Feastday: May 6
Death: May 6, 1590
Blessed Edward Jones and Anthony Middleton, Martyrs Edward Jones from Wales and Anthony Middleton from Yorkshire were both educated at the Douai College in Rheims. They became priests and were sent to the English mission in the time of Elizabeth I. Middleton was the first to arrive in England, in 1586, and pursued the ministry for some time without being discovered, helped considerably by his youthful appearance and slight stature. Jones followed, in 1588, and quickly became known by the English Catholics as a devout and eloquent preacher. The two men of God were hunted down and captured with the aid of spies posing as Catholics, and they were hanged before the very doors of the houses in Fleet Street and Clerkenwell where they were arrested. Their trial is regarded as full of irregularities; the reason for the summary justice dispensed to them was spelled out in large letters: "For treason and foreign invasion." After offering their death for the forgiveness of their sins, the spread of the true Faith, and the conversion of heretics, they died on May 6, 1590. Their feast day is May 6th.
Statue of Edward Jones in the church of St Etheldreda, Ely Place, London
Edward Jones (died 6 May 1590) was a Welsh Catholic martyr in the 16th century.
Early life
He was born in Llanelidan in Dyffryn Clwyd. He was baptised an Anglican in the Diocese of St Asaph. He travelled around Europe, and during his travels he became a Catholic.
Priesthood
In 1587, in Reims, he was received into the Catholic Church. He studied to be a priest at Douai College. On 11 June 1588, he was ordained a priest in Loon. In December 1588, he returned to England and stayed for some time in a grocer's shop in Fleet Street.
Death and legacy
In 1590, he was arrested in that shop by Richard Topcliffe, "who pretended to be a Catholic." He was taken to the Tower of London and tortured there. At the Old Bailey "he made a skillful and learned defense, pleading that a confession elicited under torture was not legally sufficient to ensure a conviction. The court complimented him on his courageous bearing". Nevertheless, he was convicted of high treason. Together with Anthony Middleton, he was hanged, drawn and quartered on 6 May 1590, opposite the grocer’s shop where he had been captured; "over the gallows there was placed an inscription: 'For treason and favouring of foreign invasion'. When he [Jones] protested he was thrown off the scaffold...and the butchery began". He was beatified on 15 December 1929 and his feast day is 6 May.
