English Catholic martyr
Nicholas Owen
,
S.J.
, (c. 1562 – 1/2 March 1606) was an
English
Jesuit
lay brother
who was the principal builder of
priest holes
during the reigns of
Queen Elizabeth I
and
James I
of England.
[1]
Owen built many priest holes in the buildings of English Catholics from 1588 until his final arrest in 1606, when he was tortured to death by prison authorities in the
Tower of London
. Owen is honoured as a
martyr
by the
Catholic Church
and was
canonized
by
Pope Paul VI
in 1970.
[2]
Life
[
edit
]
Nicholas Owen was born around 1562 in
Oxford
, England, into a devoutly
Catholic
family and grew up during the
Penal Laws
. His father, Walter Owen, was a
carpenter
and Nicholas was apprenticed as a
joiner
in February 1577, acquiring the skills that he would use to build hiding places. Two of his older brothers became
priests
.
[3]
Owen served as a servant of
Edmund Campion
, who was arrested by
priest hunters
in 1581, and was himself arrested for protesting Campion's innocence.
[4]
Upon his release, he entered the service of
Henry Garnet
, a
Jesuit
, around 1588. For the next 18 years, Owen built hiding places for Catholic priests in the homes of Catholic families. He frequently travelled from one house to another under the name of "Little John" and accepted only the necessities of life as payment before he started off for a new project. He also used the aliases "Little Michael", "Andrewes" and "Draper". During the daytime, he would work as a travelling carpenter to deflect suspicion.
[5]
: 182
Owen was of very short stature, and suffered from a
hernia
, as well as a crippled leg from a horse falling on him.
[5]
: 181, 183
Sometimes, he built a more easily discovered outer hiding place, which concealed an inner hiding place. The location of the secret room was known to only himself and the owner of the house. One certain example of his work survives, at Broad Oaks Manor
[6]
: 53
and it is extremely likely that
Baddesley Clinton
is the unidentified house in which seven priests hid in one of his hides during a search in 1591, as the hide and the house match the description perfectly.
[6]
: 39
Probable examples of his work survive at
Sawston Hall
in
Cambridgeshire
,
Oxburgh Hall
in
Norfolk
,
Huddington Court
and
Harvington Hall
in
Worcestershire
.
[6]
: 58, 40, 72, 99
There is no reason to think the turret hide at
Coughton Court
in
Warwickshire
is Owen's work.
[6]
: 234
Due to the ingenuity of his craftsmanship, some may still be undiscovered.
A
priest hole
in the staircase made by Nicholas Owen in a 16th-century manor-house,
Harvington Hall
,
Worcestershire
.
Another
priest hole
made by Nicholas Owen in the library in Harvington Hall
The same
priest hole
inside.
For many years, Owen worked in the service of the Jesuit priest
Henry Garnet
and was admitted into the
Society of Jesus
as a
lay brother
.
[7]
He was arrested in 1594 and tortured at the
Poultry Compter
but revealed nothing. He was released after a wealthy Catholic family paid a fine on his behalf, the jailers believing that he was merely the insignificant friend of some priests. He resumed his work and was involved in the famous escape of
John Gerard
from the
Tower of London
in 1597.
[8]
: 137
In early 1606, Owen was arrested a final time at
Hindlip Hall
in Worcestershire, starved, with
Ralph Ashley
, out of one of his own hides after four days, the two having had nothing to eat but an apple.
[6]
: 179
Realising just whom they had caught, and his value, Secretary of State
Robert Cecil
exulted: "It is incredible, how great was the joy caused by his arrest... knowing the great skill of Owen in constructing hiding places, and the innumerable quantity of dark holes which he had schemed for hiding priests all through England".
[1]
Death
[
edit
]
After being committed to the
Marshalsea
, a prison on the southern bank of the
Thames
, Owen was then removed to the Tower of London. He was submitted to torture on the
Topcliffe
rack, dangling from a wall with both wrists held fast in iron
gauntlets
and his body hanging. As his hernia allowed his intestines to bulge out during this procedure, the rack master strapped a circular plate of iron to his stomach. When he remained stubborn, it is believed that he was transferred to the rack, where the greater power of the
windlass
forced out his hernia, which was then slashed by the plate, resulting in his death. Owen revealed nothing to his inquisitors,
[9]
and died in the night between 1 and 2 March 1606. Gerard wrote of him:
I verily think no man can be said to have done more good of all those who laboured in the English vineyard. He was the immediate occasion of saving the lives of many hundreds of persons, both ecclesiastical and secular.
[9]
Veneration
[
edit
]
Owen was
canonized
as one of the
Forty Martyrs of England and Wales
by
Pope Paul VI
on 25 October 1970. Their joint
feast day
was initially celebrated on the anniversary of the canonization. That feast has been moved in England to 4 May. His individual feast day is on 22 March.
[10]
Catholic stage magicians who practice
Gospel Magic
consider St. Nicholas Owen the
patron saint
of
illusionists
and
escapologists
, due to his facility at using
trompe-l'œil
when creating his hideouts.
There are Catholic churches dedicated to Saint Nicholas Owen in Little Thornton, Lancashire and Burton Latimer, Northamptonshire.
The Catholic school academy company that serves the Kidderminster, Hagley and Stourbridge areas near Harvington Hall is named in his honour.
Portrayals in fiction
[
edit
]
- Owen is portrayed, as a minor character, in
Robert Hugh Benson
's novel
Come Rack! Come Rope!
(1912), where he is named "Hugh Owen".
- One of his priest holes plays a key role in the
Catherine Aird
mystery novel
A Most Contagious Game
(1967). A priest hole attributed to him is also part of
Peter Carey
's novel
Parrot and Olivier in America
(2010).
- Owen and his work play a key role in
The House of a Hundred Whispers
by Graham Masterton, published in 2020 by Head of Zeus Ltd.
- Owen is also a minor character in Leonard Tourney's novel
Catesby's Ghost: A Mystery of Shakespeare
(2022).
- Owen has a minor role in
Botany Manor
, published by Whitethorn Games in 2024.
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913).
"Nicholas Owen"
.
Catholic Encyclopedia
. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
- ^
Reynolds, Tony. "St Nicholas Owen: Priest-Hole Maker" Gracewing 2014
- ^
Hodgetts, Michael (October 1999). "The Owens of Oxford".
Recusant History
.
24
(4): 415?430.
doi
:
10.1017/S0034193200002612
.
- ^
"The Jesuit Curia in Rome"
.
www.sjweb.info
. Retrieved
24 August
2018
.
- ^
a
b
Gerard, John (1871).
A Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot
. Longmans.
ISBN
9781729755396
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
Hodgetts, Michael (2024).
Secret Hiding Places
(2nd, ed Paul Hodgetts ed.). Dudley: Pear Branch.
ISBN
9781738427000
.
- ^
Hodgetts, Michael (2024). "Nicholas Owen: Jesuit Lay Brother?".
Midlands Catholic History
.
31
.
- ^
Gerard, John (2006).
The Autobiography of an Elizabethan
. Family Publications.
ISBN
1871217636
.
- ^
a
b
Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot
, Fr. John Gerard, S.J.
- ^
"Life of St. Nicholas Owen"
. St. Nicholas Owen church, Little Thornton. Archived from
the original
on 31 May 2014
. Retrieved
29 July
2014
.