THE author of a new book about a martyr who was gruesomely executed in Leominster wants people to remember the good he did and the life he led.

Lynne Surtees, from Hereford, said she had never heard of Roger Cadwallador before his name came up during discussions of the Hereford Catholic History Society.

But when it did, it 'somehow just lit a spark' for her. She dedicated the next two years to uncovering his 'intensely dramatic' story and released her book Blessed Roger Cadwallador this summer.

Born at Stretton Sugwas in 1568 into a family of devoted Catholics who 'kept their consciences in secret', Mr Cadwallador left his home in the Marches to study abroad.

Initially going to Rheims, he then went to the English College at Valladolid where in 1593 he was ordained priest. He returned to minister in England and Wales that same year and worked for 16 years as a bilingual priest in Herefordshire as well as Monmouthshire and Worcestershire.

On Easter Sunday 1610 while saying Mass in the home of a Catholic widow, he was arrested on the orders of the Protestant bishop of Hereford.

Condemned for being a priest, he was drawn on a hurdle through Leominster before being stripped, hung, drawn and quartered. His head was displayed in the town centre and his quarters on the four main roads, one at Bargates where St Ethelbert's now stands. He was beatified by Pope John Paul 11 in 1987.

Mrs Surtees, who is secretary to Churches Together in Herefordshire and an Oblate of Belmony Abbey, said: "He's quite an inspiring figure and one of the things I like about him is that he came to this country having been trained abroad but came looking for religious toleration and not in any sort of aggressive way.

He would never have been involved in anything like the gun powder plot.

"I'm very fond of him. I'd like people to appreciate and know him really."

Though most reports about Mr Cadwallador's life begin and end with the heartbreaking end he came to, Mrs Surtees took a very different approach.

"When it came to the actually telling of the martyrdom I just reported what I had read because I just can't bring myself to focus on that," she said.

"The fact he was martyred is important but why it happened and who he was is much more important than that.

"It's local history and national history and is really the story of a brave man. It's important to remember his martyrdom but not to dwell on it."

Blessed Roger Cadwallador can be purchased online at http://www.gracewing.co.uk/index.html