Curated category
People executed under Henry VIII
- Anne BoleynAnne Boleyn went to the scaffold on the 19th of May 1536 wearing a red petticoat beneath a loose grey gown of damask trimmed in fur, and she laughed.
- George Boleyn, Viscount RochfordGeorge Boleyn, Viscount Rochford, stepped onto Tower Hill on the morning of the 17th of May 1536 to face the axe. The crowd watching was, by all accounts…
- Catherine HowardCatherine Howard was Queen of England for barely sixteen months, and she was probably still a teenager when the axe fell on the 13th of February 1542.
- Francis WestonFrancis Weston was beheaded on Tower Hill on the 17th of May 1536, twenty-five years old and still protesting his innocence.
- Henry Norris (courtier)Henry Norris arrived into a world fractured by the Wars of the Roses. His grandfather Sir William Norris fought at the Battle of Stoke Field on the 16th of…
- Thomas MoreThomas More climbed the scaffold at Tower Hill on the 6th of July 1535 and, finding the structure so rickety it might collapse, told the waiting official: "I…
- Nicholas Carew (courtier)Nicholas Carew entered the household of the future King Henry VIII at six years old. He shared his education with the boy who would become England's most…
- Thomas CromwellThomas Cromwell was a blacksmith's son from Putney who died on Tower Hill with his head set on a spike above London Bridge.
- William Brereton (courtier)William Brereton, born around 1487 or perhaps as late as 1501, emerged from a prominent Cheshire family. His father was Sir Randle Brereton of Ipstones…
- Edmund DudleyEdmund Dudley died on Tower Hill on the 17th of August 1510, executed by the very dynasty he had spent his career enriching.
- Richard EmpsonRichard Empson died on the 17th of August 1510 with an axe, not a trial verdict, as the final word on his career. A lawyer who rose from Northamptonshire…
- Mark SmeatonMark Smeaton stood in the round window of Queen Anne's chamber at Winchester on a Saturday before May Day. He was around 23 years old when he died, yet his…
- John FisherJohn Fisher entered the world around the 19th of October 1469 in Beverley, Yorkshire. His father Robert worked as a prosperous mercer who died in 1477 when…