Sticky Archiepiscopal Ends
A surprising number of Archibishops of Canterbury have met a violent end. Christopher Winn looks at some of the more notorious examples.
In December 1170 Thomas Becket, 40th Archbishop of Canterbury, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by four knights who were responding to Henry II’s apocryphal plea: ‘Will no-one rid me of this turbulent priest?’
A number of other Archbishops of Canterbury have met a violent end, including . . .
St Alfege, who became the 29th Archbishop of Canterbury in 1006, was captured in Canterbury by a Danish raiding party in 1012. Held hostage at Greenwich, he refused to allow a ransom to be paid for his release and so on Easter Day he was summarily hacked to death with an axe. A church was built in Greenwich on the site of his martyrdom in the 12th century and was most recently rebuilt by Nicholas Hawksmoor in 1714. It is the last resting place of Tudor composer Thomas Tallis and General Wolfe.
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