Today in 1553 Mary Tudor made Stephen Gardiner her Lord Chancellor. Gardiner born around 1483, and had met with Erasmus, and other humanists. He rose to prominence under Cardinal Wolsey, and he worked for Wolsey trying to secure the divorce of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. His work was unsuccessful, and as it was clear that England was headed towards a break with Rome, Gardiner stayed Conservative. He was against Cromwell, and the Reformation. But he did support royal supremacy over Rome, and so he managed to keep his head. Under the reign of Protestant Edward he actually spent some time in jail.
When Mary came to power she immediately released Gardiner and other prisoners who were imprisoned for their conservative beliefs, and she made him her Lord Chancellor today. He didn’t enjoy the position long as he died in 1555, so he never saw the shift back to Protestantism under Elizabeth.
That’s your Tudor Minute for today. Remember you can dive deeper into life in 16th century England through the Renaissance English History Podcast at englandcast.com.
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Reformation Month episodes
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Heather Teysko is the creator, writer, and producer of The Renaissance English History Podcast, one of the longest running indie history podcasts, going since 2009. She's been writing about history online for over 25 years, since her first site on Colonial American history became number one in history on Yahoo in 1998. She writes books, created the original Tudor Planner (a yearly diary filled with Tudor history) and in 2019 created the world's first Tudorcon (you can "attend" online this year!). She has been passionate about Tudor England since she first read Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII 20 years ago, and subsequently moved to London after college to spend her time immersed in Tudor history.