Thomas Garnet

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Saint Thomas Garnet (c. 1575–23 June 1608) was the protomartyr (i.e., the first martyr associated with a place) of Saint Omer and therefore of Stonyhurst College. He was executed at Tyburn and is one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales

Contents

[edit] Thomas Garnet's family

Thomas Garnet was born at Southwark in about 1575 into a prominent family. His uncle, Henry Garnet, was the Superior of all the Jesuits in England. Richard Garnet, Thomas' father, was at Balliol College, Oxford, at the time when great severity began to be used against Catholics. Thomas' father's example and spirituality provided leadership to a generation of Oxford men which was to produce Edmund Campion, Robert Persons[1] and so many other inspirational English Catholics.

[edit] Thomas' schooling

Thomas attended the Horsham grammar school and was afterwards a page to one of the half-brothers of Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, who were, however, conformists (i.e., Conformed to the Anglican faith).

[edit] Thomas goes to Saint Omer

Because English colleges had been turned over to Protestants, English Catholics had to go to the continent for their education. Thomas, at age 17, was amongst the first students of Saint Omer's Jesuit College in 1592. By 1595 he was considered fit for the new English theological seminary, Saint Albans, at Valladolid, and started in January, with five others, John Copley, William Worthington, John Ivreson, James Thomson, and Henry Mompesson, from Calais.

[edit] Captured in the Channel

They were lucky in finding as a travelling companion, a Jesuit Father William Baldwin, who was going to Spain in disguise under the alias Ottavio Fuscinelli, but misfortunes soon began. After severe weather in the English Channel, they found themselves obliged to run for shelter to the Downs, where their vessel was searched by some of Queen Elizabeth's ships, and they were discovered hiding in the hold. They were immediately made prisoners and treated very roughly. They were sent round the Nore up to London, and were examined by Charles, second Lord Howard of Effingham, the Lord Admiral.

[edit] Father Baldwin's test

After this Father Baldwin was sent to Bridewell prison, where one of those incidents occurred that were so representative of the treacherousness of the Elizabethan age. What happened was that he met a confessor[2] named James Atkinson. Atkinson, under torture, had divulged names. Atkinson was riven by remorse and terror. Terror that he would be tortured again, this time to death; and that he would die unabsolved for his betrayals.

This placed Father Baldwin in a real quandary. Was Atkinson a spy? In appealing for a priest to hear his confession was he angling to trick Baldwin into revealing himself a priest? In the end he heard Atkinson's confession; and whose joy at absolution was luminous. Later, Atkinson would suffer further tortures, and died from this cruelty, or shortly thereafter.

[edit] Escapes

Meantime his young companions had been handed over to Archbishop Whitgift, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who, having found that they encouraged one another, sent them one by one to different Protestant bishops or doctors.

Only the youngest, Mompesson, conformed. The rest eventually escaped and returned to their colleges on the continent after many adventures. It is not known for certain what happened to young Garnet, but it seems likely that he was the youth confined to the house of Dr. Richard Edes. He fell ill and was sent home under bond to return to custody at Oxford by a certain day.

The boy escaped yet again, and to avoid trouble he had then to keep away even from his own father. At last he reached Saint Omer again, and then went to Valladolid in 1596, after many escapades.

[edit] First return to the dangers of England

After ordination, in 1599, age 24 ; "returning to England I wandered", he says, "from place to place, to reduce souls which went astray and were in error as to the knowledge of the true Catholic Church".

[edit] Effect of the Gunpowder Plot

During the excitement caused by the Gunpowder Plot in 1605 he was arrested near Warwick, going under the name Thomas Rokewood, which he had no doubt assumed from Ambrose Rokewood of Coldham Hall, whose chaplain he then was, and who had, unfortunately, been implicated in the plot.

[edit] Imprisonment

Father Garnet was now imprisoned first in the Gatehouse, then in the Tower, where he was tortured in order to make him give evidence against Henry Garnet, his famous uncle, Superior of the English Jesuits, who had recently admitted him into the Society of Jesus. The authorities suspected that Henry Garnet was implicated in the plot. Henry Garnet was later executed because of his (suspected) involvement in the plot.

Though no connection with the conspiracy could be proved against Thomas, he was kept in the Tower of London for seven months, at the end of which time he was suddenly put on board ship with forty-six other priests, and a royal proclamation, dated 10 July 1606, was read to them, threatening death if they returned. They were then carried across the Channel and set ashore in Flanders.

[edit] Return to the Continent

Father Garnet now went to his old school at Saint Omer, then to Brussels to see the Superior of the Jesuits, Father Baldwin, his companion in the adventures of 1595. Father Baldwin sent him to the English Jesuit novitiate, Saint John's, Leuven, in which he was the first novice to be received.

[edit] Return to England and martyrdom

In September, 1607, he was sent back to England, but was arrested six weeks later by an apostate[3] priest called Rouse. This was the time of King James' controversy with Cardinal Bellarmine about the Oath of Allegiance. Garnet was offered his life if he would take the oath, but he steadfastly refused, and was executed age 32, at Tyburn, protesting that he was "the happiest man this day alive". His relics, which were preserved at Saint Omer, were lost during the French Revolution.

[edit] Summary

  • 1575 Born, Southwark
  • 1608 Died, Tyburn
  • 1929 Beatified (i.e., the first step to canonisation)
  • 1970 Canonised, by Pope Paul VI (Canonised, i.e., made a saint)
  • 1 December, Saint Thomas Garnet's memorial Day
  • 25 October, Feast Day of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales

[edit] External links

[edit] Notes

  1. ^  Also spelled Robert Parsons
  2. ^ Confessor, A person who suffers for Christ but has not (yet) been canonised.
  3. ^ Apostate, a person who abandons his religion.

This article incorporates text from the public-domain Catholic Encyclopedia of 1913.