Seven Brothers at Breda, Jan Pieterss, Geleyn Corneliss

In the year 1572 many exiles were living in Nieuwvaert, near Breda, where they had a little more liberty than elsewhere; and among them were also some who had fled there from other places for the testimony and the following of Jesus Christ. At the beginning of the month of August of that year, many brothers and sisters came there from outside, from Brabant, from Breda, Sevenbergen, and several neighboring villages, and also from Holland, from Leyden, Haerlem and elsewhere. This was discovered and reported to the bailiff, while he was sitting at Gerrit Vorster's and drinking with the steward; and when the steward heard it, he was filled with anger and said

"We will disturb that nest, and wipe out that band at once." So they gathered an armed force, on the evening of the fifth of August, about nine or ten o'clock, when these people had assembled to hear the preaching and to marry a couple, in a house standing on the Voorstraet. In the front part of it lived Pieter de Gulicker, a tailor, and in the back part Jan Pieterss, a weaver; and about one hundred men and women were gathered there together. The steward and the bailiff with their men came twice to the house to listen, without accomplishing anything more; but the third time the steward sent a servant, who found them gathered by the light of many candles, engaged in their preaching. Then came the steward, the stadtholder, and the bailiff, with all their servants and men, well armed with pistols, halberds, swords, and other weapons; and thrusting open the doors of the house, they seized some whom they could get. But most of them broke through the walls, the passages, and the roof of the house, and escaped. In all, these were seized: Jan Pieterss of Vlaerdinge, who lived in the rear part of the house, and served the assembly with the Word of truth; Pieter de Gulicker, a tailor, who lived in the front part of the house, with one of his apprentices, who was only sixteen or seventeen years old; Geleyn Corneliss, a shoemaker of Middleharnisse, near Somerdijck; Arent Block of Sevenberger; and Cornelis, the son of Koppen de Gijselaer, of Dortrecht; and two or three women. When these had been seized they were brought to Gerrit Vorster's house, and the men were put in irons; but the women were placed unfettered in a room by themselves, from which they made good their escape. The next morning there came to these six prisoners Michiel, the uncle of Cornelis de Gijselaer (married to the widow of Valerius the schoolmaster, who in the year 1568, about three years before this, had been offered up at Brouwershaven). He had come to visit his friends, to comfort them from the Word of God in their tribulation; but the bailiff came upon them and seized him as well, saying: "You also belong to this people; you must also stay here with them."

All the property of these prisoners was immediately written down and confiscated, so that the women and children had to flee deprived and stripped of everything, which many lamented. Because of these things the people in Nieuwvaert were so terrified that many dared not stay there any longer, the more so since the steward had written to the Duke of Alva, and, having received a letter in return, had gone there in person. In all, about thirty fled, brothers as well as sisters, of those who lived in Nieuwvaert, besides all the others who had come there from other places.

The schoolmaster of Nieuwvaert, called Master Pieter Claess van der Linden, who had disputed five hours with Jan Pieterss (besides that the pastor had also disputed with him two or three times), and who was greatly embittered against this people, nevertheless gives this testimony about them, that their chief and principal errors are these: "That they do not baptize infants; that they cannot believe that Christ had His flesh and blood from Mary; and that they regard themselves as the little flock and the elect of God. But that, apart from this, their life and conduct is better than that of many others, and that they also seek to bring up their children in better discipline and fear of God than many other people do. That he also had some of their children in his school, who were more able and learned more readily than any others. That he and many others deeply deplored the great persecution and trouble inflicted upon these people, and especially that, on account of the men, the poor women and children were so pitifully stripped of all their possessions, and driven away into misery."

These prisoners were kept in irons, in the house of the said Gerrit Vorster, from the fifth of August, when they were seized in the night, until noon of the seventh, when they were taken together to Breda. There they were most severely assailed with examinations, promises, threats, and tortures, to make them apostatize from their faith and name their fellow believers; so that Pieter de Gulicker, unable to withstand it, abandoned the faith and his God, by which he nevertheless did not obtain a release, but was executed with the sword. But the rest remained steadfast to the end, however unmercifully they were treated in the torture. For one was very cruelly tortured and wounded upon the rack, and while he lay there, urine was poured into his mouth, and his body was trampled on. Another was fastened below by his feet, his hands tied behind his back, and he was hauled up from behind in that way, and scourged. But Geleyn, the shoemaker, was tortured most cruelly of all. They stripped him naked and hung him up by his right thumb, with a weight attached to his left foot; and while he hung there he was burned under his arms with candles and fire, and scourged, until the two commissaries of the Duke of Alva, who were present, themselves grew tired, and went away and sat down to play cards, the executioner looking on, for about an hour, or an hour and a half. Meanwhile Geleyn was left hanging; and during all the time that they played he felt no pain, but was as though he had been in a sweet slumber, or in a swoon. Indeed, he afterward testified himself that he had never in his life rested on his bed with less pain than while he hung there. When they had finished playing, they said to the executioner: "Seize him again; he must tell us something; a drowned calf is a small risk." Coming to him, the executioner exclaimed: "The man is dead" (so deep was his sleep or swoon). Then one of the commissaries sprang up, and shook him so roughly by one arm as to sprain it; and it was not yet healed from the burning. When he began to revive again, he was let down; but he implicated no one, nor did he deny his faith, so that he was finally sentenced to the fire with Jan Pieterss and the young apprentice, to be burned alive. When they were standing at the stakes and were being burned, the flames were blown away from Geleyn so much that the executioner had to hold him into the fire with a fork from the other side of the stake. So these men, valiantly holding to the truth, laid down their lives for it.

Shortly after, when Cornelis de Gijselaer and Arent Block were also led out to death to be burned, Arent dropped a letter which he had written, thinking that one of the friends would pick it up and get it; but unfortunately it fell into the hands of the tyrants, who immediately had the two taken back to prison, where they were still more dreadfully tortured. But when they nevertheless remained constantly valiant, named no one, and in no torture apostatized from their God, they were finally, like the three before them, also sentenced and burned; and very soon after, Michiel, the uncle of Cornelis de Gijselaer, also followed the others with a like sacrifice.

So these now lie together under the altar, and wait for the number of their brothers to be fulfilled, so that they may then live with them forever in everlasting joy with the Lamb that was slain, and all the friends of God, and sing the new song.