To Catch a Priest

by Linda Root

Wikimedia Commons

A group of country folk were walking down a coastal road
north of London when they saw a stranger approaching.  Citizens in the area had been warned to be on the looked for unfamiliar faces.  Elizabeth Tudor’s spymaster Sir Francis Walsingham’s agents in Paris had sent an alarming message.  Jesuits were coming.  The farmers decided the current warnings could not possibly apply to the gentleman on the road.

And he indeed was a fine gentleman. He was a tall, swarthy man still in his youth, possessed of an aristocrat’s bearing and attitude. He was well groomed and dressed, although his cloak and boots were dusty as if he’d been on the road longer than customary. The poor man was obviously distressed.  He must be lost, the farmers thought.

"Have any of you good people seen my hawk?" he asked with a tremor in his voice. "I must have strayed too far from our usual surroundings and now my poor bird is gone missing."

It was not an unusual for members of the upper class to be as emotionally attached to their hawks as they were to their hunting dogs. In rural England, falconry was a favored sport of young aristocrats. It was rumored the Queen of Scots engaged in falconry from the balustrades while detained at Chatsworth. Much training was involved hunting with a falcon. Over time, a special bond formed between the handler and the hawk. No wonder the man was distraught. "Are ye sure ye have not heard its little bell?"

The farmers assured him they had not seen a hawk or heard the tinkling of a bell. With considerable empathy, they watched the man leave the road and wander off into the woods, desperately calling his bird. They had just encountered John Gerard, S.J., coming back to his English homeland after having been ordained. They would not be the only group to meet up with him and let him go merrily on his way.

I had never heard of John Gerard until I was adding finishing touches to my work-in-progress. The novel interjects a fictional Scottish aspect into the Gunpowder Treason. A mystery surrounding the accountability of Lord Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury, for allowing the plot to remain undetected until the Eleventh Hour sent me exploring the impact of the conspiracy on the  Jesuit mission to England.

Almost any historical novelist lured into that last wee bit of clarifying research before declaring a novel finished will have faced the dilemma created by a pestiferous fact challenging the novel’s premise.  Do we go on, or do we set the current work aside and begin anew, perhaps with an entirely different story?  What action should be taken when just before we type the words ‘c’est fin’, we uncloak a larger than life character whose exploits tarnish our protagonist? While we are not historians and can invoke the principle of artistic license and continue, it is often difficult to put the new character aside.  The word that comes to mind is ‘sequel.’

Questioned portrait of Father Gerard-PD Art

I was well into my  recent work In the Shadow of the Gallows, featuring Daisy Kirkcaldy and her husband, Will Hepburn, when I realized the priest I had written into the story sounded incredibly like the Jesuit John Gerard of my research, one of the few Jesuits of the English mission who survived the aftermath of November 5, 1605. The more I wrote, the larger his part in the tale became until I faced the prospect of marketing a tome. In today’s market, a historical novel the size of the Los Angeles Metropolitan telephone directory is doomed. The solution was to shave his role into something manageable and promise myself to do justice to his exploits in my next book in the series. In my case, I call it Deliverance of the Lamb.

Fortunately, in dealing with Father Gerard, there is a plethora of material on which to base a sequel. After his final flight from England in May 1606, a high-ranking Jesuit recognized the potential of using his life story as a recruitment tool.  Gerard was ordered to document his life story in writing. The original was written in Latin, but it has since been translated into English and embellished with excellent notes. Anyone who fears an autobiography written by a cleric in 1611 will be tedious drivel is in for a shock.

The Autobiography of a HUNTED PRIEST reads very much like a prize-winning well-researched historical novel.  Not being a Catholic or having much of a religious bent, I had no idea I was opening a page-turner or that Gerard was one of history’s most notable escape artists.  Research the topic of great escapes and you will find his escape from the Tower of London on the list.

No undisputed likeness of John Gerard survives.  The one shown above has recently been questioned.. However, there are three similar descriptions in his biography. Putting the accounts together, one can surmise he was exceptionally tall, very dark complected with long black hair, dark eyes and a manicured mustachio, and a stylish patch of facial hair on his chin.  Accounts of his phenomenal successes in converting aristocratic women suggests we can comfortably add the descriptors handsome and charismatic to his attributes.

A second work written by Gerard is an essay entitled The Condition of Catholics Under James I: Father Gerard’s narrative of the Gunpowder Plot. Not only is it a comprehensive critique of the Gunpowder Treason from a  Catholic point of view, and hence a bit of an apology, but it also reveals much of the author’s character. It is not as readable as the beautifully translated and edited Hunted Priest, but it is a compelling source, and its Kindle version is free of charge.

Perusing Father Gerard’s works and others writings about Early Jacobean England, a thumbnail sketch of Gerard’s colorful life emerges. Most sources place his birth in the autumn of 1564.  His father had been knighted for acts of valor and was the respected Sheriff of Lancashire. Later, however, the senior Gerard was imprisoned in the Tower for participating in one of many schemes to free the Queen of Scots.   His popularity earned him a favorable disposition of the charges.

Young John Gerard matriculated at Oxford at age eleven, but when he was asked to make a Declaration of Faith and renounce the Catholic religion to continue, he withdrew.  Surprisingly, he obtained permission from an Anglican bishop to continue his studies abroad. He headed to the Jesuit College in Douai, the institution founded by the militant activist Cardinal William Allen, the man behind the Jesuit mission to England.

When the establishment moved to Rheims in 1578, John Gerard went with it. He was still far too young to be inducted into the Society of Jesus.   Quite incidentally, the timing of his three-year stay in Rheims fits perfectly into my plotline for Deliverance of the Lamb.

He began his mission to England in 1582.

Like all Catholic priests of his day, he was aware of the risks involved if he were identified as a priest.  Early during his mission he spent a year in Marshalsea prison, which left him not the least dismayed.  He had plenty of time to study while confined. Eventually, he was bailed by none other than Anthony Babington of the infamous Babington Plot, a plan designed to place Marie Stuart on the English throne. Gerard's life story is filled with names of aristocrats associated with plots to supplant Elizabeth with her Catholic cousin Marie Stuart. Elizabeth’s fears were more than paranoid delusions.

It helps to remember that until the second quarter of the 16^th Century, England had been a Catholic country led by the Pope’s Defender of the Faith, King Henry the Eighth.  The popular mid-Twentieth century adage, You Cannot Legislate Morality applied then as now.

After he was bailed out of jail by Babington, Gerard jumped parole and returned to Europe and eventually settled in Rome.  He was still young to be inducted into the Jesuit order but after a period of accelerated but rigorous study under Cardinal Allen's oversight, he was ordained and ordered to proceed to London. This is the journey north to Paris and the coast which was observed by  Walsingham's spies. He and three other priests including his good friend Father Oldecorne eventually boarded a ship headed for the English coast. They did not disembark until they were north of London, where Gerard predicted matters would be quiet.  However, the Watchers were on the lookout.  To be less obvious, the group split up.  While the incident described earlier went well, a few days later he encountered a patrol and was taken into custody.  At the time, Gerard told a convincing story to the men who detained him and charmed his way out of it.

Many of his encounters follow a similar script.  His good breeding, physical attributes and persuasive words got him out of one fix after another.  On several occasions, appearing before magistrates who had known his father helped.

Henry Garnet, S.J. (Wikimedia)

Soon he was in London hoping to meet Father Henry Garnet, the Superior Jesuit in England. First, he made friends with a Catholic aristocrat who took him into his fine house in Grimston. The man's Protestant brother was curious as to his background, but Gerard's gentlemanly habits assuaged any fears of unwittingly harboring a priest. Gerard used his good manners and his knowledge of falconry and other indicia of membership in the gentry to convince others he was a high-born Englishman touring his country. However, to those who needed his intercession with their God, he abandoned his disguise.  The services he rendered in bringing peace to the many troubled families caught up in the Reformation earned him steadfast friends who were willing to risks their lives to keep him free.  While he did not seek rewards, he accepted them graciously as a means of supporting the lifestyle that kept his true vocation a secret.  The Watchers and Pursuivants were not seeking out well-heeled aristocrats, complete with servants and fine horses. They were looking in hidey holes and secret rooms for impoverished, starving priests.

During the latter days of Elizabeth’s rule, Gerard moved from one host household to another, converting many and sending some of the young men abroad to the Jesuit College. He sent one of the executed Earl of Northumberland's daughters to his friend Father Holt in Belgium. She later became a founder of the English Benedictine convent in Brussels which figures in the plot of my novel 1603: The Queen's Revenge.

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Gerard's exploits included a stay in the Tower of London in 1597 where he was tortured for his refusal to lead them to his Superior Father Garnet. Even the account of his suffering has its dramatic twist. His height complicated matters for his tormenters. When they hung him from the ceiling of the torture room by chaining his hands to a pole suspended between the two highest of the hooks, his toes still reached the floor. His abusers had to use shovels to dig a pit to make the device effective.

The Salt Tower- courtesy Richard Nevell

What is more, their tactics failed. His escape from the notorious Tower is well remembered.  Different versions appear on almost every list of famous escapes and prison breaks. He did it by employing remarkable charm, an innovative flight plan, a healthy dose of personal ingenuity and a bit of derring-do. He made friends with an inmate John Arden in another tower by passing notes written in orange juice. He made fast friends with his jailor who helped them pass information to friends on the outside.  The jailor provided a rope to use to climb down the out wall and toss across the moat. Finally, the two escapees and their jailor made it to a spot on the Thames where the jailor had a dinghy hidden.  They rowed to a prearranged rendezvous with Gerard's friends. He was never taken into custody again during the remaining several years of his mission in England.

During the remainder of his mission, he did not spend his time in hidey-holes like so many of his counterparts. He played the role of an aristocrat too well to resort to secret rooms and false cabinets to keep him free.  He was a master at hiding in plain sight. At the time of the Gunpowder Treason, he had been living in the Strand.

Midway through his autobiography, a student of early Jacobean history will recognize familiar names in the footnotes. Gerard described his friends but never named them in the original Latin text.  Gerard was far too wily to kiss and tell.  The single noteworthy exception is in several references to Everhard Digby, one of the plotters who came into the conspiracy in the middle stages. For years, he had been among John Gerard’s closest friends.  The intensity of their relationship is the one point which makes Gerard's disclaimer of guilty knowledge of the conspiracy disingenuous.

In discussing the Gunpowder Treason, there is no doubt where Gerard's passions lay. He empathized with the men involved and considered their deaths acts of martyrdom.  Although he believed their grievances were legitimate, he did not endorse the violence, and he did not know the details until the plan was in motion. He did not join their conspiracy, but he was not blind to the emotions driving it.  While at least two other Jesuits knew what was planned, they had received their information under seal of the confessional. Had he been caught, he would not have the sanctity of the Confessional as a defense, for whatever good it might have done.

After the Gunpowder Plot was uncovered, Jesuits were fair game, even though they had not been active in it.  Cecil used the event to launch a purge. At least four former Catholics who knew members of the English mission offered their services to Cecil, one of whom was a woman whose husband was in exile. She was anxious to get her lands and privileges restored, and offered to deliver Gerard. When the house where he was staying came under scrutiny, she arrived with the pursuivants, waving a king’s warrant in her hand. On that occasion, Gerard’s escape was less spectacular than his Tower breakout. He withdrew into a secret room with a scant supply of water and a jar of rich preserves. He stayed there under unhealthy circumstances for nine days before the searchers moved on.

Other women--especially Ann and Elizabeth Vaux, risked their lives to help Gerard and others escape.  The celebrated recusant Elizabeth Vaux was taken to London and interrogated as to Gerard's whereabouts and remained defiant.  By then, others of Gerard’s associates including his superior Father Henry Garnet had been apprehended.

The Discovery of Father Garnet and Father Oldecorne
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After her release, Elizabeth Vaux made certain Father Gerard had everything he needed to subsist until an escape could be arranged. She offered to finance his flight to the tune of five thousand florins and gifted Gerard a thousand florins in travel money.

Gerard’s last escape was brilliant, but likely he had little to do with its planning. It appears to have been arranged by people with rank and  power in the Spanish Netherlands or France.  He left the country of his birth disguised as a manservant in the entourage of the Spanish Ambassador and a diplomat sent by the Hapsburg co-rulers of the Spanish Netherlands, Albert and Isabella Clara. The Dutchman had been in London setting the ground rules for peace negotiations between England and the Hapsburgs scheduled for later in the year 1606. Shortly before they were scheduled to board ship, the Spanish Ambassador balked, but on the morning of May 3, he rethought his position and welcomed Gerard  into the group of departing dignitaries, playing the part of a footman. The ship set sail on the day of his mentor Father Henry Garnet's suffering.

 Father Gerard remained an active Jesuit engaged in the education of seminarians and the spiritual preparation of novitiates, and he was the first Rector of a Jesuit House of philosophy and theology at Liege.  Later he returned to Flanders to take a similar position in Ghent, supervising the newly ordained during their year of probation.  In the last ten years of his life,  he served as confessor to the English College in Rome. He died there in 1637, one of the few survivors of Lord Robert Cecil's purge.  Since the annexation of Rome to the Italian State, the Collegio Roma is now houses the Italian Ministry of Heritage and Culture.

Collegio Roma-Wikimedia Commons

His autobiography is a gem, filled with anecdotes and what modern readers might call 'war stories' told with a light touch that captivates and entertains. It is a small wonder he was successful as a recruiter. What I have reported is but a small sampling of a life even the best historical novelist would be hard pressed to surpass.

I plan to enjoy assisting Father John Gerard’s escape in The Deliverance of the Lamb, which, God willing, I will have ready to launch by the end of the year.  I invite his spirit to guide me in my endeavors. I can hear his ghost whispering as I write, ‘Greetings, Madame. The name’s Gerard. John Gerard.’

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Linda Root
Amazon

The man who grew a backbone - meet Philip Howard

by Anna Belfrage

Some people are an unknown quantity until life throws them into the fires of fate. Some emerge hardened by the experience, some crumble to ashes. Today, I’d like you to meet Philip Howard, a man who (probably) had no idea he had as much courage as he did until the day he needed it.

Thought to be Philip's mother

Philip Howard was born into the upper echelons of English nobility. His father, Thomas Howard, was the Duke of Norfolk, his mother, Mary FitzAlan,  the heiress to the Earl of Arundel. Not that Philip ever got the opportunity to develop a relationship with his mother, as she died after having given birth to him.

Thomas Howard did not remain a widower for long. Philip was presented with a step-mother, and over the coming years, the Howard nursery expanded with four more children. And then Margaret died as well. Thomas Howard remarried – a widow with three little daughters. Yet again, Thomas’ wife died. This time, he didn’t marry again. Instead, he married his three sons to his step-daughters. A complicated “let’s keep it in the family” game.

Thomas Howard

Philip Howard was twelve when he married Anne Dacre. This was also the year when his father was accused of planning to marry Mary, Queen of Scots. The Duke wiggled out of that one, but some years later he was back kicking his heels in the Tower, now accused of participating in the Ridolfi plot whereby the plotters intended to supplant Elizabeth with Mary, Queen of Scots. The evidence tying Howard to the plot is somewhat tenuous, but in June of 1572 he was executed for treason.

At the time, Philip Howard was fifteen. His father’s vast estates were attainted and fell to the crown, but fortunately for Philip, his maternal grandfather left an impressive inheritance, and so he became the Earl of Arundel – not quite as fancy as being a Duke, but definitely better than being an impoverished lordling.

The Philip – Anne marriage was not exactly a bed of roses, at least not initially. Anne was devout, and her upbringing had her leaning towards the Catholic faith. The Howard family had its own sizeable share of Catholic recusants, but Philip was not one of them, and he wasn’t thrilled to have a wife whose religion could cause him major problems at court. After all, Philip intended to spend a lot of time at court where he very quickly had become one of Elizabeth’s favourites.

Philip Howard as a young man

Things, however, happened. Philip began developing an affection for his wife – and for her religious preferences. He witnessed a debate at the Tower between Jesuits and Protestants in the early 1580’s that definitely swung him in matters of religion – he was more than impressed by the Jesuit Edmund Campion’s arguments – but for some years more he sat on the fence. Not so his wife, who openly converted in 1582. When the Queen found out, Anne was placed under house arrest, a whole year of solitude during which she gave birth to a daughter whom she promptly named Elizabeth.

The Queen relented, Anne was released and rushed into her husband’s arms. No longer the foppish courtier of his early youth, Philip had developed a serious – and devout side. The Queen’s treatment of his wife had not served to deter him from conversion, instead it made him all that more determined to become a Catholic, just like Anne. Chances are Philip never had the intention of going public with his faith, but he lived in a time and age where every major household had a bevy of servants, and quite a few of those servants also acted as informers on their masters, which was how Queen Elizabeth found out that her erstwhile favourite and second cousin had decided to become a recusant.

Queen Elizabeth ordered Philip to be placed under house arrest. Unlike his wife, Philip chose to flee instead. One wonders why: did he have reason to suspect the house arrest would be permanent? That the Queen would never release him? That he would be assassinated? The present mood at court was very anti-Catholic, so maybe his fears were warranted.

Whatever the case, Philip decided to flee to France, but was yet again betrayed and captured at sea. He was brought back to England where he was thrown into the Tower in 1585, sentenced to pay a fine of 10 000 pounds and to remain imprisoned at the Queen’s pleasure. His wife was ordered to leave London and retire to the country, and no matter how much Philip begged, the Queen refused permission for his wife and newborn son to visit him. Not one of Elizabeth’s better moments…

Things might have ended differently for Philip had it not been for the events of 1588. When Philip II commanded the Great Armada to invade England under the auspices of restoring the True Religion, he did every Catholic in England a huge disfavour – including Philip Howard. As we all know, the threat of invasion came to nothing, and the English people rejoiced. Not so Philip Howard, who was now tried for treason for having prayed for the Armada’s success and for having been party to a plan to excommunicate Queen Elizabeth. (As an aside, it is somewhat interesting that the excommunication threat be brought up: as a Protestant Monarch, why should Elizabeth care about a papal bull excommunicating her? Shows just how ingrained the Old religion still was…)

Philip in the Tower

Of course, Philip was found guilty and was attainted. For the coming years, he lived in constant fear that this would be the day he was dragged out to be beheaded, but in actual fact Queen Elizabeth never signed his execution order – even if no one had the charity to tell him so. Philip spent his days in relatively comfortable captivity in the Beauchamp Tower, accompanied by a dog that he used as a go-between to other prisoners. But he worried constantly for his family, knowing full well the future of his children now depended on the fortitude of his wife.

Some of his despair shines through in the inscription he carved out of the stone above the chimney in Beauchamp Tower. In a spidery handwriting it reads “quanto plus afflictions pro Christo in hoc saeculo, tanto plus gloriae cum Christo in future” which translates as the more affliction we suffer in the name of Christ in this world, the greater the glory at Christ’s side in the next. Not sure just how much comfort he could draw from that.

Interestingly enough, Philip Howard always had a “Get out of jail” card at his disposal. All he had to do was recant, embrace the Protestant faith, and he would be forgiven, his estates restored to him. But he never did. Not even when he lay dying and yet again begged the Queen to allow his wife and children to visit him, did he ever consider denying his faith. It must have been a terrible temptation for the ailing man. All he had to do, as per the Queen, was to attend a Protestant Service, and he would have the joy of his family at his side and be restored to all his honours – and her favour. An hour or so of lip service and he would be allowed to hold his wife’s hand one last time, lay eyes on his son and daughter. One measly service and he would buy his children an easier life, himself a respectable death.

Obviously, Philip Howard refused. In a last burst of inspiration, he had the following message conveyed to the Queen: “Tell Her majesty if my religion be the cause for which I suffer, sorry I am that I have but one life to lose.” And so Philip Howard died, alone in his tower on a cold October day of 1595. He was thirty-eight years old and had spent more than ten years behind the walls of the Tower for the single sin of being a Catholic. I wonder if Elizabeth ever felt a sting of shame – she who is quoted as once saying that religion was a private matter, not one for the state to meddle in.

Anne Dacre in her old age

After Philip’s death, the Queen withheld the possessions that should rightfully go to his widow. But Anne was no milksop and she fought for her rights, for the rights of her otherwise impoverished children.  So successful was she that ultimately her son, yet another Thomas Howard, was restored to his title as Earl of Arundel. And in the fullness of time, this Thomas Howard’s descendants would yet again become the Dukes of Norfolk – which they remain until today – but that would have to wait another hundred years or so.

Philip's son, Thomas

As to Philip, his body was first buried together with that of his father, executed twenty-three years earlier. But in 1624, his widow had his remains transferred to Arundel, where they still lie at rest. Philip Howard quickly became a Catholic Martyr, and was canonised by the pope in 1970.

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Anna Belfrage is the successful author of seven published books, all of them part of The Graham Saga. Set in 17th century Scotland, Virginia and Maryland, this is the story of Matthew Graham and his wife, Alex Lind - two people who should never have met, not when she was born three centuries after him.
Anna's books are available on Amazon US,  Amazon UK, or wherever else good books are sold.
For more information about Anna and her books, please visit  her website. If not on her website, Anna can mostly be found on her blog.