Jamestown in The National Catholic Register

After posting about the reliquary found in the grave of Captain Gabriel Archer, I wrote an article and posted it off to my contact at The National Catholic Register. My story was posted on-line the next day:

Several articles have appeared recently about the discovery and identification of remains in Jamestown, Va., in The Atlantic, Smithsonian Magazine, The New York Times and The Washington Post. The Atlantic headline on July 28 summed up the issue: “A Skeleton, a Catholic Relic and a Mystery About American Origins.” In the article by Adrienne Lafrance, the researchers at Jamestown and others discuss the ramifications of one of the discoveries in the grave of Capt. Gabriel Archer, a leader of the English colony. His grave and those of three others were found in the sanctuary of the Anglican chapel.

A small silver box found in his grave is “a historical bombshell” because the archaeologists believe it is a reliquary, which leads them to believe that Archer, who had many conflicts with Capt. John Smith of Pocahontas fame, might have been a secret Catholic in Anglican Jamestown.

A reliquary is a receptacle containing a piece of bone or some other object associated with a saint. Relics have always been important to Catholics: Every church altar contains a reliquary, and the priest kisses the altar, usually on top of the reliquary, at the beginning and end of each Mass.

The presence of a Catholic reliquary buried in an Anglican church has provoked quite a few questions. Was Archer secretly a Catholic and just seeming to conform to the Church of England, with King James I as its supreme governor and defender of the faith? Since Jamestown “was fundamentally anti-Catholic” and was “meant to be the beachhead for an English empire in America that will serve as a bulwark against Catholicism,” The Atlantic article states, his crypto-Catholicism brings questions about his leadership in the colony.

Please read the rest there.

Henry Howard, 1st Earl of Northampton, RIP

The second son of Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey and the younger brother of Thomas Howard, the fourth Duke of Norfolk, Henry Howard, the first Earl of Northampton died on June 15, 1614. His father had been executed by Henry VIII's orders just before the old king died and his brother was executed by Elizabeth I's orders because of his plans to marry the former Queen of Scotland.

Northampton was a crypto-Catholic during his time at Court during the reigns of Elizabeth I and James I, but he died in the Catholic Church, according to his will. Edward de Vere denounced him once as a Catholic and a traitor, but he convinced Elizabeth of his loyalty, even though he did admit attending the Catholic Mass.

He was very successful during the reign of James I, leading peace treaty discussions with Spain and participating in the trials of Guy Fawkes and Father Garnet after the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. Toward the end of his life he was involved in a sordid story of unfaithfulness and murder! According to the website:

Despite his lack of principle, Northampton displayed a many-sided culture, and was reputed the most learned nobleman of his time. His taste in architecture is proved by his enlargement of Greenwich Castle, by the magnificence of his London residence, afterwards Northumberland House, which was built at his cost from the designs of Moses Glover, and by his supervision of Thorpe's designs for Audley End, the residence of his nephew Suffolk. He planned and endowed three hospitals, one at Clun, Shropshire; a second at Castle Rising, Norfolk, for twelve poorwomen,27 and a third at Greenwich, called Norfolk College, for twelve poor natives of Greenwich, and for eight natives of Shottesham, Northampton's birthplace. He laid the foundation-stone of the college at Greenwich, 25 Feb. 1613-14, and placed its management under the Mercers' Company.