Cuthbert Mayne

Cuthbert Mayne was an English Catholic priest executed for high treason in 1577 and later venerated as a martyr of the Elizabethan persecution. He is remembered as the first of the seminary priests trained on the European Continent to be put to death under the penal statutes of Queen Elizabeth I. Born in the mid-sixteenth century at Youlston, near Barnstaple in Devon, he was raised in the Church of England. An uncle who served as a Protestant clergyman had him ordained in the established church at a young age so that he could enjoy ecclesiastical livings. Mayne studied at the University of Oxford, at St Alban Hall and subsequently at St John's College, where he became chaplain and took the degree of Master of Arts in 1570. Contact with Catholic-minded scholars such as Edmund Campion and Gregory Martin led him to abandon the Elizabethan religious settlement and to seek reception into the Roman Catholic Church.

In 1573 he left England for the English College at Douai in the Low Countries, founded by William Allen to prepare clergy for the English mission. Ordained priest in 1575, he returned secretly to England in 1576 and settled in Cornwall under the protection of the recusant gentleman Francis Tregian at Golden, near Probus. For about a year he ministered to Catholics in the district, celebrating Mass and bringing the sacraments to households that remained loyal to Rome. In June 1577 Richard Grenville, sheriff of Cornwall, searched Tregian's house and arrested Mayne. Among the items seized were an Agnus Dei and a papal document, which were produced against him at trial.

Mayne was imprisoned in Launceston Castle and brought to trial at the assizes. He was found guilty of high treason. Offered a pardon on condition that he acknowledge the royal supremacy in spiritual matters and abandon his Catholic faith, he refused. On 29 November 1577 he was hanged, drawn, and quartered in the marketplace at Launceston. His head was displayed on the castle and his quartered remains were exhibited in neighbouring towns. Francis Tregian, his host, was condemned to imprisonment and the forfeiture of his property, remaining a prisoner for many years.

Catholics in England and in the exile colleges immediately regarded Mayne as a martyr, and he became known as the protomartyr of Douai. He was beatified by Pope Leo XIII in 1886 and canonized by Pope Paul VI on 25 October 1970 as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales. His liturgical feast is kept on 29 November, the day of his death. Relics associated with him have been preserved and venerated in Catholic churches in England.