Trials, recantations, execution (1553–1556)
Edward VI became seriously ill and the councillors were told that he did not have long to live. In May 1553, the council sent several letters to Continental reformers assuring them that Edward's health was improving. Among the letters was one addressed to Melanchthon inviting him to come to England to take up the Regius Chair in Cambridge which had been vacant since the death of Martin Bucer in February 1551. Both Henry VIII and Cranmer had previously failed to convince Melanchthon to come; this time, the council made a serious effort by sending him an advance to cover his travel expenses. Cranmer sent a personal letter urging him to take the offer. Despite his plea, Melanchthon never made the voyage to England. While this effort to shore up the reformation was taking place, the council was working to persuade several judges to put on the throne Lady Jane Grey, Edward's cousin and a Protestant, instead of Mary, a Catholic. On 17 June 1553, the King made his will, noting Jane would succeed him, contravening the Third Succession Act. Cranmer tried to speak to Edward alone, but he was refused and his audience with Edward occurred in the presence of the councillors. Edward told him that he supported what he had written in his will. Cranmer's decision to support Jane must have occurred before 19 June, when royal orders were sent to convene the Convocation for the recognition of the new succession.
By mid-July, there were serious provincial revolts in Mary's favour and support for Jane in the council fell. As Mary was proclaimed queen, Dudley, Ridley, Cheke, and Jane's father, the Duke of Suffolk, were imprisoned. No action was taken against the Archbishop. On 8 August, he led Edward's funeral according to the rites of the prayer book. During these months, he advised others, including Peter Martyr, to flee England, but he himself chose to stay. Reformed bishops were removed from office and conservative clergy, such as Edmund Bonner, had their old positions restored. Cranmer did not go down without a fight. When rumours spread that he authorised the use of the mass in Canterbury Cathedral, he declared them to be false and said, "All the doctrine and religion by our said sovereign lord king Edward VI is more pure and according to God's word than any that hath been used in England these thousand years." Not surprisingly, the government regarded Cranmer's declaration as tantamount to sedition. He was ordered to stand before the council in the Star Chamber on 14 September and on that day he said his final goodbye to Martyr. Cranmer was sent straight to the Tower to join Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley.
On 13 November 1553, Cranmer and four others were brought to trial for high treason, found guilty, attainted by legislation passed by parliament (and so stripped of his see and right to make a will), and condemned to death. Numerous witnesses testified that Cranmer had encouraged heresy and had written heretical works, and he was charged with heresy. Through February 1554, Jane Grey and other rebels were executed, and attention then turned to the religious leaders of the reformation. On 8 March 1554, the Privy Council ordered Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer to be transferred to Bocardo prison in Oxford to await a second trial for heresy. During this time, Cranmer was able to smuggle out a letter to Martyr, who had fled to Strasbourg, the last surviving document written in his own hand. He stated that the desperate situation of the church was proof that it would eventually be delivered. Cranmer remained isolated in Bocardo prison for seventeen months before the heresy trial started on 12 September 1555. Although it took place in England, the trial was under papal jurisdiction and the final verdict would come from Rome. Under interrogation, Cranmer admitted to every fact that was placed before him, but he denied any treachery, disobedience, or heresy. The trial of Latimer and Ridley started shortly after Cranmer's but their verdicts came almost immediately and they were burned at the stake on 16 October. Cranmer was taken to a tower to watch the proceedings. On 4 December, Rome decided Cranmer's fate by depriving him of the archbishopric and giving permission to the secular authorities to carry out their sentence.
In his final days, Cranmer's circumstances changed, which led to several recantations. On 11 December, he was taken out of Bocardo and placed in the house of the Dean of Christ Church. This new environment was very different from that of his two years in prison. He was in an academic community and treated as a guest. Approached by a Dominican friar, Juan de Villagarcía, he debated the issues of papal supremacy and purgatory. In his first four recantations, produced between the end of January and mid-February, Cranmer submitted himself to the authority of the king and queen and recognised the Pope as head of the Church. On 14 February 1556, he was degraded from holy orders and returned to Bocardo. He had conceded very little and Edmund Bonner was not satisfied with these admissions.
On 24 February, a writ was issued to the mayor of Oxford and the date of Cranmer's execution was set for 7 March. Two days after the writ was issued, a fifth statement, the first which could be called a true recantation, was issued. Cranmer repudiated all Lutheran and Zwinglian theology, fully accepted Catholic theology, including papal supremacy and transubstantiation, and stated that there was no salvation outside the Catholic Church. He announced his joy at returning to the Catholic faith, asked for and received sacramental absolution, and participated in the mass. Cranmer's burning was postponed and, under the normal practice of canon law, he should have been absolved. Mary, however, decided that no further postponement was possible. His last recantation was issued on 18 March. It was a sign of a broken man, a sweeping confession of sin. Despite the stipulation in canon law that recanting heretics be reprieved, Mary was determined to make an example of Cranmer. An ambassador summarised her position to her thus: Cranmer's "iniquity and obstinacy was so great against God and your Grace that your clemency and mercy could have no place with him, but you were constrained to administer justice". She pressed ahead with his execution required by his attainder by parliament for high treason.
Cranmer was told that he would be able to make a final recantation, but that this time it was to be in public during a service at the University Church in Oxford. He wrote and submitted the speech in advance and it was published after his death. At the pulpit on the day of his execution, 21 March 1556, he opened with a prayer and an exhortation to obey the King and Queen, but he ended his sermon totally unexpectedly, deviating from the prepared script. He renounced the recantations that he had written or signed with his own hand since his degradation and he stated that, in consequence, his hand would be punished by being burnt first. He then said, "And as for the Pope, I refuse him, as Christ's enemy, and Antichrist with all his false doctrine." He was pulled from the pulpit and taken to where Latimer and Ridley had been burnt six months previously. As the flames surrounded him, he fulfilled his promise by placing his right hand into the heart of the fire, calling it "that unworthy hand". His dying words were, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. I see the heavens open and Jesus standing at the right hand of God." These were also the last words of Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr.
