Sir George Blagge (1512 – 17 June 1551) was an English courtier, politician, soldier and a minor poet. He was the Member of Parliament for Bedford from 1545 to 1547, and Westminster from 1547 to 1551, during the reign of Edward VI. His trial and condemnation for heresy in 1546 earned him a place in Protestant martyrology. His family surname was frequently rendered Blage by contemporaries, while another variant was Blake.
Background and education Blagge was the eldest son of Mary Brooke and Robert Blagge. Robert Blagge was an Exchequer Baron – an important post in a court dealing mainly with equity cases. He had prospered in the Tudor administration and owned land in several parts of England:in the south-west in rural Somerset and at Bristol; near London at Holloway and Westminster in Middlesex; and in the south-east, especially at Dartford and elsewhere in Kent. The latter was acquired through his first marriage, to Katherine Brune or Brown.Foss, p. 99. Mary Brooke was the daughter of John Brooke, 7th Baron Cobham of Cobham, Kent, an important landowner in the vicinity of Blagge's Kent holdings. Their son George was born about 1512.
George's father, Robert, died in 1522Webb. The parish: Inhabitants, note anchor 45. or perhaps a year or so later, as he was later recorded as occupying his position on the bench during 1523–24. He was buried close to his first wife, Katherine, in a family chapel at the church of St Bartholomew-the-Great, still part of an Augustinian priory. He made considerable bequests to the prior and the canons, for the high altar and for painting images, and for the poor, including 20 marks for the marriage of poor girls.Webb. The parish: Inhabitants, note anchor 42. He was survived by his wife Mary.
There seems to have been some confusion about his legacy. In 1516 he had procured a patent for Barnaby, a son of his first marriage, to receive his own old post of Remembrancer of the Exchequer. This was disallowed in 1561 on the grounds that Robert had no legal estate at the time of his death.
Robert Blagge left George the use of his lands in the south-west and at Holloway, as well as two houses at Dartford. One of the elder sons took the property in Westminster, but it seems that George later moved there, as he was described as "of Westminster", in his pardon of 1546.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 21, part 1, no. 72, p. 687. The entry in Wriothesley's Chronicle dealing with his trial, before he reached the zenith of his wealth, describes Blagge as a "gentleman, a man of faire landes."Wriothesley’s Chronicle, p. 169.
George Blagge was educated at Cambridge.
Early career The search for patronage
As with many minor member of the landed gentry, Blagge's early career consisted mainly of a search for patronage from a great man who might provide openings and opportunities for advancement. However, he was unfortunate in his choice of patrons, the two most important of whom were involved in fatal or near-fatal political entanglements.
Initially he attached himself to Sir Thomas Wyatt, a rising Kent landowner who was married to a cousin of Blagge. Wyatt was a few years older than Blagge and a client of Henry VIII's chief minister, Thomas Cromwell. Both a poet, though unpublished in his lifetime, and a diplomat, Wyatt was an important influence on Blagge, who sought to emulate his style and dabbled in poetry. It was almost certainly with Wyatt that Blagge travelled in France and Germany in 1535–36. Immediately after the death of Catherine of Aragon, during the genesis and outbreak of the Italian War of 1536–38, an English embassy was sent to Paris, apparently to negotiate a French alliance.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 10, no. 170, p. 61. The priest Thomas Runcorn, a close observer of Francis I's war preparations near Lyon, wrote to Blagge on 25 January 1536, commenting on the French king's health difficulties, and passing on his regards to both Wyatt and Sir Francis Bryan, the English ambassador.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 10, no. 177, p. 63. There is no news since you left. They say that the king of France is making great preparations for war with the duke of Savoy, and war materials are brought here from Paris. Four days since he was so ill in the night that his thirst could not easily be quenched, and there is great danger of his having a relapse of the same complaint he had when you were here. This will be sad news both for us and his subjects. Perhaps it had better not be spoken of; therefore commit this letter to the flames, unless you wish to communicate it to Knevet, to whom, as to Wiot, give my best remembrance….Give my respects to dom. Brianus, to whom I would have written if I had anything worth communicating. The letter was addressed to Blagge "in Aula," in the Palace, so Blagge, Wyatt and Sir Henry Knyvet were at this point with Bryan, as part of the embassy.
Wyatt narrowly escaped with his head in 1536, when he was one of those rumoured to have had intercourse with Anne Boleyn. However, Cromwell's protection allowed him to emerge as Henry's resident ambassador to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, in 1537, although his chances of high office in England were ruined. Blagge accompanied him to France and Spain, and acted as diplomatic courier for him in 1539, returning to England with his dispatches from Toledo in February.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 14, no. 280-1. Blagge repaid his patron by standing witness for him when he was accused of diplomatic misconduct 1541.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 16, no. 641. Wyatt died in the following year.
Blagge then attached himself to the Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, a friend of Wyatt and a distinguished poet. Surrey was the son and heir of Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, one of the most powerful magnates in the land. Blagge was the earl's senior by a few years and was not afraid to rebuke him for his erratic behaviour – a fact noted by Millicent Arundel, a witness before the Privy Council when, in March 1543, it investigated and punished Surrey's and Thomas Wyatt the Younger's rioting in London, which involved shooting in the streets as well as glass breaking.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 18, part 1, no. 327-2, page 185. In July of that year English forces under Sir John Wallop were sent to support Imperial forces in defence of the Low CountriesLetters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 18, part 1, no. 831, page 466. on the northern front of the Italian War of 1542–1546, moving out of the Pale of Calais. Blagge accompanied Surrey, taking 12 infantry from Kent on the expedition.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 18, part 1, no. 832, page 467. He and Sir George Carew were nearly killed by sniper fire when they were inspecting a forward trench at the siege of Landrecies, a town occupied by the French early in the campaign. Both Surrey and Blagge gained considerable credit from their courage in the fighting. A letter of September 1543 from Sir Ralph Vane to Knyvet shows that Blagge was known by his comrades by the pet name Tom Trubbe.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 18, part 2, no. 190, page 97. Blagge was again listed as part of the Kent contingent in 1544.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 19, part 1, page 153, no. 273. His war service was probably a contributory factor when, on 11 March 1544, Blagge, the "King's servant," was granted the stewardship of the manor of Maidstone. However, the post had previously been held by his friend, Thomas Wyatt and the terms of the grant made clear that Blagge was appointed in his place.Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII, volume 19, part 1, page 643, no. 37.
At some point before 1547, probably through Surrey's influence and contacts, Blagge was made an esquire of the body, a member of the Privy Chamber of Henry VIII, who used to call him 'Pig'. This probably brought Blagge's quest for a patron to a conclusion, as he now had a position of considerable potential influence at the very heart of the royal household.
MP for Bedford A measure of Blagge's progress was his election to Parliament to represent the borough of Bedford early in 1545. Both Bedford and Bedfordshire were dominated by a coterie of local gentry – notably the Mordaunts, the Gascoignes and the St. Johns. However, Sir Francis Bryan, who knew Blagge well from his diplomatic service alongside their mutual friend Wyatt, was influential in the borough and may already have been its recorder, as he certainly was in the next reign. A consummate political fixer and a close intimate of the king, Bryan is thought to have arranged the election of at least five members for Bedford. It is very likely that he arranged the election of both Blagge and Henry Parker, the other member elected in 1545. Parker was a long-standing servant of Bryan and was also, like Blagge, a member of the royal household. The parliament had been summoned on 1 December 1544 but did not assemble for its first session until almost a year later. Its deliberations were brief. When he was arrested in 1546, Blagge was an elected Member, but because Parliament was not in session, nor about to sit, according to the customs of the time he was not protected by parliamentary privilege.
Heresy trial
Towards the end of Henry VIII's reign, Blagge allegedly attracted attention because of his sacramentarian beliefs about the Lord's Supper, denying the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation. On 9 May 1546 Blagge was heard to deny the efficacy of the Mass, while walking home after church. According to the chronicle of Charles Wriothesley, who was a cousinWriothesley’s Chronicle, p. 115. of Thomas Wriothesley, the Lord Chancellor, Blagge's case was bundled together with those of two others accused of the same heresy and rushed through to trial. The twelfe daie of Julie were arraigned at the Guildhall for Certaine heresy, John Hemley, priest, de Essex, John Lasell, gentleman, one of the sewers of the Kinges chamber, and Georg Blage, gentleman, a man of faire landes, which said persons that daie were first endited of heresie against the sacrament of the aulter, and ymediatlie arraygned on the same, the priest and Lasceles not denying the same their opinions but confessing them guiltie; and Mr. Blage abode the triall of twelve men, for he was sent for to my Lord Chauncelors but the night before, and this daie sent to Newgate not halfe an howre or he was brought to the hall, nor knew not wherfore he was taken, for he was never examyned before he came to his arraignemente...
In Blagge's Guildhall trial, the prosecution witnesses were Sir Edward Littleton of Pillaton Hall and Sir Hugh Calverley. Littleton, a former and future MP for Staffordshire, was a known religious conservative who had nevertheless done well from the Dissolution of the Monasteries. He was an abrasive, acquisitive figure, who had a talent for making enemies in high places and was considered over-mighty in his own county. Calverley, then the MP for Cheshire, had a long record of violence, poaching and rustling behind him, as well as before him. Notwithstanding the notoriety of his accusers, their testimony carried weight in this case. According to John Foxe: The wordes whiche his accusers layd vnto hym, were these: What if a Mouse should eate the bread? then by my consent they should hang vp the Mouse. Where as in dede these woordes hee neuer spake, as to hys lyues end hee protested. The account of his alleged words given in his pardon is substantially similar. Despite his claims that it was a misunderstanding or the result of a trick, Blagge was found guilty. He was sentenced to be burned for heresy the following Wednesday and sent to Newgate Prison.