Anglican converts to Catholicism John Stone, O.E.S.A was an English Augustinian friar who was executed, probably in December 1539; he was canonized in 1970 by Pope Paul VI, and is one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales.

Being a doctor of theology, every effort was made to win his influence and to gain the weight of his opinion at the Council convoked at Canterbury; but he was resolute in his denunciation of the divorce as being contrary to the tenets of morality and justice.

[4] During the time of the Reformation Parliament, Stone publicly denounced from the pulpit of the Austin Friars the claim of King Henry VIII to spiritual supremacy over the English Church.

All bishops, priests and religious were required to sign a formal document explicitly acknowledging Henry VIII as head of the church in England.

On 14 December 1538 the Bishop of Dover Richard Yngworth visited Canterbury and called on the Augustinian friary with an order to close it down as part of the dissolution of monasteries in England.

"[6] As each friar was expelled he had to sign two documents: one acknowledging the king as supreme head of the church in England, and another declaring their surrender of their friary to be voluntary.

Anne of Cleves, who was coming to England to be the fourth wife of King Henry VIII, was due to arrive on Sunday, 7 December 1539, and would be stopping at Canterbury overnight on her way to London.

However, the historian Michael Benedict Hackett, who was an expert on Stone, questioned whether the execution occurred during Anne of Cleves' time in Canterbury.

[9] In the account books of Canterbury, there appears an expense of two shillings and six pence "Paid for a half-ton of wood to build the gallows on which Friar Stone was brought to justice.

[8][11] "Behold I close my apostolate in my blood, in my death I shall find life, for I die for a holy cause, the defence of the Church of God, infallible and immaculate", Stone said as the executioners prepared to do their work.

Later in the century, Pope Gregory XIII sanctioned a painting in the English College at Rome depicting Stone as martyr, and likewise permitted an engraving of him to be printed in 1584.

[13] There is an illustration of St. John Stone by János Hajnal in "Il Fascino di Dio: Profili de Agiografia Agostiniana" by Fernando Rojo Martínez, O.S.A.