| Bigod's rebellion | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of European wars of religion and the English Reformation | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| English Catholics [ citation needed ] |  Kingdom of England | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| King Henry VIII | |||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 216 executed | |||||||
Bigod's rebellion of January 1537 was an armed rebellion by English Catholics in Cumberland and Westmorland against King Henry VIII of England and the English Parliament. It was led by Sir Francis Bigod, of Settrington in the East Riding of Yorkshire.
Following the Pilgrimage of Grace of 1536, the King had made promises which had not yet been kept [1] and, in January 1537, a new rising began to take shape, although Robert Aske (a leader of the Pilgrimage of Grace) tried to prevent it. [2]
An undated letter from Aske to the Commons, probably early in 1537, tells them: "Neighbours, I do much [marvel] that ye would assemble yourselves with Bigod [seeing how] earnestly the King's highness extendeth general pardon to all this North". He goes on that the king intends to hold a parliament at York and to have the new Queen crowned. Bigod had intended to destroy the effect of previous petitions, but "as I hear you were forced to assemble by his threats and menaces, I shall declare this to the King, and fear not but that you shall have his Grace's pardon notwithstanding". [3]
Lord Darcy wrote to Aske and Robert Constable on 17 January
Of Sir Fras. Bigod I heard, this day at dinner, as you wrote; and more, that Hallum was taken at Hull yesterday with a letter in his purse from Sir Francis Bigod promising that he and all the West Countries would rise and come forward. This day with my servant, Alan Gefreyson, I sent you my news which are of such bruits, rages, and furies as the like I have not read nor heard of. I sent to my cousin Ellerker and Whartton for the premises concerning Hull. My advice is that you stay the people till the coming of my lord of Norfolk, which, I hear, shall be shortly, and all the gentlemen that is above of the North with him. He brings gracious answers of the Parliament and petitions. Good Mr. Aske, where you write desiring me to stay my quarters; there has yet been no stir in my rooms and lands, but what was caused by other wild countries and dales. I shall do my duty, and play my part therein, though I lie in my bed. I hear my lord of Cumberland is likely to have business for two prisoners he keeps. [3]
Bigod himself wrote to Constable on 18 January:
"Though the commons at first had me in suspicion for my learning and conversation with such a lewd one as they judged were enemies both to Christ's Church and the commonwealth, and I was even in danger of my life at Pountefrett, they have now the greatest confidence in me. Now messengers come from Bishopric, Richmondshire, and the West, for me to go forward with the commons, especially to bring John Halom, whom the mayor of Hull has imprisoned, to their great offence. I have sworn to go with the commons having good reason to doubt the Duke of Norfolk is coming rather to bring them to captivity like those of Lincolnshire than to fulfil our petitions. There is no man they trust so much as Constable whom Bygott would gladly join and follow his advice, if he will be true to them." He begs an answer and sends a copy of their oath. [3] [4]
William Todde, prior of Malton in Ryedale, later gave evidence that on the Tuesday before the uprising, Bigod had dined with him at Malton on his way to York. Bigod had showed him part of the King's pardon, saying it would enrage the Scots, known in the North as "our old ancient enemies", while Todde showed Bigod a copy of the articles given at Doncaster, Bigod asked for a copy, and one was sent after him. On leaving, Bigod said he had to go to Settrington to meet his brother Ralph. [5]
Bigod, fearing repression by the King, launched his uprising on 16 January 1537, in concert with his tenant, John Hallam, a yeoman of Watton. [6] His efforts to promulgate his platform attracted little support, either from the aristocracy or the commons. [1] His plan to have George Lumley [7] seize Scarborough Castle and Hallam Hall on 16 January failed utterly, and his own assault on Kingston upon Hull on 19 January was forestalled by the capture of almost his entire force in a dawn raid at Beverley, Yorkshire. He escaped to Mulgrave, and from thence to Cumberland, where he was captured on 10 February, and sent to Carlisle Castle. [6]
In the aftermath of the rebellion's defeat, Henry arrested Bigod, Aske and several other rebels, including Darcy, Lord Hussey, the Chief Butler of England, Sir Thomas Percy and Sir Robert Constable. All were convicted of treason. On 2 June, 1537, Bigod was hanged, drawn & quartered at Tyburn, Darcy and Hussey both beheaded, Thomas Moigne, one of the members of Parliament for Lincoln, was hanged, drawn and quartered, Constable was hanged in chains at Hull, and Aske was hanged in chains at York. In all, 216 were executed: several lords and knights (including Sir Thomas Percy, Sir Stephen Hamerton, Sir William Lumley, Sir John Constable and Sir William Constable), six abbots (Adam Sedbar, Abbot of Jervaulx, William Trafford, Abbot of Sawley, Matthew Mackarel, Abbot of Barlings and Bishop of Chalcedon, William Thirsk, Abbot of Fountains and the Prior of Bridlington), 38 monks, and sixteen parish priests. Sir Nicholas Tempest, Bowbearer of the Forest of Bowland was hanged at Tyburn, Sir John Bulmer hanged, drawn and quartered, and his wife Margaret Stafford burnt at the stake. [8] In late 1538, Sir Edward Neville, Keeper of the Sewer was beheaded. [9] [ self-published source? ]
The circumstances of their trial and execution were recorded by the author of Wriothesley's Chronicle: [8] [10] [1]
Also the 16 day of May [1537] there were arraigned at Westminster afore the King's Commissioners, the Lord Chancellor that day being the chief, these persons following: Sir Robert Constable, knight; Sir Thomas Percy, knight, and brother to the Earl of Northumberland; Sir John Bulmer, knight, and Ralph Bulmer, his son and heir; Sir Francis Bigod, knight; Margaret Cheney, after Lady Bulmer by untrue matrimony; George Lumley, esquire; [7] Robert Aske, gentleman, that was captain in the insurrection of the Northern men; and one Hamerton, esquire, all which persons were indicted of high treason against the King, and that day condemned by a jury of knights and esquires for the same, whereupon they had sentence to be drawn, hanged and quartered, but Ralph Bulmer, the son of John Bulmer, was reprieved and had no sentence.
And on the 25 day of May, being the Friday in Whitsun week, Sir John Bulmer, Sir Stephen Hamerton, knights, were hanged and headed; Nicholas Tempest, esquire; Doctor Cockerell, priest; [11] Abbot quondam of Fountains; [12] and Doctor Pickering, friar, [13] were drawn from the Tower of London to Tyburn, and there hanged, bowelled and quartered, and their heads set on London Bridge and divers gates in London.
And the same day Margaret Cheney, 'other wife to Bulmer called', was drawn after them from the Tower of London into Smithfield, and there burned according to her judgment, God pardon her soul, being the Friday in Whitsun week; she was a very fair creature, and a beautiful.
The Council of the North was an administrative body first set up in 1484 by King Richard III of England, to improve access to conciliar justice in Northern England. This built upon steps by King Edward IV of England in delegating authority in the north to Richard, duke of Gloucester, and in establishing the Council of Wales and the Marches.
The Pilgrimage of Grace was a popular revolt beginning in Yorkshire in October 1536, before spreading to other parts of Northern England including Cumberland, Northumberland, Durham and north Lancashire, under the leadership of Robert Aske. The "most serious of all Tudor period rebellions", it was a protest against Henry VIII's break with the Catholic Church, the dissolution of the lesser monasteries, and the policies of the King's chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, as well as other specific political, social, and economic grievances.
Robert Aske was an English lawyer who became a leader of the Pilgrimage of Grace uprising against the Suppression of Religious Houses Act 1535 in 1536. He was executed for treason against King Henry VIII on 12 July 1537.
Sir Marmaduke Constable of Flamborough, Yorkshire, was a courtier and soldier during the reigns of Richard III, Henry VII and Henry VIII.
Francis Dereham was a Tudor courtier whose involvement with Henry VIII's fifth Queen, Catherine Howard, in her youth, prior to engagement with the king, was eventually found out and led to his arrest. The information of Dereham having a relationship with Howard displeased King Henry to such great lengths he arranged the executions of all involved.
The Bulmer family were a noble family of Norman England, resident in Yorkshire. The family takes their name from Bulmer, North Yorkshire. The name Bulmer comes from English "Bull mere", a lake frequented by a bull, and is an Anglicised form of Gaelic "Búir na mara" from the Celtic tribe Brigantes during their occupation of the area. Ansketil de Bulmer was the first documented member of the Bulmer family who lived in the area in the twelfth century with the current spelling.
Kirk Hammerton is a village and civil parish in the Harrogate district of North Yorkshire, England. It is near the River Nidd and the A59 road, 10 miles (16 km) west of York. The village suffix refers to the Hamerton family who owned the land until the 16th century.
Sir Robert Constable was a member of the English Tudor gentry. He helped Henry VII to defeat the Cornish rebels at the Battle of Blackheath in 1497. In 1536, when the rising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out in the north of England, Constable was one of the insurgent leaders, but towards the close of the year, he submitted at Doncaster and was pardoned. He did not share in the renewal of the rising, Bigod's rebellion, which took place in January 1537; but he refused the king's invitation to proceed to London, and was arrested, tried for treason, and hanged at Hull in the following June.
Settrington is a village and civil parish in North Yorkshire, England, about 3 miles (5 km) east of Malton. It was historically part of the East Riding of Yorkshire until 1974 and part of the Ryedale district from 1974 until 2023.
Events from the 1530s in England.
Thomas Darcy, 1st Baron Darcy of Darcy or of Temple Hurst, was an English nobleman, the only son, and heir, of Sir William Darcy and his wife, Euphemia Langton, the daughter of Sir John Langton. Darcy was opposed to the Dissolution of the Monasteries, and for his role in the Pilgrimage of Grace was convicted of high treason for delivering up Pontefract Castle to the rebels. He was executed on Tower Hill 30 June 1537.
Adam Sedbar or Sedbergh was the 23rd and last Abbot of Jervaulx Abbey in Wensleydale, Yorkshire.
Sir Francis Bigod was an English nobleman who was the leader of Bigod's Rebellion.
Sir Ralph Bulmer of Wilton in Yorkshire, was an English knight and soldier active on the Scottish border and during the war of the Rough Wooing.
Sir Thomas Percy was a participant in the 1537 Bigod's Rebellion in the aftermath of the Pilgrimage of Grace, a Catholic uprising against King Henry VIII. He was convicted of treason and hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn. The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) states that he "is considered a martyr by many".
The fortifications of Kingston upon Hull consisted of three major constructions: the brick built Hull town walls, first established in the early 14th century, with four main gates, several posterngates, and up to thirty towers at its maximum extent; Hull Castle, on the east bank of the River Hull, protecting Hull's river harbour, constructed in the mid 16th century and consisting of two blockhouses and a castle connected by a curtain wall; and the later 17th century Citadel, an irregular triangular, bastioned, primitive star fort replacing the castle on the east river bank.
Thomas Moigne, of Willingham, Lincolnshire, was an English politician, executed for his part in the Lincolnshire Rising.
Sir Bevis Bulmer (1536–1615) was an English mining engineer during the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I. He has been called "one of the great speculators of that era". Many of the events in his career were recorded by Stephen Atkinson in The Discoveries and Historie of the Gold Mynes in Scotland, compiled in part from a lost manuscript by Bulmer entitled Bulmer's Skill.
Margaret Cheyne, later Margaret Bulmer, was a woman burned at the stake for high treason in the aftermath of the Pilgrimage of Grace and Bigod's Rebellion during the reign of Henry VIII of England.
John Hallam, conspirator, was a native of Cawkill, Yorkshire, and had much local influence and popularity.
