[4] Under Mary I of England he was one of the commissioners involved in the trials of Protestants and condemned John Bradford, Laurence Saunders and Rowland Taylor to death.
[5] During John Capon's period as bishop of Salisbury the town and country witnessed some of its bloodiest years in its persecution of Protestants.
Under Edward VI he became a Protestant; and, changing once more to Catholic under Mary, sat as a judge at the trial of Bishop Hooper and John Rogers.
During the more than twenty years of his episcopate he saw many people put to death for heresy, denying the king's supremacy, or on other pretences; among the more notable victims were Archbishop Cranmer, and Bishops Ridley and Latimer.
Having sent numerous well-known Protestants to the stake elsewhere in England, Capon did not hesitate to do the same to men of humble rank in his own Salisbury diocese.