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🌹Reformation History🌹

Anne Askew was burned at the stake at Smithfield, London, at the age of 26, on July 16, 1546, 472 years ago today.

Most Christians have heard the names of John Calvin, Martin Luther, John Knox, and other giants of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. But there are many, many other men and women who worked to advance the cause of the Reformation!

Women also played an important role, either in disseminating the ideas of the Reformation, or using their political power to protect the preachers and teachers of these ideas, and, yes, some were burned at the stake.

Here is one of these women:

Anne Askew 1521-1546

Anne Askew (or Ayscough) was born in 1521 in Lincolnshire, England, to William Askew, a wealthy landowner. Anne was a woman of courage and strong beliefs. She was tortured, in the Tower of London and burned alive as a Protestant heretic for preaching the Gospel in London and handing out Protestant leaflets.

William Askew had arranged that his eldest daughter, Martha, be married to Thomas Kyme. When Anne was 15 years old, Martha died. Her father decided Anne would take Martha’s place in the marriage to Thomas to save money.

She was a woman of very strong and sincere beliefs. In her early life she showed an interest and ability for theological studies. Anne was converted to Protestantism when the ‘new bible’ emerged from the continent. After much study and reading of the Holy Scriptures she adopted the principles of the reformers and became a dedicated believer, a devout Protestant, studying the Bible and memorizing verses, and remained true to her belief for the entirety of her life. Her reading convinced her of the falsity of the doctrine of transubstantiation, and her pronouncements created some controversy in Lincoln.

Her husband was a Catholic, and the resultant marriage was brutal. Askew had two children with Kyme before he threw her out for being Protestant. It is alleged that Askew was seeking to divorce Kyme, so this did not upset her.

Upon being thrown out, Askew moved to London. Here she met other Protestants, including the Anabaptist Joan Bocher, and they studied the Bible together. Askew stuck to her maiden name, rather than her husband’s name. While in London, she became a “gospeler –someone who knew large parts of the bible by heart and could preach about them. The ban on Bible reading had intensified the hunger for it, and those who knew the Bible well became lay preachers. As a woman of high social status, this was bound to attract the attention of the authorities.

In March 1545, her husband Thomas Kyme had Askew arrested. She was brought back to Lincolnshire, where he demanded that she stay. The order was short lived; she escaped and returned to London to continue preaching. In early 1546 she was arrested again, but released. In May 1546 she was arrested again, and tortured in the Tower of London. She was then cross examined by the chancellor of the Bishop of London, Edmund Bonner. He ordered that she be imprisoned for 12 days. During this time she refused to make any sort of confession.

She was ordered to name like-minded women, but refused. She was then subject to a two-day-long period of cross examination led by Chancellor Sir Thomas Wriothesley, Stephen Gardiner, The Bishop of Winchester (John Dudley), and Sir William Paget (the king’s principal secretary). They threatened her with execution, but she still refused to confess or to name fellow Protestants. She was then ordered to be tortured. Her torturers did so, probably motivated by the desire for Askew to admit that Queen Catherine was also a practicing Protestant.

According to her own account, and that of gaolers within the Tower, she was tortured only once. She was taken from her cell, at about ten o’clock in the morning, to the lower room of the White Tower. She was shown the rack and asked if she would name those who believed as she did. Askew declined to name anyone at all, so she was asked to remove all her clothing except her shift. Askew then climbed onto the rack, and her wrists and ankles were fastened. Again, she was asked for names, but she would say nothing.

What was exceptional about Anne was that despite being arrested, interrogated, and put on the rack (a device so fearful that most victims confessed whatever was required of them), she refused to give names or implicate others, including women at court close to Queen Catherine Parr. She also refused to be silent, arguing forcefully and confounding her accusers with her knowledge and learning.

Sir Anthony Kingston, the Constable of the Tower of London, was so impressed with the way Anne behaved that he refused to torture her. King Henry VIII’s Lord Chancellor Wriothesley and Sir Richard Rich had to take over. Other accounts say it was Anne’s obstinacy that so enraged Wriothesley that he turned the rack himself.

In her own words, Anne said, “Then they did put me on the rack because I confessed no ladies or gentlemen to be of my opinion; and thereon they kept me a long time and because I lay still and did not cry, my Lord Chancellor and Master Rich took pains to rack me with their own hands till I was nigh dead.”

The wheel of the rack was turned, pulling Askew along the device and lifting her so that she was held taut about 5 inches above its bed and slowly stretched. In her own account written from prison, Askew said she fainted from pain, and was lowered and revived. This procedure was repeated twice. They turned the handles so hard that Anne was drawn apart, her shoulders and hips were pulled from their sockets and her elbows and knees were dislocated. Askew’s cries could be heard in the garden next to the White Tower where the Lieutenant’s wife and daughter were walking. Askew gave no names, and her ordeal ended when the Lieutenant ordered her to be returned to her cell.

On 18 June 1546, she was convicted of heresy, and was condemned to be burned at the stake. Because of the torture she had endured, she had to be carried to the stake on a chair wearing just her shift as she could not walk and every movement caused her severe pain. She was dragged from the chair to the stake which had a small seat attached to it, on which she sat astride. Chains were used to bind her body firmly to the stake at the ankles, knees, waist, chest and neck.

Prior to their death, the prisoners were offered one last chance at pardon. Bishop Shaxton mounted the pulpit and began to preach to them. His words were in vain, however. Askew listened attentively throughout his discourse. When he spoke anything she considered to be the truth, she audibly expressed agreement; but when he said anything contrary to what she believed Scripture stated, she exclaimed: “There he misseth, and speaketh without the book.”

Her body was covered in gunpowder before her execution. This was seen as a kindness. Friends often placed gunpowder on the condemned, as it hastened what could be a very slow and painful death. But because she had obstinately defied authority, she was burned alive slowly rather than being strangled first or burned quickly.

So many people turned out for the execution that there was hardly enough room to carry it out. The crowd had to be pushed back. Those who saw her execution were impressed by her bravery, and reported that she did not scream until the flames reached her chest. The execution lasted about an hour, and she was unconscious and probably dead after fifteen minutes or so.

At her execution there was a sudden thunderstorm and a loud clap of thunder. Bale wrote that “Credibly I am informed by various Dutch merchants who were present there, that in the time of their sufferings, the sky, abhorring so wicked an act, suddenly altered colour, and the clouds from above gave a thunder clap, not unlike the one written in Psalm 76. The elements declared the high displeasure of God for so tyrannous a murder of innocents.

Anne Askew was burned at the stake at Smithfield, London, at the age of 26, on 16 July 1546. She burned to death, along with three other Protestants, John Lascelles, Nicholas Belenian and John Adams. She was the last martyr in the reign of Henry VIII.

Her crime? Knowing the Bible, preaching the true gospel and the falsity of Catholic doctrine, especially the doctrine of transubstantiation, and handing out Protestant leaflets.

Of all the stupid and suicidal mistakes that the Romish Church ever made, none was greater than the mistake of burning the Reformers. It cemented the work of the reformation and made Englishman Protestants by the thousands. When plain Englishman saw the church of Rome so cruelly wicked and Protestants so brave, they ceased to doubt on which side was the truth. May the memory of our martyred Reformers never be forgotten until the Lord comes!“

[sources: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne_Askew

http://historysheroes.e2bn.org/hero/whowerethey/4265]