Pastor Smith and the Halloween Bells

The New England Puritans would have condemned the ancient folk religions and Catholic traditions that merged to become “Hallowed Evening” (Halloween). Their attitudes may be illustrated by the militant Puritan pastor of Holy Trinity Church in Hull of East Yorkshire, England. 

When Melchior Smith heard the church bells ring on October 31, 1563, he sent a messenger to demand silence. It was not just a matter of disturbing the peace but proper church practices. Puritan leaders sought to erase the customs of Catholicism, such as Halloween bell-ringing. The practice was meant to remind people to pray for their dead loved ones and was said to comfort those souls suffering in the cleansing fires of purgatory. Such Catholic traditions were reinvigorated under the late Queen Mary, whose religious policies led to the frightful deaths of many Protestants. 

When two more messages failed to stop the clanging, pastor Smith gathered the mayor and several officers into the night to arrest those who rang bells in sympathy for the dead. (Mayor John Smith was uncle to the young William Brewster, future leader of Plymouth Colony.) 

The pastor and his party chased down the noisy culprits in the darkened church. After the scuffle, one captured man dripped blood from his nose and mouth. Some claimed the pastor himself inflicted the injury when he grabbed the man by the beard and slugged him, but Pastor Smith denied responsibility to church officials. However, he said if he did cause the injuries, it only was accidental.  

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“An angry man stirreth up strife, and a furious man aboundeth in transgression.”

(Proverbs 29:22; 1599 Geneva Bible)

“Wherefore my dear brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. For the wrath of man doth not accomplish the righteousness of God.”

(James 1:19-20; 1599 Geneva Bible)

"Bloody Mary" Takes the Throne

Queen Mary of England, daughter of King Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, detested her father’s break with the Catholic Church and quickly returned the kingdom to the Roman faith after she was crowned. Growing up sickly and depressed, her childhood was made more miserable by her father's harsh treatment and his refusal to allow Mary to see her mother. It is no surprise that during her youth she refused to recognize her father as the rightful leader of the English Church. 

After the death of her Protestant brother, King Edward VI, and a controversial nine-day reign of her cousin, Lady Jane Grey, Mary ascended the throne at age 37. Though her father executed numerous people for their religious leanings, Mary far surpassed him in number and cruelty, earning her the nickname “Bloody Mary.” The executions began less than two years after she took the throne, and before she died at age 42, nearly 300 more were killed for their Protestant faith and hundreds more fled the kingdom. 

John Foxe’s book recounting Mary’s persecutions was a major influence on the Pilgrims of Plymouth. William Bradford, in the first pages of his journal, spoke of Foxe’s account of “those worthy martyrs and confessors which were burned in Queen Mary’s days and otherwise tormented.” 

Though she ruled as queen since the previous July, it was on this day, October 1, 1553, that Mary was crowned the Queen of England, ushering in the horrors that would last throughout her reign. 

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“These things have I said unto you, that ye should not be offended.  They shall excommunicate you, yea, the time shall come, that whosoever killeth you, will think that he doeth God service.” 

(John 16:1-2; 1599 Geneva Bible)

“And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great marvel.” 

(Revelation 17:6; 1599 Geneva Bible)