Excerpt from The Venerable Sir Adrian Fortescue: Knight of the Bath, Knight of St. John, Martyr

Amongst the Martyrs of the time of Henry the Eighth, who were not depicted on the walls of the English College Church and who are therefore not included in the Decree that gave to fifty-four Martyrs the honours of the Blessed, are three Knights of the Order. Of St. John of Jerusalem. These are Sir Adrian Fortescue and Sir Thomas Dingley, who were beheaded on Tower Hill on the 8th or loth of July, 1539, and Sir David Gunston, who was hanged, drawn, and quartered at St. Thomas Waterings in Southwark on July I, 1541. Of these three Martyrs hardly a word has been published by Catholic writers, excepting that Fortescue and Dingley were attainted by Act of Parliament for denyingthe King's Supremacy and that Gunston was tried and found guilty of high treason for the same cause, Of Sir Thomas Dingley and Sir David Gunston there is little more, as yet, that can be said but fortunately modern research, and more especially the labours of Thomas (fortescue) Lord Clermont, the historian of his family, have put us in possession of a considerable body of information respecting Sir Adrian Fortescue. He comes of an interesting family, of which Lord Clermont modestly says that it is a fair example of a knightly and noble house of England, and it will be well for us under his guidance to learn something, not only of our Martyr, but of those who went before him and followed after him of his blood and name.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.