BL. WILLIAM PIKES, MARTYR - 21 MARCH

 

ALL SAINTS CELEBRATED IN MARCH

Saints celebrated on the 21st March

WELCOME!

BLESSED WILLIAM PIKES, MARTYR

Some time this year, 1591, (the particular day or month, I have not found,) William Pikes [William Pike], a layman, suffered at Dorchester, as in cases of high treason, for being reconciled to the church of Rome, and denying the queen's spiritual supremacy. 

He was, as I learn, from a written relation of the reverend Mr Manger's, born in Dorsetshire, and dwelt in a village called Moors, in the parish of Parley, four or five miles from Christ's church, in Hampshire. He was hanged, cut down alive, bowelled, and quartered. Being cut down all alive, says a manuscript relation in my hands, and being a very able, strong man, when the executioner came to throw him on the block to quarter him, he stood upon his feet; whereupon the sheriff's men over-mastering him, threw him down, and pinned his hands fast to the ground with their halberts; and so the butchery was perfected.

This year, 1591, on the 29th of November, a new proclamation was published against the catholics, as if the laws hitherto made, and all the fines, imprisonments, banishments, and deaths suffered in consequence of those laws, had not been sufficient. Of this proclamation, Cecil, Lord Burleigh, was supposed to be the author.

Source: Bishop Richard Challoner, Memoirs of Missionary Priests, Volume 1

⬅️ The Holy Martyrs of England and Wales

PRAYER:

Grant, we beseech you, almighty God, that we who know how courageously your holy martyr William 

confessed the faith, may experience his goodness as he intercedes for us with you. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, for ever and ever. Amen.