page_title: John Rogers (Bible editor and martyr)
section_title: Imprisonment and martyrdom
hierarchical_section_title: John Rogers (Bible editor and martyr) / Biography of John Rogers / Imprisonment and martyrdom
caption_attribution_description: Bust of John Rogers, Bible editor and martyr, at St John's Deritend, Birmingham, England. Image extracted from page 31 of The Making of Birmingham: being a history of the rise and growth of the Midland metropolis ... With ... illustrations, etc. Publisher: J. L. Allday', by Robert Kirkup Dent. Original held and digitised by the British Library. Copied from Flickr. Note: The colours, contrast and appearance of these illustrations are unlikely to be true to life. They are derived from scanned images that have been enhanced for machine interpretation and have been altered from their originals.
context_page_description: John Rogers was an English clergyman, Bible translator and commentator. He guided the development of the Matthew Bible in vernacular English during the reign of Henry VIII and was the first English Protestant martyr under Mary I of England, who was determined to restore Roman Catholicism.
context_section_description: On 16 August 1553 he was summoned before the council and bidden to keep within his own house. His emoluments were taken away and his prebend was filled in October. In January 1554, Bonner, the new Bishop of London, sent him to Newgate Prison, where he lay with John Hooper, Laurence Saunders, John Bradford and others for a year. Their petitions, whether for less rigorous treatment or for opportunity of stating their case, were disregarded. In December 1554, Parliament re-enacted the penal statutes against Lollards, and on 22 January 1555, two days after they took effect, Rogers (with ten other people) came before the council at Gardiner's house in Southwark, and defended himself in the examination that took place. On 28 and 29 January he came before the commission appointed by Cardinal Pole, and was sentenced to death by Gardiner for heretically denying the Christian character of the Church of Rome and the real presence in the sacrament. He awaited and met death cheerfully, though he was even denied a meeting with his wife. Shortly before the execution, Rogers was offered a pardon if he were to recant but refused.
  He was burned at the stake on 4 February 1555 at Smithfield. Bishop Thomas Cranmer who had encouraged the Matthew Bible, was executed in 1556 also by Queen Mary I of England. 
  Antoine de  Noailles, the French ambassador, said in a letter that Rogers' death confirmed the alliance between the Pope and England. He also spoke of the support given to Rogers by the greatest part of the people: "even his children assisted at it, comforting him in such a manner that it seemed as if he had been led to a wedding."
  A bust in his memory was erected at St John's Church, Deritend in 1853, by public subscription.
caption: Bust, St John's, Deritend
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