# A Letter From Jaques De Somere, Sent To His Mother, At Ghent.

16th century (source section) · Historical source

Source: Martyrs’ Mirror. Original heading: A LETTER FROM JAQUES DE SOMERE, SENT TO HIS MOTHER, AT GHENT.

Century of containing source section; exact event date not assigned

Venerable and beloved mother, after most humbly
commending myself to you, please let me inform
you, that we are well, God be praised, even as we,
not without great joy, learned 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 the same assures me of
your health, since I, aware of the weakness and infirmity
of your nature, and in constant dread, lest
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 visit you more grievously, nor lay upon
you a greater burden, than you, by his help and
the consolation of his word, and the hope of the life
to come, are able to bear; and permits me to enjoy
the greatest joy which a good child might wish in
this world, namely, to see my father and mother
attain to a good old age, and bear me such solicitude,
love and favor as I could possibly expect from
the most solicitous and benevolent parents, for which
I owe you eternal gratitude.

Further, my beloved mother, as regards the particulars
of the execution of the Anabaptists, though
I doubt not but you have already heard much concerning
it from the accounts of others, and I do not
like to write of this matter, of which I can never
think without great sadness; yet, since you desire
it of me, and I perhaps know more about it than
the common people, as I was often with them, and
took a memorandum of everything, I would not
forbear to write you such information as I have with
regard to it; and I will also send you some copies
of their confession, upon 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
3d of April, A. D. 1575, there were gathered in
a house beyond Aldgate (on the way leading to
Mirror Court), thirty Anabaptists, men as well as
women, for the purpose of exhortation and prayer.
But being discovered of 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, in order 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 subscribe to, excepting only the article
touching the oath, in which they openly confessed
that they believed that one might not swear
in any wise.

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

The articles were: 1. That they should desist
from, renounce and forsake all errors, sects and
heresies of the accursed sect of the Anabaptists, and
confess that they had been seduced thereto by the
devil; and further believe and confess with heart
and mouth, that Christ had assumed 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 administer the office of
magistracy. 4. That a Christian might swear an
oath.

Thereupon they replied that they could not believe
this in their consciences, and that they would
hold to their first confession. Hence they were from
there conducted back to prison; but on the way ten
or twelve of them (seeing in what danger they were,
and that they had a good opportunity to escape,
since only one or two beadles went with them),
escaped, all of whom, however, in a day or two,
of their own accord, returned to the prison, 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 should release all of them together in four
or five days, if they returned; if not, he should 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), before they were condemned
as heretics became converted. And yet they were
made to stand, in St. Paul’s church-yard, 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 merited the fire; and
much other loss and ignominy was inflicted upon
them, though the bishop had promised them, that
he should forthwith acquit them of everything, and
release them without any trouble, if they would only
sign the four articles; but the contrary was evident.

968

This occurred on the twenty-fifth day of May,
A. D. 1575.

A few days afterwards, when the bishop saw that
the rest would not depart from their faith, he condemned
them all to death, in the ecclesiastical court
in St. Paul’s church (where the papistic bishop in
Queen Mary’s time was wont to sentence the Christians),
and delivered them over to the secular judge,
by whom the women, tied hand to hand, were conducted
to Newgate (which is the prison of those
confined for capital crimes); together with one of
the men, whom they considered to be the youngest
and most innocent. But the rest of the men were
taken back to their old place of confinement of the
bishop’s prison, so that it was thought that the
women were to be executed first, even as they also
daily came and threatened them, holding up death
before their eyes, if they should not renounce; so
that for five or six days they suffered great distress
and temptation, expecting from day to day to be
burnt, 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 prison, to make an
inventory of all their property, and to apprise them,
that they should prepare themselves to die the next
day, which he did, in order to see whether none
of them would renounce through 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 cause
the youth to be scourged behind a cart.

Thus, within five or six days afterwards, fourteen
women or thereabouts, were conducted, by the officers
of justice, from the prison which stands near
St. Martin’s Church, to St. Catharine’s on ship board,
and the youth was scourged behind a cart that went
immediately in front; and thus all were banished
from the country, on pain of death, and they are
now residing in Holland and Zealand.

A few days afterwards, 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, through the poverty and hardship
of the severe confinement, died in prison. The
others, fearing that the extreme penalty should be
inflicted upon them, since they had so rigorously
dealt even with the women; and hearing that the
Queen and the entire council were so incensed
against them, that hardly any one dared intercede
for them, because of an evil report that they denied
God and Christ, and rejected all government and
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 that had delivered it to them.

When they saw this they changed said articles and
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,
except they were willing to sign the articles, and renounce
their heresy. In the meantime, the bishop,
in behalf of Her Majesty, issued several articles, one
of which was That a Christian magistrate might
punish obstinate heretics with the sword; commanding
all strangers to subscribe to the same, or if not,
to give sufficient bail that whenever it shall please
the bishop they will appear before him and the
Queen’s commissioners, to be more fully examined
and punished according to the finding. Hence,
nearly all the strangers, more through fear than
otherwise, signed the same, except some who would
rather be in danger, than, against their conscience,
sanction, by their handwriting, the killing of the
poor people; how it will end with them, is not yet
known.

Shortly after, an order from the Court came 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 previously likewise been burnt for
her religion, here in Ghent in Flanders. And he
was now married to a woman whose husband had
also previously been burnt at Ghent for his religion.
Hence both, on account of persecution, had fled to
England, thinking that they should be able to live
there without peril in the liberty of their conscience.
All this he stated to the bishop, and asked for
mercy to leave 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 only been married
eight or ten weeks previous to his apprehension.

These two, as no disputing of the Dutch and
French preachers could move them to subscribe the
articles, but were much rather confirmed in their
views through the cruelty and unchristian proceeding
of those who boast themselves of the gospel and
the true faith, notwithstanding that many Englishmen
as well as Dutchmen solicited pardon for them,
were, nevertheless, the 22d of July, at six o’clock
in the morning; in Smithfield (where they formerly
used to burn persons belonging to our religion)
most miserably burnt alive at a stake, till consumed
to ashes, without any strangling or gun-powder,
according to the custom of the country, on the Friday
after that on the preceding Tuesday the stake
had been erected. I doubt not but that the Queen
consented to it with reluctance, but was persuaded
thereto 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 thus overthrow the salvation
of souls, but that they also reject all secular politics,
laws and authorities, and instigate the people to
sedition and rebellion, teaching that the office of the
magistracy is ungodly and unchristian, whereby
mostly, I doubt not, she became incensed against
them, so that she would not even receive their supplication.

969

May the Lord forgive those who were the cause
and authors of this, and so greatly slandered these
poor people before Her Majesty, as you may judge
from this their confession, which they subscribed 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 misapprehension
as regards the point of Christ’s first conception and
the origin of his flesh; yet, since they with expressed
words confess in a Christian manner, and have often
orally confessed in my presence, that Christ is true
God and true man, like unto us in flesh and blood
and all other things, except sin alone; I am so far
from deeming them worthy of any capital punishment,
that I would not hesitate to recognize them
as brethren and 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 misapprehension and error, but much
rather graciously forgives their weakness and infirmity,
for his Son Christ Jesus’ sake, if it does not
arise from stubbornness, but from pure ignorance,
even as Paul says of himself, that he obtained mercy
with God, because he had sinned ignorantly (1 Timothy
1:13); 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 regards the two young men that 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 had with much talking brought
the matter so far that they subscribed the confession
(a copy of which I herewith send you), hoping
that the bishop should be satisfied with it; who,
when he had read it, found it good enough, but
would nevertheless not accept it graciously, except
they would subscribe 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 thereby have to condemn the
two executed, and all others of their fellow-believers
(who died or still live in the same faith), and confess
that they had been led into damnable heresy by the
devil, the spirit of lies and error, in which they say
that they, in their consciences, in no wise believe,
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.

Hence there is nothing known but that they will
have to suffer the same punishment which their associates
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 should consider themselves fortunate, if
they, the sooner the better, could be released
through death 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 they who formerly suffered
persecution themselves here now persecute others 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 implanted 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 thereby sets himself in the place and
judgment-seat of God, and ascribes to 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 hereby not become offended
or take occasion to doubt the true faith; but will
think (as is also the truth) that it has not been
sanctioned or approved of by some of the godfearing
and learned, of the English, as well as of the
foreigners that are here.

Moreover, though this church should approve of
it, you nevertheless well know that the truth does
not depend on men, who are but frail, weak, sinful,
and changeable, so that those who are good and
godly to-day, may to-morrow fall into great sins,
especially if their affairs prosper in this world; but
that our comfort and hope, religion, faith and salvation
consist in God, who is unchangeable, and
whose truth ever remains uniform. 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. Even as Paul declares concerning what befell
him, the persecution which he suffered from false
brethren was not the least.

I would write you more about this matter, if time
did permit me. Hence I will conclude here, and
pray the Lord, that he will strengthen you and all
the godfearing and lovers of the truth, in virtue and
godliness, to the salvation of the soul. Amen.

Your obedient son,

Jaques de Somere.

Wherefore, let them that suffer according to the
will of God commit the keeping of their souls to
him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator,
1 Peter 4:19.

970





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