The Tudor Society

#OTD in Tudor history – 24 April

On this day in Tudor history, 24th April, Lord Chancellor Thomas Audley set up some of the legal machinery used in the fall of Anne Boleyn; Mary, Queen of Scots married Francis, the Dauphin, at Notre Dame; and it was the night for divining who you were going to marry...

  • 1536 – Commissions of oyer and terminer were set up by Thomas Audley, Lord Chancellor. They were later used to try four of the men involved in the fall of Anne Boleyn. See video below.
  • 1545 – Baptism of Henry Wriothesley, 2nd Earl of Southampton, at St Andrews, Holborn. He was the son of Thomas Wriothesley, 1st Earl of Southampton and 1st Baron Wriothesley, Henry VIII's Lord Chancellor.
  • 1549 – Death of Ralph Neville, 4th Earl of Westmorland, English peer, soldier and Privy Councillor. He was buried at Staindrop in County Durham. Neville was one of the peers who sat in judgement on Anne Boleyn in May 1536 and served Henry VIII as a soldier in the North of England and borders, and Edward VI in Scotland.
  • 1551 – Execution of Dutchman George van Parris, surgeon and religious radical at Smithfield. He was burned at the stake for Arianism (denying the divinity of Christ).
  • 1555 – Burning of George Marsh, Protestant martyr, former curate at All Hallows Church, London and a preacher in Lancashire, at Spital Boughton outside the walls of Chester. He had refused the offer of a royal pardon if he would recant his Protestant faith. His ashes were buried in the St Giles cemetery.
  • 1558 - Mary, Queen of Scots married Francis, the Dauphin of France, at Notre Dame in Paris. Mary was fifteen, and Francis was fourteen. See video below.

Today is also St Mark’s Eve, the day before the Feast of St Mark the Evangelist, one of Christ’s apostles and the man who is said to have written the Gospel of Mark. In medieval and Tudor times, St Mark's Eve was the night to divine who you were going to marry. See video below for more information.

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#OTD in Tudor history – 24 April