In 1536, when the rising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out in the north of England, Constable was one of the insurgent leaders, but towards the close of the year, he submitted at Doncaster and was pardoned.
He did not share in the renewal of the rising, Bigod's rebellion, which took place in January 1537; but he refused the king's invitation to proceed to London, and was arrested, tried for treason, and hanged at Hull in the following June.
Constable's maternal uncle, Sir Humphrey Stafford (c. 1426/7 – 8 July 1486), was executed at Tyburn for his part in an insurrection against King Henry VIII.
In the reign of Henry VII, he was of signal service to the crown upon the Cornish Rebellion led by Lord Audley, who marched on London and was defeated at the battle of Blackheath in 1497.
[4] In 1536, on the outbreak of the great Yorkshire rising, known as the Pilgrimage of Grace, caused by the beginning of the destruction of monasteries in 1536, he took the leading part, along with Robert Aske and Lord Darcy.
At the beginning of the next year, January 1537, when Sir Francis Bigod rashly attempted to renew the insurrection, Constable exerted himself to keep the country quiet.