Godfried Coart was born in a house on the Keelstraat in Melveren in 1512 and baptized in Holy Trinity Church.

[1] During the Dutch Revolt against Spanish rule, inhabitants of the northern Netherlands who were primarily Protestant began to turn against the Catholic priests and monastics present.

[2] On June 26, 1572, Father Nicolaes Pieck, guardian of the Franciscan monastery of Gorcum, gave permission to those who wished to do so to seek safer havens.

The next day Protestant rebels, the Watergeuzen {pirates) seized Gorinchem and captured eleven Franciscans, along with other religious.

After about ten days imprisonment, they were transferred to Brielle[3] where they were offered their freedom in return for denying Catholic teaching on the Eucharist and papal primacy.

Despite a letter from the Prince of Orange, William the Silent, which enjoined all those in authority to leave priests and religious unmolested, they were subjected to a mock trial, and on July 9, 1572 hanged in a turfshed at a burned out monastery in nearby Rugge.