Why is Queen Mary I of England known as Bloody Mary?

Such a vain attempt did Mary, Queen of England, make, in seeking to compel her people to follow popery. For there beat honest hearts on English soil, who would not forswear their conscience to suit a monarch's folly. Consequently such faithful ones were made to suffer, and many to die, to please the blood-thirsty queen. Her reign was so full of bloodshed that her name is handed down in history with that word which ever reminds us of her ungodly deeds.

As is well known, many were put to death in the reign of Queen Mary — earning for her the title of "Bloody Queen Mary." But God had mercy on England, and cut her life short.

In 1558 Mary died, and Queen Elizabeth was proclaimed queen. Again all was changed. The queen was Protestant, and required an oath from the clergy to renounce the pope.

Within three years (from 1555 to 1558) according to the historians of the time, two hundred and eighty-four martyrs suffered by fire, while many perished in prison from hunger and ill-usage. "Over all England," says one, "from the eastern counties to Wales on the west, and from the midland shires to the shores of the English Channel, blazed those baleful fires. Both sexes, and all ages and conditions, the boy of eight and the man of eighty, were dragged to the stake and burnt, sometimes singly, at other times in dozens. Just two days before the death of the queen, five martyrs were burnt in one fire at Canterbury." The news of her death filled the country with rejoicings. It is said that bonfires were lighted, that the people setting tables in the street, and bringing forth bread and wine, "did eat, drink, and rejoice." Thus was fulfilled the saying of the wise king, "When it goeth well with the righteous, the city rejoiceth: and when the wicked perish, there is shouting. By the blessing of the upright the city is exalted: but it is overthrown by the mouth of the wicked." (Prov. 11:10-11) The world, notwithstanding the native enmity of the heart, bears its testimony to consistent godliness, both in princes and people; and what a testimony against wickedness when the death of a wicked ruler is matter of national exultation! So it was on the death of Mary; there was the shout of joy throughout the whole land. And such was the joy of Rome on the death of Nero; and of France on the death of Robespierre. And such shall it be at last when God shall judge the harlot, and avenge the blood of His saints at her hand. Then heaven shall rejoice, and shout its loud Alleluia! Alleluia! (Rev. 18:20)

On the same day that Mary breathed her last-November 17th, 1558-died Cardinal Pole, her guilty counsellor. The system of Jezebel, reared at the cost of so much blood, fell with these two, never to be restored. Mary's zeal for Rome had been fired into fanaticism by her marriage with Philip II. of Spain; and her three advisers-the bigoted Gardiner the brutal Bonner, and the sanguinary Pole-led her to believe that in burning her Protestant subjects she was doing the will of God. When mourning the cold-heartedness of Philip, who rarely came to see her, Pole assured her that the estrangement of her husband was God's displeasure for her leniency towards the Amalekites: then a few more were sacrificed to bring over the gloomy bigot; but Philip cared not to come, which, with other things, in the great mercy of God to this afflicted nation, hastened her to the grave in the forty-third year of her age, and in the sixth of her reign.*

Two hundred and twenty-eight persons in all, were sacrificed on the altar of their faith in this country during Mary's reign, five of whom were bishops, twenty-one clergymen, eight gentlemen, eighty-four tradesmen, a hundred husbandmen, labourers and servants, fifty-four women, and four children. In addition to these were many who suffered in other ways, by torture and imprisonment: and the reformer, Miles Coverdale, who retired to the Continent during the persecution, informs us that, "Some were thrown into dungeons, ugsome holes, dark, loathsome, and stinking corners. Others lay in fetters and chains, and loaded with so many irons they could scarcely stir. Some were tied in the stocks with their heels upwards, others had their legs in the stocks, and their necks chained to the wall with iron bands, having neither stone nor stool to sit upon to ease their wearied bodies. Some stood in Skevington's gyves, which were most painful engines of iron, with their bodies bent double; others were whipped and scourged, beaten with rods and buffetted with fists. Some had their hands burned with a candle, and others were miserably famished and starved."

Mary died on the 17th of November, 1558, within a few moments of her cousin and chief adviser, Cardinal Pole, and her sister Elizabeth succeeded her on the throne. No two women could have borne less resemblance to each other; and few, perhaps, have been so completely misunderstood. Protestants have talked much of Elizabeth, and have never wearied of branding with contumely the memory of Mary; so that the expressions, "Good Queen Bess" and "Bloody Mary" have become proverbial amongst us. But say what we will, Mary was the nobler woman of the two. Whatever charges of blood-guiltiness she may have incurred, she acted with a conscience — and this is more than can be said of her sister. True, she was cruel, but her very cruelty was the result of strong religious convictions. She persecuted the Protestants, but only because she thought she was doing God service. With Saul of Tarsus she might have said, "I verily thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth." Elizabeth, however, had no such thoughts. History has shewn her to us as a woman without a heart: and as for her character what was it? She was void of modesty and reserve; cold and calculating in all her dealings, and full of dissimulation. Self-confidence was the secret of her courage, and her intellectual attainments were marred by excessive vanity. She could be everything to everybody as occasion required; and her heart was in nothing. Though she mixed in all the pleasures of a gay court, and was luxurious in matters of dress, her purpose seemed merely to dazzle those who came to court her favour; for her manner of life in private was simple and frugal in the extreme. Cool, dispassionate, and stoical hating none, and loving none she was, as we have said, a queen without a heart, and almost without a conscience.

The Reign of Mary

The Princess Mary ascended the throne in July, 1553. She inherited from her mother, Catherine of Arragon, a determined hatred of the Protestant religion, and a strong attachment to the Roman Catholic faith. Her first acts were to repeal the laws of her father and brother in favour of Reform and against the pope and popish worship. Gardiner and Bonner were released from the Tower, and the leaders of the Reformation-Cranmer, Hooper, Coverdale, Rogers, and others-were sent to occupy their vacant prisons. Meanwhile cardinal Pole arrived from Italy, with full powers from the pope to receive the kingdom of England into the Roman pale. Persecution commenced, and all men apprehended a terrible storm. "A thousand of the Reformers," says Marsden "including five bishops, many noblemen, fifty dignitaries of the church, and others whose position in society might render them obnoxious, hurried their departure, and fled abroad-chiefly to Geneva, Basle, and Zurich, where the Reformed religion was now established." The year 1555 has been termed the one of burning and blood.

That brief reign of six years and a half brought these happy peaceful days to an end. For the accession of Mary after his death brought a bigoted Roman Catholic to the English throne, and liberty for the conscience was unknown in England while she lived. The result was that able, learned, and God-fearing men, in common with all, were expected to bow to her wishes in religious matters, whether it suited them or not. That the queen should be obeyed was right and lawful, they very well knew, but that she should rule their consciences was a thing to which they could not agree. The reason was simple � the word of God and the queen's wishes were not alike, and consequently obedience to the monarch meant disobedience to God. Therefore sorrow and trouble became their earthly lot, yet withal, many grew brighter in soul as the days of persecution increased in fury.

When command and threat alike had failed to cause a faithful man to deny the truth of God, nothing but death remained for him. Consequently, many a noble-hearted believer in Jesus was speedily sent from earth to heaven by the fires which popery kindled in the reign of Queen Mary. A brief examination settled the point of guilt. The suspected person was brought before his judges to answer them on one particular point. A word was sufficient, and on it, hung the doom of the person suspected. The whole thing hinged on whether one error of Rome was believed or denied. That was the false and foolish Romish doctrine, that the bread, used to remind us of the body of Christ, actually became His body of flesh after being blessed by the priest. When these faithful ones denied that error, only the stake and the fire remained for them on earth.

Fires were thus kindled in all parts of England in order to strike a wider terror into the hearts of the people, and deter them by these terrible examples from siding with the Reformers. But they had just the opposite effect. Men could easily contrast the mild treatment of the papists under the reign of Edward, and the cruelties practiced on innocent men under the reign of Mary. Barbarous as the nation then was, and educationally Catholic, it was shocked beyond measure with the severities of the court of Mary, especially when the council issued an order to the sheriffs of the different counties to exact a promise from the martyrs to make no speeches at the stake-otherwise to cut out their tongues. Thus were kindred and friends deprived of the last and sacred words of the dying. Even the most rigid papists pretended to be ashamed of these savage proceedings when they saw their effect upon the nation. Undying hatred of the church which encouraged such atrocities took the place of superstitious reverence. The hearts of the people by thousands and tens of thousands were moved by sympathy to take part with the oppressed. In the summer of this year of horrors, Bradford, prebendary of St. Paul's, was burnt at Smithfield, together with an apprentice, a lad of nineteen; and many others whom we cannot name. But we must briefly notice three familiar and honoured names in the martyrology of England.

In 1542 the Popish Bishops got an order suppressing the circulation of the Bible and its place in the churches; but on the accession of Edward VI. the order was revoked, and the Bible stored as before; but again it was forbidden to be read or circulated by Popish Queen Mary, till the first year of the reign of Elizabeth, who did so much, politically and individually, to further the cause of the Reformation at home and abroad. We wish we could number Queen Elizabeth, of illustrious name and memory, amongst the saints of God. From the first publication of the "Great Bible," 1539 till 1568 (30 years), numerous editions were issued, and it became the only authorised version in use, save during the brief and bloody reign of Mary of about five years.

The outlook at this point was far from pleasant. Mary was a bigoted catholic; and that was not a very promising fact for the protestants: moreover, she was a daughter of Catherine of Aragon, of whose divorce from Henry, Cranmer had approved, and that was no very cheering thought for the ecclesiastical head of Protestantism in this country. Mary had no kindly feelings towards the doctrines which Cranmer had been so assiduously promulgating during the reign of her brother and still less had she any kindly feelings towards the primate himself, whom, indeed, she looked upon as her arch-enemy. During the young king's reign she had requested permission to hear Mass in her own house, but Edward had refused; and now, on Cranmer's devoted head, the consequences of this refusal were to fall. True, he had counselled the king to grant the request, but Mary either ignored this fact, or was ignorant of it; and nothing would now appease her indignation but Cranmer's blood. As a queen, she hated him because of his reforming measures; as a catholic, because of the restraints of a religious kind which he was supposed to have put upon her in the previous reign; and, above all, as a woman, because of his decision in the great divorce question, by which she had been pronounced illegitimate.

For the first few months of her reign, however, the queen dissembled her true feelings; and in order to establish her position on the throne, promised toleration. The Protestants were not to be molested either in the profession or practice of their religion, nor was any compulsion to be used in matters of faith: the catholic was to refrain from the offensive term "heretic" when speaking of a Protestant, and the Protestant was to eschew the use of the word "papist" when speaking of his catholic neighbours. But Cardinal Pole was at the queen's elbow, and Gardiner and Bonner were waiting by to drop their poison into the queen's ear, and it was scarcely possible under such circumstances that this state of neutrality should continue.

In 1553 Edward died, and Queen Mary succeeded. She did all she could to sweep away the Reformation, and bring England again under the power of the pope.