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Manuscripts of Anthony Tyrrell's ‘Lamentable Confession’

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 October 2016

Patrick C. Barry
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Extract

Anthony Tyrrell, born in 1552 of an Essex family, was ordained priest in Rome about 1580 and returned to England soon afterwards. In April 1581, he was imprisoned in the Gatehouse prison in London, but he soon escaped and went back to the Continent. He came to England again at the end of 1584, and was imprisoned again, in the Counter prison, Wood Street, London, in July 1586. He now made many disclosures regarding Catholics, and in September he was moved to the Clink prison in order that he might have more scope to act as an informer amongst the many Catholics confined there. Shortly afterwards he was released. He continued for a while to act outwardly as a Catholic, while in reality being a spy for the Government; then he openly announced his conversion to Protestantism. Soon, however, he repented of his behaviour, fled to the Continent once more, and wrote his ‘lamentable confession’, as he called it, exposing in detail the duplicity of his former life.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Catholic History , Volume 12 , Issue 1 , January 1973 , pp. 79 - 81
Copyright
Copyright © Catholic Record Society 1973 

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References

Notes

1 Cf. Diet, of Nat. Biogr., 57, pp. 437–9;Google Scholar Devlin, C., ‘An Unwilling Apostate’, in The Month, December 1951, pp. 346–58;Google Scholar Anstruther, G., o.p., The Seminary Priests, I, Ware 1969, pp. 361–3.Google Scholar

2 The Letters and Despatches of Richard Verstegan, ed. Anthony, G. Petti (C.R.S. 52), London 1959, pp. 134, 135, 138, 187.Google Scholar

3 ‘The Fall of Anthony Tyrrell’, in The Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers, 2nd series, London 1875, pp. 285–501.Google Scholar

4 Whether or not it is an autograph copy could possibly be decided by comparing it with Tyrrell's letters, e.g. in Lansdowne MSS. 50, nos. 73, 74, 75 Google Scholar (also in the British Museum).

5 Cf. Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the years 1894-99, London 1901, p. 262;Google Scholar Munby, A. L. N., Phillipps Studies, no. 3, Cambridge, UK 1954, p. 56.Google Scholar

6 This corresponds with Fr Morris's printed version, op. cit., p. 382.

7 Morris, op. cit., p. 288.

8 Cf. Pollen, J. H., S.J., ‘Supposed Cases of Diabolical Possession in 1585-6’, in The Month, May 1911, pp. 449–64.Google Scholar