Adrian Fortescue
English Roman Catholic martyr and blessed (ca. 1476 - 1539)
Feast: 9 July (not on the universal Roman calendar; kept in the Roman Martyrology or local calendars)
Who they were
Sir Adrian Fortescue, born about 1476, was a Devonshire country gentleman, knighted, who served the king in the wars with France, attended the Field of the Cloth of Gold in 1520 and in 1532 became a Knight of St John. His mother was a great-aunt of Anne Boleyn.
A serious, careful, God-fearing man, he was executed on 10 July 1539 under Henry VIII, and is honoured as a martyr.
The miracles
As a martyr he was beatified without a miracle.
Why that counted as sanctity
An English knight who died a martyr for his Catholic faith under Henry VIII.
The cause
The cause continues. No postulation address is published here yet. Favours received through this person’s intercession, and offers of help, are best sent to the religious order or congregation they belonged to, or to the diocese where the cause was opened; either will pass them to the postulation.
- Catholic Encyclopedia (1913), via New Advent - Blessed Adrian Fortescue
- Wikidata Q372929 — dates, feast day and identifiers (CC0)
- English Wikipedia — Adrian Fortescue (martyr) (CC BY-SA)
Checked against the sources listed on 21 September 2026. Corrections welcome.