Chronology: Key Events 1536–69

1536: Dissolution of the smaller monasteries; outbreak of the Pilgrimage of Grace.
1539: Dissolution of the larger monasteries.
1540: 28 July: Henry VIII executes Thomas Cromwell.
1542: War with Scotland; alliance with Charles V.
1543: Peace with Scots 1 July, rejected December; coinage debased (1).
          Henry VIII declares war on France.
1544: Edward Seymour devastates southern Scotland; capture of Boulogne by Henry; Charles V makes Peace of Crépy and leaves Henry to fight France alone.
1546:  By now £2,100,000 spent on war since 1543; peace with France (2).
1547:  28 January: Henry VIII dies; Edward VI a minor; Somerset Lord Protector; financial crisis, food shortages, popular discontent, Vagrancy Act.
1548:  Social and religious unrest; coinage debased; sheep tax; ban on football; French army in Scotland.
1549: Western Rebellion, Kett’s Rebellion, France declares war on England; bankruptcy; Somerset arrested, Northumberland President of the Council.
1550:  Collapse of Antwerp cloth market leads to unemployment (3); Repeal of Vagrancy Act and sheep tax; peace with France.
1551:  Last debasement of coinage; William Hawkins opens Barbary coast trade.
1552: Somerset executed for treason; peace with Scotland; coinage reissued; new Poor law; attack on church wealth (4).
1553:  9 July: Edward VI dies; Mary I succeeds after Lady Jane Grey’s brief reign.
1554:  January: Mary to marry Philip II / Wyatt's Rebellion; financial reform (5);
          Second Act of Repeal restores Roman Catholicism to 1529 position (not land).
1555:  Smithfield burnings begin: Hooper 9 February; Ridley and Latimer 16 October; Act Touching Weavers proves ineffectual.
1556:  21 March: Cranmer burned - Foxe's Book of Martyrs; Act concerning Apprenticeship; war against France.
1558: Loss of Calais; November: Mary dies.
1560: Elizabeth reluctantly sends military help to the Presbyterians in Scotland.
1561: Coinage is reformed.
1562: War against France begins.
1563: Statute of Artificers seeks to stabilise employment and reduce vagrancy.
1568: Mary Queen of Scots seeks asylum in England.
1569: Rebellion of the Northern Earls seeks to release Mary from house arrest and marry her to Norfolk.

1. The government approximately doubled the amount of money in circulation between 1542 and 1551, coinciding with rapid price rises as the quantity of goods remained static. Northumberland’s reduction in the money supply after 1551, copied by Elizabeth I, reduced but did not end inflation, which was a European phenomenon.
2. War dramatically increased government expenses, due to costs of feeding and supplying armies and maintaining fortifications, especially on the border with Scotland, during the period of the Auld Alliance between France and Scotland. A corresponding increase in demand may have caused prices to rise further.
3. A glut of wool piled up in Antwerp during 1549, causing a major slump in the cloth trade in 1550. The resulting unemployment necessitated repeal of Somerset’s Vagrancy Act, which branded and enslaved unemployed vagrants.
4. A 1552 survey confirmed that church land was worth £1,087,000. Government commissioners were beginning to confiscate this wealth, melting down church plate, when Edward VI died, and Mary succeeded to the throne.
5. Mary implemented drastic reform of the revenue court, and restored the Exchequer as the main financial department. Her proposed Book of Rates and changes to the currency were implemented by Elizabeth I between 1558 and 1560, benefiting her solvency.