A Letter from Jaques de Somere, Sent to his Mother

Venerable and beloved mother, after commending myself to you most humbly, please let me tell you that we are well, God be praised, just as we learned, not without great joy, from father's letter, that this is also the case with you. I dare say that I never read a letter from my father without anxiety and fear, until the end of it assures me of your health, since I know the weakness and frailty of your nature, and am in constant dread that you might have fallen into some severe sickness, which would cause me greater grief than if I myself were in the greatest distress and pain.

But God be praised for His goodness, that He does not afflict you more grievously, nor lay a greater burden upon you than you are able to bear by His help, the comfort of His Word, and the hope of the life to come; and that He permits me to enjoy the greatest joy a good child might wish for in this world, namely, to see my father and mother reach a good old age, and to show me such care, love and kindness as I could possibly expect from the most caring and kindhearted parents, for which I owe you eternal gratitude.

Further, my beloved mother, as to the particulars of the execution of the Anabaptists, though I do not doubt that you have already heard much about it from the accounts of others, and I do not like to write of this matter, which I can never think of without great sadness; yet, since you ask it of me, and I perhaps know more about it than the common people, since I was often with them and took a memorandum of everything, I would not hold back from writing you such information as I have about it; and I will also send you some copies of their confession, on which they died (though some of them are still imprisoned), together with a supplication which they presented to her majesty, but which was not accepted.

The matter was as follows. On Easter Day, the 3rd of April, in the year 1575, thirty Anabaptists, men as well as women, were gathered in a house beyond Aldgate (on the way leading to Mirror Court), for the purpose of exhortation and prayer. But being discovered by the neighbors, nearly all of them were led from there to prison, with so few beadles that part of them could easily have escaped, had they felt free in their conscience to run. After they had fallen into the hands of the magistrates, they were brought to the house of the bishop of London, to be examined by him (through the mouth, however, of the Dutch and French preachers, since the bishop did not understand their language) concerning their faith, which they delivered in writing, and which was of such a character that it contained nothing but what I myself would have dared to sign, except only the article touching the oath, in which they openly confessed that they believed one might not swear in any way.

Not satisfied with this confession, the bishop laid four articles before them, which they were to sign, or, if they remained obstinate, be burned alive; and he declared that he had received this commission from the court.

The articles were: 1. That they should stop, renounce and forsake all errors, sects and heresies of the accursed sect of the Anabaptists, and confess that the devil had seduced them into it; and further believe and confess with heart and mouth, that Christ had taken His flesh and blood from the substance of the flesh and blood of Mary. 2. That infants ought to be baptized. 3. That a Christian might hold the office of the magistracy. 4. That a Christian might swear an oath.

Then they replied that they could not believe this in their consciences, and that they would hold to their first confession. So they were taken back from there to prison; but on the way ten or twelve of them (seeing what danger they were in, and that they had a good opportunity to escape, since only one or two beadles went with them) escaped. All of them, however, within a day or two, returned to the prison of their own accord, partly to release their bail, who were bound in the sum of a hundred pounds, and partly because the bishop, as a man of honor, promised them with an oath that he would release all of them together in four or five days if they returned; if not, he would keep the others in confinement till Christmas.

Shortly after, five of the men (through the much disputing of our Netherlanders, who belonged to the [Calvinistic] church) were converted before they were condemned as heretics. And yet they were made to stand in Saint Paul's churchyard, in a full assembly of many thousand Englishmen, in front of the pulpit (mark), each with a fagot on his shoulder, as a token that they had deserved the fire; and much other loss and disgrace was inflicted upon them, though the bishop had promised them that he would at once acquit them of everything, and release them without any trouble, if they would only sign the four articles; but the contrary was plain.

This happened on the twenty-fifth day of May, in the year 1575.

A few days afterward, when the bishop saw that the rest would not depart from their faith, he condemned them all to death in the ecclesiastical court in Saint Paul's church (where the papist bishop in Queen Mary's time used to sentence the Christians), and delivered them over to the secular judge, by whom the women, tied hand to hand, were taken to Newgate (which is the prison of those confined for capital crimes), together with one of the men, whom they considered the youngest and most innocent. But the rest of the men were taken back to their old place of confinement in the bishop's prison, so that it was thought the women were to be executed first, just as they also came daily and threatened them, holding up death before their eyes if they would not renounce; so that for five or six days they suffered great distress and temptation, expecting from day to day to be burned. And this was done even on the very day when their sentence of banishment had arrived from the court; for at ten o'clock in the evening the bailiff and his beadles came into the prison, to make an inventory of all their property, and to inform them that they should prepare themselves to die the next day, which he did in order to see whether any of them would renounce out of fear. But when he saw that they all remained steadfast, he announced to them that the queen would show them mercy, and only banish them from the country, and have the youth scourged behind a cart.

Thus, within five or six days afterward, fourteen women or thereabouts were taken by the officers of justice from the prison which stands near Saint Martin's Church to Saint Catharine's, on shipboard, and the youth was scourged behind a cart which went immediately in front; and so all were banished from the country, on pain of death, and they are now living in Holland and Zealand.

A few days afterward, the five men who were still confined in the bishop's prison were likewise sentenced by the bishop, and brought to Newgate, where one of them died in prison, through the poverty and hardship of the severe confinement. The others, fearing that the extreme penalty would be inflicted upon them, since they had dealt so rigorously even with the women; and hearing that the queen and the entire council were so incensed against them that hardly anyone dared intercede for them, because of an evil report that they denied God and Christ, and rejected all government and the authority of magistrates and higher powers as ungodly and unchristian; ventured to present a supplication, together with their confession concerning the four articles that had been laid before them (copies of which I send here), to her majesty, who was so incensed against them that she would not even receive it, but severely reprimanded the maids of honor who presented it to her, as they themselves reported to those who had delivered it to them.

When they saw this, they changed those articles and the supplication to some extent, and delivered it to My Lord of Bodley, who, having conferred with the bishop about the matter, returned them the following day with the answer that he was sorry for their sakes, but that there was no hope at all of mercy, unless they were willing to sign the articles and renounce their heresy. In the meantime the bishop, on behalf of her majesty, issued several articles, one of which was that a Christian magistrate might punish obstinate heretics with the sword; and he commanded all strangers to sign it, or, if not, to give sufficient bail that whenever it should please the bishop they would appear before him and the queen's commissioners, to be more fully examined and punished according to the finding. So nearly all the strangers signed it, more out of fear than anything else, except some who would rather be in danger than sanction the killing of the poor people by their handwriting, against their conscience; how it will end with them is not yet known.

Shortly after, an order came from the court to the sheriff or bailiff of London, that he should execute the oldest two, according to their sentence. One of them, named Jan Pieterss, was a poor man, more than fifty years of age, with nine children. His first wife had likewise been burned before this for her religion, here in Ghent in Flanders. And he was now married to a woman whose husband had also been burned at Ghent before this for his religion. So both of them, because of persecution, had fled to England, thinking that they would be able to live there without danger, in the liberty of their conscience. He stated all this to the bishop, and asked for the mercy of leaving the country with his wife and children; but it was not granted him.

The other, named Hendrick Terwoort, was a handsome, wealthy man of thirty-five or six years, a goldsmith by trade, and had been married only eight or ten weeks before his arrest.

These two, since no disputing of the Dutch and French preachers could move them to sign the articles, but they were much rather confirmed in their views through the cruelty and unchristian proceeding of those who boast of the Gospel and the true faith, and notwithstanding that many Englishmen as well as Dutchmen asked pardon for them, were nevertheless most miserably burned alive at a stake on the 22nd of July, at six o'clock in the morning, in Smithfield (where they formerly used to burn persons belonging to our religion), until they were consumed to ashes, without any strangling or gunpowder, according to the custom of the country, on the Friday after the stake had been erected on the preceding Tuesday. I do not doubt that the queen consented to it with reluctance, but was persuaded to it by some papists or other perverse persons and enemies of the truth, of whom there are many here; who made her believe that the Anabaptists (which religion is unknown to this nation) not only deny God and Christ, and so overthrow the salvation of souls, but also reject all secular politics, laws and authorities, and incite the people to sedition and rebellion, teaching that the office of the magistracy is ungodly and unchristian; and by this, mostly, I do not doubt, she became incensed against them, so that she would not even receive their supplication.

May the Lord forgive those who were the cause and authors of this, and who so greatly slandered these poor people before her majesty, as you may judge from this their confession, which they signed in my presence with their own hands: which, though it does not satisfy me in every respect, and I greatly fear that they labor under a misunderstanding as regards the point of Christ's first conception and the origin of His flesh; yet, since they confess in express words, in a Christian manner, and have often confessed orally in my presence, that Christ is true God and true man, like us in flesh and blood and all other things, except sin alone; I am so far from considering them worthy of any capital punishment, that I would not hesitate to recognize them as brothers, and I do not doubt their salvation, provided they have feared the Lord, and walked before Him in a good conscience; for our God is a merciful and gracious God, who does not condemn men for this or that misunderstanding and error, but much rather graciously forgives their weakness and frailty, for the sake of His Son Christ Jesus, if it does not arise from stubbornness, but from pure ignorance, just as Paul says of himself, that he obtained mercy with God because he had sinned ignorantly (First Timothy 1, verse 13); and the error does not concern the fundamental doctrines of the faith, but the accessories of it, as is the case with these Anabaptists.

As for the two young men who are still left, they continue as firm and steadfast as ever, and daily expect to have the same punishment inflicted upon them.

Lucas and I sought, if it were possible, to help them out of prison (four days after the others had been executed), and with much talking we had brought the matter so far that they signed the confession (a copy of which I send you here), hoping that the bishop would be satisfied with it; and he, when he had read it, found it good enough, but would nevertheless not accept it graciously, unless they would sign the first four articles without any contradiction, and unite with the Dutch church, which they had resolved not to do, even though they were entirely and in every respect of our belief, because they would then have to condemn the two who were executed, and all others of their fellow believers (who died or still live in the same faith), and confess that the devil, the spirit of lies and error, had led them into damnable heresy, which they say they in no way believe in their consciences, but that they are much more assured of their salvation in Christ, who is true God and true man; and because they would greatly offend God, as they say, by saying all these things against their conscience.

So there is nothing known but that they will have to suffer the same punishment which their companions suffered; and this the more, because they attempted to break out of prison by filing off an iron bar from a window, for which reason they are now also fettered much more heavily than ever before, and would consider themselves fortunate if they could be released through death, the sooner the better, from the great poverty and misery of the imprisonment, since they are both confined apart, so that they cannot comfort each other, and no one may come there and speak to them, on pain of being held himself.

Here you have, beloved mother, from beginning to end, a written account of the sad history of the imprisoned, converted, banished and executed Anabaptists, which, as I well know, has seemed very incredible and strange to you, and that you have been greatly grieved: because those who formerly suffered persecution themselves now persecute others here for their religion, and force the conscience of others with fire and sword, whereas they formerly taught (which is the truth) that no man has a right to rule over the conscience of another; and that faith is a special gift of God and cannot be planted in man by any physical force, but through the Word of God and the illumination of the Holy Ghost; also, that heresy is not a carnal but a spiritual crime, which God alone must punish; that lies must be overcome not by force, but with the truth; that the disposition of the children of God is, not to put others to death for their faith, but to be put to death themselves for the testimony of the truth; finally, that the shedding of blood for the sake of religion is a sure sign of antichrist, who by it sets himself in the place and judgment seat of God, and claims for himself dominion over the conscience (which belongs to God alone). I am well aware, I say, that this matter has greatly grieved you and every sympathizing heart; yet I hope that you will not be offended by it, or take occasion to doubt the true faith; but will think (as is also the truth) that it has not been sanctioned or approved by some of the God-fearing and learned, among the English as well as among the foreigners who are here.

Moreover, though this church should approve of it, you nevertheless know well that the truth does not depend on men, who are only frail, weak, sinful and changeable, so that those who are good and godly today may tomorrow fall into great sins, especially if their affairs prosper in this world; but that our comfort and hope, our religion, faith and salvation consist in God, who is unchangeable, and whose truth always remains the same. By Him we have also been taught and warned beforehand, that we should not be offended at the scandals of this world, which are many and of various kinds, and are also often caused by those who shelter in the church of Christ. Just as Paul declares concerning what happened to him, the persecution which he suffered from false brothers was not the least.

I would write you more about this matter, if time permitted me. So I will conclude here, and pray the Lord, that He will strengthen you and all the God-fearing and lovers of the truth, in virtue and godliness, to the salvation of the soul. Amen.

Your obedient son,

JAQUES DE SOMERE.

Therefore, let those who suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to Him in well-doing, as to a faithful Creator. First Peter 4, verse 19.