For many years parishioners in Diss have marked the feast day of their local saint with a special mass and celebration.

But this year, 35 of them travelled to the Tyburn Convent, near Hyde Park in London, to visit the place where St Henry Morse was executed.

Morse, who was born in Brome, Suffolk, in 1595, is one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales, and was one of 105 Catholics hanged for their faith at the Tyburn Gallows.

He was found guilty of being a Catholic priest in what was a Protestant country and was killed on February 1, 1645.

The St Henry Morse Catholic Church on Shelfanger Road in Diss is dedicated to him.

Father David Bagstaff, the parish priest of the Catholic Parish of the Most Holy Trinity, Diss, said: 'To come on this pilgrimage is a beautiful thing to do, journeying from his birthplace, or very close to it, to Tyburn, where, just a few yards from here, he was executed.

'He had a passionate love for God, and it's an opportunity for us to renew our love for God today.'

The shrine is the resting place for the martyrs' relics and the pilgrims were welcomed by Mother Catherine of the Benedictine Adorers of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Montmartre, and prioress of Tyburn Convent.

The day finished with a short walk to the recently restored Tyburn Tree Memorial, near Marble Arch.