of 1521, refuting and roundly insulting Luther. Fisher was an implacable heretic hunter all his life; in May 1521 he started by preaching at the book burning of all Luther’s works. From then on, Fisher devoted himself to the destruction of Luther and all his works. He wrote a series of exhaustive and detailed writings, which made him the most famous theologian in Europe, and produced a body of work that would time and again form the basis for others to attack Luther and his supporters.

The Royal Supremacy
The King’s divorce changed everything. Initially, Fisher’s involvement was purely theological. Henry was desperate to have such an eminent writer on his side. Fisher responded by seeking to re-assure him. Only slowly did it dawn on Fisher where the king was going; and over time became the king’s greatest and most outspoken opponent.
Fisher became once of Catherine’s firmest supporters; he wrote to the queen, he supported her, and more than that he whipped up support by writing pamphlets and so on. As far as Fisher was concerned, Kings should be subject to the authority of the church:
“Kings usually think that they are permitted to do whatever pleases them, because of the magnitude of their power. Therefore it is good for these kings in my opinion, to submit themselves to the decrees of the church…lest perhaps they kick over the traces and do what they like, so long as they can weave together some appearance and pretence of right.”
Brave he might be, but some of Fisher’s clerical contemporaries may well not have thanked him for his intransigence. Fishers arrogance and deep belief in Papal primacy, that reform of the church was the church’s business and nobody else’s, was part of the attitude that fed anti-clericalism. The anti-clericalism that Cromwell and Henry would use in parliament to bring about the very thing Fisher would die for – the Royal supremacy and break with Rome.
Fisher was almost alone in his opposition to the king. At the legatine trial in 1529 he supported Catherine, and spoke for her after she had left. In the Reformation Parliaments he was outspoken in defiance of the Commons and King:
Now with the Commons is nothing but down with the Church and all this meseemeth for lack of faith only
Fisher was essentially accusing the Commons of heresy. He had gone too far; the Duke of Norfolk angrily told him ‘the greatest clerks be not always the wisest men’, the Commons lodged a formal complaint, and the king forced Fisher to take back his words. It was not the end of his resistance. Famously, the Convocation of the Church, the parliament of the church if you like, bowed to Henry’s demands to recognise his supremacy, but Fisher had the words ‘as far as the law of Christ allows’, limiting Henry’s supremacy.
By the end of September 1533 Fisher was clearly guilty of treason; he urged Charles V to get papal condemnation of Henry’s divorce and remarriage, and then bring an army to England to enforce it.

The Tower and Trial
In the end like More it was the Act of Succession which proved the final downfall. Fisher was in fact already in the Tower, and also tried silence; but was tricked by Richard Rich into giving his opinion that the royal supremacy was illegal and against the laws of the church.
In the Tower, Fisher was not treated well. He was getting on a bit now, 66 or so, and quite probably in someone’s mind was the thought that if he was kept cold, damp and under fed maybe nature would come and solve the king’s problem for him. Fisher was even forced to write to Cromwell:
“I beseech you to be a good master unto me in my necessity, for I have neither shirt nor sheet nor yet other clothes that are necessary for me to wear…my diet also God knows how slender it is at many times… I decay forthwith, and fall into coughs and diseases of my body, and cannot keep myself in health”
At this point the Pope, Paul III made Fisher a Cardinal, fondly imagining it might save Fisher’s life, an illustration of how little the papacy understood. Henry nastily declared that anyway before the Cardinal’s Hat arrived he’d make sure Fisher had no head left to put it on.
On 17th June 1535, Fisher was tried as a commoner by jury in front of Thomas Cromwell, Thomas Boleyn and 10 justices. Richard Rich was the only witness, and it was more than enough; Fisher was convicted of Treason and to be hanged, drawn and quartered, though commuted to beheading. He made a short speech as he was condemned:
My lords, I am here condemned before you of high treason for denial of the King’s supremacy over the Church of England, but by what order of justice I leave to God, Who is the searcher both of the king his Majesty’s conscience and yours; nevertheless, being found guilty, as it is termed, I am and must be contented with all that God shall send, to whose will I wholly refer and submit myself. And now to tell you plainly my mind, touching this matter of the king’s supremacy, I think indeed, and always have thought, and do now lastly affirm, that His Grace cannot justly claim any such supremacy over the Church of God as he now taketh upon him; neither hath (it) been seen or heard of that any temporal prince before his days hath presumed to that dignity; wherefore, if the king will now adventure himself in proceeding in this strange and unwonted case, so no doubt but he shall deeply incur the grievous displeasure of the Almighty, to the great damage of his own soul, and of many others, and to the utter ruin of this realm committed to his charge, wherefore, I pray God his Grace may remember himself in good time, and harken to good counsel for the preservation of himself and his realm and the quietness of all Christendom.

Execution
As you would expect from a man of such courage, conviction and with eyes fixed firmly on heaven, Fisher died with dignity. When he arrived, things weren’t ready and so he had to wait sitting on his mule; He spoke boldly to the crowd, telling them to be loving and obedient to the king; he’s a good king he said it’s just that in this one matter he’s been deceived.
Fisher stripped and everyone noticed his dry, spare, emaciated figure, the physical embodiment of the disciplined and determined man he was; and of course, unsurprising given the conditions he’d been held in at the Tower. He knelt slowly, laid his head on the block and died for the unity of Christendom its inherited faith and the rights of the Pope to determine the consciences of men and women in England.
His body was not treated with much respect – by order of a vindictive king who had probably never liked him, the headless body was left lying around for a while, as you do. His head was stuck up on a pike on London Bridge as normal, but irritatingly seemed to get fresher with each passing day. Seeing a miracle on its way, some thoroughly earthy bloke booted it into the Thames before he could cause any more trouble."


2. Background from {[https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08462b.htm]}
St. John Fisher
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Cardinal, Bishop of Rochester, and martyr; born at Beverley, Yorkshire, England, 1459 (?1469); died 22 June, 1535.

John was the eldest son of Robert Fisher, merchant of Beverley, and Agnes his wife. His early education was probably received in the school attached to the collegiate church in his native town, whence in 1484 he removed to Michaelhouse, Cambridge. He took the degree of B.A. in 1487, proceeded M.A. in 1491, in which year he was elected a fellow of his college, and was made Vicar of Northallerton, Yorkshire. In 1494 he resigned his benefice to become proctor of his university, and three years later was appointed Master of Michaelhouse, about which date he became chaplain and confessor to Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, mother of King Henry VII. In 1501 he received the degree of D.D., and was elected Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge University. Under Fisher's guidance, the Lady Margaret founded St. John's and Christ's Colleges at Cambridge, and also the two "Lady Margaret" professorships of divinity at Oxford and Cambridge respectively, Fisher himself being the first occupant of the Cambridge chair.

By Bull dated 14 October, 1504, Fisher was advanced to the Bishopric of Rochester, and in the same year was elected Chancellor of Cambridge University, to which post he was re-elected annually for ten years and then appointed for life. At this date also he is said to have acted as tutor to Prince Henry, afterwards Henry VIII. As a preacher his reputation was so great that in 1509, when King Henry VII and the Lady Margaret died, Fisher was appointed to preach the funeral oration on both occasions; these sermons are still extant. In 1512 Fisher was nominated as one of the English representatives at the Fifth Council of Lateran, then sitting, but his journey to Rome was postponed, and finally abandoned. Besides his share in the Lady Margaret's foundations, Fisher gave further proof of his genuine zeal for learning by inducing Erasmus to visit Cambridge. The latter indeed (Epist., 6:2) attributes it to Fisher's protection that the study of Greek was allowed to proceed at Cambridge without the active molestation that it encountered at Oxford. He has also been named, though without any real proof, as the true author of the royal treatise against Luther entitled "Assertio septem sacramentorum", published in 1521, which won the title Fidei Defensor for Henry VIII. Before this date Fisher had denounced various abuses in the Church, urging the need of disciplinary reforms, and in this year he preached at St. Paul's Cross on the occasion when Luther's books were publicly burned.

When the question of Henry's divorce from Queen Catherine arose, Fisher became the Queen's chief supporter and most trusted counsellor. In this capacity he appeared on the Queen's behalf in the legates' court, where he startled his hearers by the directness of his language and most of all by declaring that, like St. John the Baptist, he was ready to die on behalf of the indissolubility of marriage. This statement was reported to Henry VIII, who was so enraged by it that he himself composed a long Latin address to the legates in answer to the bishop's speech. Fisher's copy of this still exists, with his manuscript annotations in the margin which show how little he feared the royal anger. The removal of the cause to Rome brought Fisher's personal share therein to an end, but the king never forgave him for what he had done. In November, 1529, the "Long Parliament" of Henry's reign began its series of encroachments on the Church. Fisher, as a member of the upper house, at once warned Parliament that such acts could only end in the utter destruction of the Church in England. On this the Commons, through their speaker, complained to the king that the bishop had disparaged Parliament. Dr. Gairdner (Lollardy and the Reformation, I, 442) says of this incident "it can hardly be a matter of doubt that this strange remonstrance was prompted by the king himself, and partly for personal uses of his own".

The opportunity was not lost. Henry summoned Fisher before him, demanding an explanation. This being given, Henry declared himself satisfied, leaving it to the Commons to declare that the explanation was inadequate, so that he appeared as a magnanimous sovereign, instead of Fisher's enemy.

A year later (1530) the continued encroachments on the Church moved the Bishops of Rochester, Bath, and Ely to appeal to the Apostolic see. This gave the king his opportunity. An edict forbidding such appeals was immediately issued, and the three bishops were arrested. Their imprisonment, however, can have lasted a few months only, for in February, 1531, Convocation met, and Fisher was present. This was the occasion when the clergy were forced, at a cost of 1000,000 pounds, to purchase the king's pardon for having recognized Cardinal Wolsey's authority as legate of the pope; and at the same time to acknowledge Henry as Supreme Head of the Church in England, to which phrase, however, the addition "so far as God's law permits" was made, through Fisher's efforts.

A few days later, several of the bishop's servants were taken ill after eating some porridge served to the household, and two actually died. Popular opinion at the time regarded this as an attempt on the bishop's life, although he himself chanced not to have taken any of the poisoned food. To disarm suspicion, the king not only expressed strong indignation at the crime, but caused a special Act of Parliament to be passed, whereby poisoning was to be accounted high treason, and the person guilty of it boiled to death. This sentence was actually carried out on the culprit, but it did not prevent what seems to have been a second attempt on Fisher's life soon afterwards.

Matters now moved rapidly. In May, 1532, Sir Thomas More resigned the chancellorship, and in June, Fisher preached publicly against the divorce. In August, Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, died, and Cranmer was at once nominated to the pope as his successor. In January, 1533, Henry secretly went through the form of marriage with Anne Boleyn; Cranmer's consecration took place in March of the same year, and, a week later, Fisher was arrested. It seems fairly clear that the purpose of this arrest was to prevent his opposing the sentence of divorce which Cranmer pronounced in May, or the coronation of Anne Boleyn which followed on 1 June; for Fisher was set at liberty again within a fortnight of the latter event, no charge being made against him. In the autumn of this year (1533), various arrests were made in connexion with the so-called revelations of the Holy Maid of Kent, but as Fisher was taken seriously ill in December, proceedings against him were postponed for a time. In March, 1534, however, a special bill of attainder against the Bishop of Rochester and others for complicity in the matter of the Nun of Kent was introduced and passed. By this Fisher was condemned to forfeiture of all his personal estate and to be imprisoned during the king's pleasure. Subsequently a pardon was granted him on payment of a fine of 300 pounds.

In the same session of Parliament was passed the Act of Succession, by which all who should be called upon to do so were compelled to take an oath of succession, acknowledging the issue of Henry and Anne as legitimate heirs to the throne, under pain of being guilty of misprision of treason. Fisher refused the oath and was sent to the Tower of London, 26 April, 1534. Several efforts were made to induce him to submit, but without effect, and in November he was a second time attained of misprision of treason, his goods being forfeited as from 1 March preceding, and the See of Rochester being declared vacant as from 2 June following. A long letter exists, written from the Tower by the bishop to Thomas Cromwell, which records the severity of his confinement and the sufferings he endured.

In May, 1535, the new pope, Paul III, created Fisher Cardinal Priest of St. Vitalis, his motive being apparently to induce Henry by this mark of esteem to treat the bishop less severely. The effect was precisely the reverse. Henry forbade the cardinal's hat to be brought into England, declaring that he would send the head to Rome instead. In June a special commission for Fisher's trial was issued, and on 17 June he was arraigned in Westminster Hall on a charge of treason, in that he denied the king to be supreme head of the Church. Since he had been deprived of his bishopric by the Act of Attainder, he was treated as a commoner, and tried by jury. He was declared guilty, and condemned to be hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, but the mode of execution was changed, and instead he was beheaded on Tower Hill.

The martyr's last moments were thoroughly in keeping with his previous life. He met death with a calm dignified courage which profoundly impressed all present. His headless body was stripped and left on the scaffold till evening, when it was thrown naked into a grave in the churchyard of Allhallows, Barking. Thence it was removed a fortnight later and laid beside that of Sir Thomas More in the church of St. Peter ad Vincula by the Tower. His head was stuck upon a pole on London Bridge, but its ruddy and lifelike appearance excited so much attention that, after a fortnight, it was thrown into the Thames, its place being taken by that of Sir Thomas More, whose martyrdom occurred on 6 July next following.

Several portraits of Fisher exist, the best being by Holbein in the royal collection; and a few secondary relics are extant. In the Decree of 29 December, 1886, when fifty-four of the English martyrs were beatified by Leo XIII, the best place of all is given to John Fisher. He was canonized in 1935 by Pope Pius XI — Ed.

A list of Fisher's writings will be found in Gillow, "Bibliographical Dictionary of the English Catholics" (London, s.d.), II, 262-270. There are twenty-six works in all, printed and manuscript, mostly ascetical or controversial treatises, several of which have been reprinted many times. The original editions are very rare and valuable. The principal are:

"Treatise concernynge . . . the seven penytencyall Psalms" (London, 1508);
"Sermon . . . agayn ye pernicyous doctrin of Martin Luther" (London, 1521);
"Defensio Henrici VIII" (Cologne, 1525);
"De Veritate Corporis et Sanguinis Christi in Eucharistia, adversus Johannem Oecolampadium" (Cologne, 1527);
"De Causa Matrimonii . . . Henrici VIII cum Catharina Aragonensi" (Alcalá de Henares, 1530);
"The Wayes to Perfect Religion" (London, 1535);
"A Spirituall Consolation written . . . to hys sister Elizabeth" (London, 1735)."

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Thank you for the history share brother David.

Ouch!