The execution of Robert Aske at York in July 1537 — hanged in chains from Clifford's Tower until he died — marked the final crushing of the Pilgrimage of Grace. Henry VIII used the minor Bigod rebellion of January 1537 as the excuse to destroy the Pilgrim leadership despite the general pardon of December 1536. Aske's execution at York — the very city he had used as his headquarters — was a deliberate act of exemplary terror. 216 rebels were executed across Yorkshire; the monasteries were dissolved without further serious resistance.
Robert Aske, Lord Darcy, and 214 others executed; thousands implicated but pardoned
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in Britain — drawing on Domesday records, scheduled monuments, Victorian OS maps, geological data and archaeological archives to tell the full story of a place.
Research a location near North Yorkshire