Most people in the United States know amost nothing about the Virgin Queen of England. However, if she had not risen up and called upon God to assist her in destroying the great Spanish Armade anchored right there on the shores of England, there would not have been 13 Colonies in America and no United States. And we would all be speaking Spanish to this Day. So do read about her and what happened: Ron

The Story of England’s Virgin Queen

When Henry the Eighth died in 1547, his nine-year-old son by Jane Seymour, Edward the Sixth, reigned for six years.

Edward the Sixth

He advanced Protestantism in England, most notably by requiring the use of The Book of Common Prayer, prepared the Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury. After the Bible, The Book of Common Prayer is considered the most influential book in the English language, followed by the works of Shakespeare.

When it became apparent that Edward’s illness was terminal, he passed over his older half sisters, Mary and Elizabeth, to appoint his Protestant first cousin, Lady Jane Grey as his heir.

Upon Edward’s death in 1553, Mary, Henry the Eighth’s oldest daughter, from his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, quickly ascended to power. She executed Lady Jane Grey – the Nine Day Queen, and put Elizabeth in the Tower of London, the same place where Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn, had been beheaded 18 years earlier.

Queen Mary

Queen Mary reigned 5 years. Her popularity suffered in 1554 when, at the age of 38, she married her 27-year-old first cousin, the future King of Spain, Philip the Second. Phillip spent most of his time absent from England, fighting in the Netherlands.

Mary repealed the Protestant reforms of her father, Henry the Eighth, and her half-brother, Edward the Sixth, and brought back the Heresy Acts. She had over 300 executed, resulting in the sobriquet “Bloody Mary.”

Among those she had executed were the Oxford Martyrs:

– Bishop Hugh Latimer, who had been Edward the Sixth’s chaplain;

– Reverend Nicholas Ridley, who had been the Bishop of London; and

– Thomas Cranmer, the former Archbishop of the Anglican Church, who published The Book of Common Prayer.

As they were about to be burned at the stake, October 16, 1555, Bishop Hugh Latimer exhorted Nicholas Ridley: “Play the man, Master Ridley. We shall this day light such a candle, by God’s grace, in England, as I trust shall never be put out.”

Thomas Cranmer was taken to a tower and forced to watch their execution. Cranmer was then given the opportunity to give a sermon to publicly renounce his Protestant teaching. Unexpectedly, he reaffirmed them, was immediately pulled from the pulpit, taken outside and burned at the stake. As he was engulfed in flames, he was heard saying “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. I see the heavens open and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.”

Mary had two false pregnancies, then died, November 17, 1558, resulting in her half-sister Elizabeth becoming Queen.

Elizabeth I

Elizabeth continued the hierarchical Church of England, also called the Anglican Church, begun when her father separated from Rome in order to marry her mother, Anne Boleyn.

Some in England insisted that the Anglican Church separate even further from Rome. They wanted to “purify” it, resulting in them being called “Puritans.” Puritans had a theology influenced by John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli, John Knox, and other Protestant Reformers.

Elizabeth attempted to take the middle ground between Puritan fundamentalist views on one side, and England’s centuries old Catholic heritage on the other.

At her Coronation in 1558, Elizabeth was questioned as to the presence of Christ in the Sacrament. She responded: “Christ was the Word that spake it, He took the bread and brake it, And what that Word did make it, I do believe and take it.”

Elizabeth stated: “There is only one Christ, Jesus, one faith. All else is a dispute over trifles.”

Elizabeth reissued The Act of Supremacy, declaring the Monarch was the: “Supreme Governor in all Spiritual or Ecclesiastical Things.”

She enacted The Act of Uniformity, making Anglican Church attendance compulsory, and required use of The Book of Common Prayer, though penalties for nonconforming were not extreme. Though an estimated 300 Catholic priests lost their jobs, Catholic “papists” or “recusants” were tolerated and simply had to pay a weekly fine for not attending the Anglican Church.

Elizabeth did not like Henry the Eighth’s Great Bible, which relied on the Latin Vulgate. She also did not like the Geneva Bible, which had John Calvin’s margin notes recommending Presbyterian church government of elders chosen as representatives of the congregation. She authorized the Bishops’ Bible, which supported an episcopalian church government led by Anglican bishops appointed by the monarch.

Anglicans drew their ideas of government from the Old Testament period of King Saul and afterwards, where Israel had an anointed King.

Puritans drew their ideas of government from the 400 year period pre-King Saul, where people of Israel were in a covenant with God and with each other.

The Hebrew Republic was the first instance in world history of a nation with millions of people and no king, maintaining order with an educated population where every citizen was taught God’s Law and personally accountable to God to follow it.

Puritans divided into two main forms of church government: Presbyterian and Congregational. Presbyterians favored elders, called presbyters, who gathered together to make decisions in local synod assemblies – synod is derived from the same root word as synagogue, which means “meeting place.” Congregationalists favored a church government were each congregation was completely independent. These were called Radical Puritans, Separatists, Independents, Dissenters, Non-conformists, Brownists – followers of Robert Browne, Baptists – followers of John Smyth, John Murton and Thomas Helwys. The latter were referred to as the “Pilgrims.” They believed the “gathered church” was founded by the Holy Spirit, not by man or the state, therefore each individual church had the right to determine its own affairs.

Pilgrim Separatists fled to Holland, and then later to America in 1620.

Mainstream Puritans came in large numbers beginning in 1630, with the Great Puritan Migration to escape the persecution of King Charles the First. In America, both Pilgrims and Puritans were generally referred to as “Congregationalists.”

During Queen Elizabeth’s 45 year reign, monumental achievements occurred. Shakespeare wrote 38 plays impacting world literature.

Sir Francis Bacon began the scientific revolution. In his treatise titled, Of Atheism, Francis Bacon declared: “A little philosophy inclineth man’s mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men’s minds about to religion.”

In 1577, Sir Francis Drake began the second voyage in history to circumnavigate the globe, almost 60 years after Ferdinand Magellan’s first voyage.

In 1579, Oxford educated priest Thomas Stephens became one of the first western Christian missionaries, and probably the first Englishman, to reach India, converting many of the upper Indian society by writing Kristpurana – Story of Christ.

In 1600, English navigator William Adams, sailing for the Dutch East India Company, arrived in Japan.

In 1584, Sir Walter Raleigh began a colony he named Virginia, in honor of the “Virgin Queen Elizabeth.”

Virginia’s Charter, 1584, stated: “Elizabeth, by the Grace of God of England, Defender of the Faith, grant to our trusty and well beloved servant Walter Raleigh, to discover barbarous lands, not actually possessed of any Christian Prince, nor inhabited by Christian People. Upon finding such remote lands it shall be necessary for the safety of all men to live together in Christian peace, and Ordinances agreeable to the laws of England, and also so as they be not against the true Christian faith.” 

Phillip’s half-brother, Don Juan of Austria, in what was considered a miraculous victory, defeated the Ottoman Muslim fleet at the Battle of Lepanto in 1571.

Afterwards, instead of freeing the rest of the Mediterranean from Muslim control, Spain turned its attention to stopping the Reformation in Holland and England.

Beginning in 1572, Spanish General Alba, known as the Iron Duke, committed the “Spanish Furies,” pillaging, burning, raping and slaughtering in the Netherlands. This led to the Eighty Years War and eventually Holland’s independence.

Philip the Second of Spain had proposed marriage to Elizabeth, but she continually put him off. They were cordial until Elizabeth began aid the Netherlands. Considering this as aiding his enemies, Philip the Second of Spain sent his Invincible Spanish Armada to invade England in 1588.

The Armada consisted of 130 ships, 1,000 iron guns, 1,500 brass guns, 7,000 sailors, 18,000 soldiers, plus 30,000 soldiers from the Spanish Netherlands. It looked like the end of England and the Virgin Queen.

Queen Elizabeth told her troops, August 19, 1588: “Let tyrants fear. I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think foul scorn that Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm. I myself will take up arms, I myself will be your general. We shall shortly have a famous victory over those enemies of my God, of my kingdom, and of my people.”

(Many of us are convinced that God miraculously intervened at that point, in an amazing miracle.)

England’s smaller, more maneuverable vessels proved difficult for the Spanish to apprehend. Then, at midnight, July 28, 1588, Sir Francis Drake set eight English ships on fire and floated them downwind to the closely anchored Spanish ships of that great Spanish Armada.

In a panic, the Spanish ships cut anchor. And at that very moment, an unusual violent hurricane scattered and destroyed most of the Spanish Armada.

When King Philip the Second of Spain learned of the loss, he exclaimed: “I sent the Armada against men, not God’s winds and waves.”

If Spain would have won, there would not only have been no Anglican England, there would have been no Puritans, no Pilgrims, no New England, and no United States.

(This is a good place to end the story of England’s Queen Elizabeth I. However, this is not the end of the story. So much still happened because of her, includeing the founding of America. Do continue on, finishing this story of the Virgin Queen if you wish) Ron

In 1596 and 1597, Philip the Second again sent Armadas to England, but they were also destroyed in storms. These losses contributed to Spain’s financial bankruptcy and ended Spain’s monopoly of the seas.

England soon became a major European power, and joined the countries of Holland, Sweden, and France in founding colonies in America.

Adam Smith wrote The Wealth of Nations, 1776. In it he said: “The Spaniards, by virtue of the first discovery, claimed all America as their own, and such was the terror of their name, that the greater part of the other nations of Europe were afraid to establish themselves in any other part of that great continent; but the defeat of their Invincible Armada put it out of their power to obstruct any longer the settlements of the other European nations. In the course of the 17th century English, French, Dutch, Danes, and Swedes attempted to make some settlements in the new world.”

When Elizabeth died, March 24, 1603, James the First became King of England. He was the son of Mary Queen of Scots.

Though James’ mother was Catholic, and though he was raised and tutored by Scottish Presbyterians, when he became King he acted as an absolute monarch, embracing Anglicanism with all the hierarchical power concentrated in the hands of the King. James was noted for the Jamestown Colony and the King James Bible in 1611.

Before her death, Queen Elizabeth, the last monarch of the House of Tudor, stated in 1566: “I am your Queen. I will never be by violence constrained to do anything. I thank God I am endued with such qualities that if I were turned out of the Realm in my petticoat I were able to live in any place in Christendom.”

Elizabeth told William Lambarde in 1601: “He that will forget God, will also forget his benefactors.”

Rebellions and assassinations were a constant threat. In France, King Henry the Third was assassinated in 1589. France’s “Good King” Henry the Fourth survived at least a dozen attempts on his life before he was eventually assassinated in 1610.

Elizabeth faced the rebellion of the Catholic Northern Earls in 1569. Though Elizabeth was relatively tolerant toward Catholics, things changed when Pope Pius the Fifth officially excommunicated her in 1570, declaring her an illegitimate queen.

In response, she passed the Treason Acts of 1571, making it a crime for anyone to say she was not the legitimate queen.

The Religion Act was passed in 1580 making it high treason to persuade subjects to not be loyal to the Queen or the Church of England, increasing recusant fines to £20 a month or imprisonment for being absent from Anglican Church service, or attending a Catholic mass.

There were numerous plots to remove Elizabeth:

The Ridolfi Plot, 1571;

The Throckmorton Plot, 1583;

The Babington Plot, 1586.

When rumors arose in England of a possible assassination plot, Elizabeth executed dozens, including, sadly, her Catholic cousin, Mary Queen of Scots, who was under her protection.

Before her death, responding to questions from Parliament regarding succession after her death, Elizabeth stated: “I know I am but mortal and so therewhilst prepare myself for death, whensoever it shall please God to send it.”

Of her epitaph, Queen Elizabeth I had it put:  “I am no lover of pompous title, but only desire that my name may be recorded in a line or two, which shall express my name, my virginity, the years of my reign, and the reformation of religion under it.”

(End of the Story of the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth I}