1417
Execution of Sir John Oldcastle.
Oldcastle, later Lord Cobham, served as a soldier and politician in the reigns of the first Lancastrian kings, Henry IV and Henry V. He became influenced by the Wyclifite heresy (also known as Lollardy) and sheltered its adherents from government persecution. Lollards are often termed as proto-Protestants in that they favoured scripture in the English language and predestination while they opposed church wealth, papal power and transubstantiation. The sixteenth-century English reformer John Bale wrote of him:
The truth of it is, that after he had once throughly tasted the Christian doctrine of John Wicliffe and of his disciples, and perceived their livings agreeable to the same, he abhorred all the superstitious sorceries (ceremonies, I should say) of the proud Romish church … He tried all matters by the scriptures, and so proved their spirit whether they were of God or nay. He maintained such preachers in the dioceses of Canterbury, London, Rochester, and Hereford, as the bishops were sore offended with. He exhorted their priests to a better way by the gospel; and when that would not help, he gave them sharp rebukes.
This open support of heresy came in a bad time as Henry V had passed legislation allowing the burning of religious dissidents. Oldcastle was imprisoned in the Tower of London but escaped. On recapture he was condemned to be hanged in chains and burnt alive. His death and those of others of high rank who had espoused Lollardy drove the movement underground for over a century.