6. The infant child of Perotine Massey
Perotine Massey, her sister Guillemine Gilbert, and their mother, Catherine Cauches (sometimes spelled Gawches) were imprisoned in Castle Cornet on the west coast of the Channel Island of Guernsey in 1556. They were charged with possession of stolen property, specifically a wine goblet. At their trial they were found not guilty of the offense, the court has determined that a key witness lied. But unfortunately for the three women, it was learned that they had been, “disobedient to the commandments and ordinances of the church” and were thus guilty of heresy. The religious edicts imposed by Queen Mary required that they be made to suffer death, in the form of strangling and burning, and though Perotine was pregnant and near her time of delivery she was not to be spared.
At their execution, with all three being killed in the same fire, Perotine collapsed in the flames before “the belly of the woman burst asunder” and her baby was subsequently rescued from the fire by a witness, William House. On the advice of the executioner, Helier Gosselin, the baby was returned to the fire to be burned to death alongside its mother. According to eyewitness accounts, the child was a fully formed male. Thus, according to John Foxe in his 1563 Book of Martyrs, “the baby born of one of them being taken up and cast into the fire again, four being executed, though only three had been condemned”. The executioner was later imprisoned and then pardoned by Elizabeth I.