On this day in Tudor history, 11th January 1584, Carter paid the ultimate price after being found guilty of treason. His crime? Printing a book that allegedly encouraged the assassination of Queen Elizabeth I.
William Carter was born in London in around 1548 and was the son of draper John Carter and his wife, Agnes. When he was about fifteen, Carter became apprenticed to John Cawood who had been Queen’s Printer to Mary I and who was joint Queen’s Printer to Elizabeth I. Carter was an apprentice to Cawood for a term of ten years before moving on to become secretary to Nicholas Harpsfield, a man who had been Archdeacon of Canterbury under Cardinal Pole in Mary I’s reign and who had been a zealous promoter of heresy trials of Protestants. He had been imprisoned by Elizabeth I’s government for refusing to swear the oath of supremacy and was still in Fleet prison when Carter became his secretary.
Following Harpsfield’s death in 1575, Carter set up his own printing press on Tower Hill with the aim of printing Catholic literature, a dangerous thing to do in Elizabethan England. In 1578, he found himself imprisoned in the Poultry Compter for just over a month for not attending Protestant services, and then the following year, he ended up in the Gatehouse Prison “for not conforming himself in matters of religion”. His press was seized along with books he’d been working on and books he owned. While he was in prison, evidence was found connecting him to the 1578 publication and printing of “A Treatise of Schism” by Gregory Martin, which Burton and Pollen in “The Lives of English Martyrs” describe as being written “in order to keep Catholics from going to Protestant service.” In 1581, after the government decided that the prisons must be cleared, Carter was one of the prisoners released under conditions. He agreed “not to depart the realm, but to continue within three miles of his house in Hart Street, St. Olave’s, until he conforms unto orders for religion, and comes unto divine service established by act of Parliament”, i.e. the Protestant service. He also had to agree not to “admit the access of any Jesuit massing priest or seminary priest, or recusant, or keep any Catholic servant or partner.” He had to pay 100 marks, a large sum, as surety.
While Carter didn’t print any more books following his release, he didn’t stop trading them, and in July 1582, his home was searched by Richard Topcliffe, the famous Elizabethan investigator and torturer, and a man who saw it as his mission to eradicate Catholicism from England. Topcliffe and his men found Catholic vestments, chalices and crosses, and other objects related to Carter’s Catholic faith. They also found a copy of “Disputations in the Tower”, about Jesuit priest and martyr Edmund Campion’s disputations in the Tower with his Protestant adversaries. Another book found at this time was Harpsfield’s “Treatise of the Pretended Divorce”, a criticism of King Henry VIII’s Great Matter.
Carter was imprisoned in the Tower of London where he was racked in an attempt to get names of Catholic contacts out of him. Carter courageously would not betray anyone.
He remained in the Tower for 18 months, his wife Jane sadly dying while he was there. In January 1584, Carter was moved to Newgate Prison and on 10th January he was tried for printing Martin’s “Schism”, the charge stating that the book exhorted Englishwomen to follow the example of the Biblical Judith and cut off Elizabeth I’s head. London lawyer Thomas Norton, a zealous Puritan, quoted from the book: “Judith followeth, whose godly and constant wisdom, if our Catholic gentlewomen would follow, they might destroy Holofernes, the master heretic”, claiming that Holofernes must refer to Queen Elizabeth and that it was therefore exhorting Catholic women to kill her. Carter pleaded not guilty to inciting the assassination of his queen and defended himself well, but he didn’t have a chance against Norton, Bishop Aylmer and the Attorney General, who pointed out that the book was written by a traitor, approved by a traitor and addressed to traitors. The jury returned their verdict after just 15 minutes, finding him guilty, and he was sentenced to execution. He was hanged, drawn and quartered the following day, 11th January 1584.
William Carter’s story is a powerful reminder of how dangerous it was to be Catholic in Tudor England, and that Elizabeth I’s reign wasn’t exactly a golden age for everyone. His devotion to his faith, despite imprisonment, torture, and even the death of his wife, shows the unimaginable risks people took to hold on to their beliefs.
For Elizabeth I’s government, printing certain books was seen as an act of treason. But for Carter, it was an act of faith and loyalty to his community.
Centuries later, in 1987, he was beatified by Pope John Paul II, recognised as a martyr for his beliefs. But in his time, Blessed William Carter was just a man who paid the ultimate price for refusing to conform.
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