Anne Askew - Arrest and Interrogation

Arrest and Interrogation

In 1545, Anne Askew was arrested and accused as a heretic. She was examined by Anglican clerics regarding her beliefs and found to disagree with their doctrine of transubstantiation. She often caught them in their own questions, which only enraged them more. She was brought before Bishop Bonner, who was determined to see her burned. He was unable to draw anything from her that would incriminate her, so instead he taunted her with the insinuation that her life was not as pure as the Scripture required. She calmly challenged him to bring forth anyone who could prove dishonesty in her. He could not and eventually released her.

Thomas Wriothesley, Lord Chancellor of England at that time, undertook the prosecution. He subjected her to an examination which lasted five hours. He asked her opinion of the bread and the eucharist. She replied; "I believe that as oft as I, in Christian congregation, receive the bread in remembrance of Christ's death, and with thanksgiving, according to His holy institution, I receive therewith the fruits also of His most glorious passion." She was then asked; "How can you avoid the very words of Christ, 'Take, eat, this is my body which is broken for you?'" She replied, "Christ's meaning in this passage ... is similar to the meaning of those other places of Scripture, 'I am the door', 'I am the vine', 'Behold the Lamb of God', 'That rock was Christ', and other such references to Himself. You are not in these texts to take Christ for the material thing which He is signified by, for then you will make Him a very door, a vine, a lamb, a stone, quite contrary to the Holy Ghost's meaning. All these indeed do signify Christ, even as the bread signifies His body in that place." She was sent back to Newgate.

Arrested again, she was examined in June 1546 by Martin Bowes, Lord Mayor of London. Sir Anthony Kingston, the Constable of the Tower of London, was ordered to torture Askew in an attempt to force her to name others. According to her own account, and that of gaolers within the Tower, she was tortured only once. She was taken from her cell, at about ten o'clock in the morning, to the lower room of the White Tower. She was shown the rack and asked if she would name those who believed as she did. Askew declined to name anyone at all, so she was asked to remove all her clothing except her shift. Askew then climbed onto the rack and her wrists and ankles were fastened. Again, she was asked for names, but she would say nothing. The wheel of the rack was turned, pulling Askew along the device and lifting her so that she was held taut about 5 inches above its bed and slowly stretched.

In her own account written from prison, Askew said she fainted from pain, and was lowered and revived. This procedure was repeated twice. Kingston refused to carry on torturing her, left the tower, and sought a meeting with the king at his earliest convenience to explain his position and also to seek his pardon, which the king granted. Wriothesley and Rich set to work themselves. They turned the handles so hard that poor Anne was drawn apart, her shoulders and hips were pulled from their sockets and her elbows and knees were dislocated. Askew's cries could be heard in the garden next to the White Tower where the Lieutenant's wife and daughter were walking. Askew gave no names, and her ordeal ended when the Lieutenant ordered her to be returned to her cell.