Edmund Gennings

Edmund Gennings (1567 – 10 December 1591), was an English martyr, who was executed during the English Reformation for being a Roman Catholic priest. He came from Lichfield, Staffordshire.

Life Gennings was born at Lichfield in 1567. A thoughtful, serious boy naturally inclined to matters of faith, at the age of sixteen he became a page to a Catholic gentleman, Richard Sherwood. Impressed by his master's example, when Sherwood left England to become a priest, Gennings followed. He went immediately to the English College at Rheims where he was ordained a priest at Soissons in 1590, being then only twenty-three years of age. He immediately returned to the dangers of England under the assumed name of "Ironmonger".

Mission On his return to England, Gennings landed at Whitby. He was estranged from his family because of his conversion, but headed straight for Lichfield to seek out his kindred. He found that all his relatives were dead except one brother, who had left his native city and gone to London. There Gennings proceeded and for a whole month searched the city, visiting every place where he thought his brother might be found. Eventually, when he was about to give up the search, he achieved his purpose, but the younger brother, far from being won over to Gennings's faith, only besought him to go away, lest he himself should become suspect.