Turville a walk and a pub.

Here is a thought from Paul:

‘ Be strong in the Lord. Put on truth, righteousness, the gospel of peace, faith, salvation and the Spirit, which is the word of God and remember to pray. All these are like an armour against spiritual wickedness.’ (Sandy has made this her own. Read it in Ephesians 6: 11-18)

Now for a walk.

We have spent many Sabbath afternoons walking for miles in the Chiltern Hills of Buckinghamshire where this picturesque village lies. However, it is a short walk on this sunny week day afternoon and then lunch in the pub.

It is ‘The Bull and Butcher’. It is early. We with one other couple are the only guests. There is time for the knowledgeable waitress to talk. ‘ Why the name, The Bull and Butcher?’ The question was answered well but as I later researched it, it became much longer. Are we ready?

The waitress: ” This is the pub/inn where the executioner of Anne Boleyn stayed the night before he traveled into London.”

It suddenly felt darker inside and her voice continued to tell of a murder in the pub and films all made in Turville.

My mind had stopped following and started asking other questions. Why was he here roughly 40 miles from London? Who was he? This is what I found out:

This executioner was no ordinary person. He was known as the “Swordsman of Calais”. He was commissioned for the sum of £23 6s 8d to provide a swift, dignified death by sword, not axe, to Anne Boleyn. This he did on 18th May 1536. He traveled from France to do this and stayed in Turville ‘The Bull and Butcher.”

Why was she beheaded? Here it is said very simply:

‘ She had refused to be Henry VIII’s mistress which led to the King’s break from Rome and the creation of the Church of England. She then failed to produce a male heir, and was accused of multiple crimes leading her to be the first English queen to be publicly executed. Anne’s rise and fall changed English history.’

Ah, the pub with glass covering a well and seating to eat on a plank around it and thick white walls seemed smaller, ceiling lower, older and yes, its secret of its name was not that it served beef!

Let us go back to the final words of Anne Boleyn which just maybe the “Swordsman of Calais” may have heard. Anne addressed the crowds who had come to watch:

” Good Christian people, I have not come here to preach a sermon, I have come here to die. For according to the law and by the law I am judged to die, and therefore I will speak nothing against it. I am come hither to accuse no man… I pray God save the King and send him long to reign over you, for gentler nor a more merciful prince was there never.”

Odd?

Kneeling at the block, her final prayer was:

” To Jesus Christ I commend my soul, Lord Jesus receive my soul.”

She was executed and he stayed in this very place the night before her execution, a professional hired by the King. ” The Bull and Butcher” and so he is the butcher.

Here are a few photographs I took:

The Bull and Butcher an historic 16th century pub on the left in white, and the equally ancient flint cottages on the right. Piles of wood ready for the fires in the foreground.

Trees and hedges showing a little green and closest to the camera the extension on the pub that surrounds the well.

A beautiful April walk with all of nature responding to the 20ºC warmth.

Here is a thought by Maya Angelou:

‘ History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.’

Take care,

Sandy 🙂