Robert Nutter
Martyr 1600

A brief biography.

Robert Nutter born at Burnley, Lancashire, ca. 1550, entered Brasenose College, Oxford in 1564 or 1565, and, with his brother John Nutter, also a martyr, became a student of the English College, Reims.
Having been ordained priest, 21 Dec., 1581, he returned to England. On 2 Feb., 1583-84 he was committed to the Tower, where he remained in the pit forty-seven days, wearing irons for forty-three days, and twice subjected to the tortures of "the scavenger's daughter".
On 10 November, 1584, he was again consigned to the pit, where he remained until, on 21 Jan., 1584-85, he, with twenty other priests and one layman, was shipped aboard the "Mary Martin" of Colchester, at Tower Wharf.

Landing at Boulogne, 2 Feb., he revisited Rome in July, but, on 30 November, he was again committed to prison in London, this time to Newgate, under the alias of Rowley.
In 1587 he was removed to the Marshalsea, and thence, in 1589-90, sent to Wisbech Castle, Cambridgeshire, Nutter escaped to Lancashire.
There he met a Dominican, who received him in the Dominican Order. Again arrested, May, 1600, Nutter was tried at the next assizes and condemned for being priest. He and his friend, the priest Edward Thwing, were hanged and quarted at Lancaster, 26 July, 1600.
 

In 1970, the Vatican selected as representatives of a larger group (totalling perhaps three hundred) forty Roman Catholic men and women, both clergy and laity, who suffered death for conscience' sake.
Pope John Paul II canonized a group of 85 martyrs of England, Scotland and Wales, ca. 1557-1584, - 63 priests and 22 laymen -, in Rome on 22 November 1987. Among them Robert Nutter.

 Philately

Canonization of Robert Nutter and 84 Martyrs from England, Scotland and Wales, ca. 1537-1584  by
Pope John Paul II in Rome on 22 November 1987.

Vatican City 1987, KimCover 22.11.1987. PW 601.

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