Under no other reign in English history during peacetime was so much Christian blood, so many Englishmen's lives been spilled, as under the said Queen Mary.
- John Foxe, Book of Martyrs, 1563.

Additional Information on
Mary I (b. 1516 r. 1553-1558)

Mary was the daughter of Henry VIII and his first wife, Catherine of Aragon. Her first acts on becoming queen were to have the Duke of Normandy and Lady Jane Grey executed, and to re-establish the Catholic Church of which she was, like her mother, a fervent supporter. The humiliation of her parent's divorce and her denied succession to her father's throne made Mary a very bitter person, and had strengthened her Catholic faith. Mary had over one hundred people executed almost in retaliation to this and had her own half sister Elizabeth imprisoned. In 1554 Mary married the Catholic Prince Philip of Spain, but theirs was to be an unhappy marriage and after failing to produce an heir Philip left her to rule Spain. The despondent Mary embarked on a major persecution of the Protestants burning many at the stake - earning her the nickname 'Bloody Mary'. In 1557 England lost Calais her last piece of French territory, Mary died the following year childless and embittered.

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