Gunpowder Plot

Catesby is suspected by historians to have embarked on the scheme after hopes of greater religious tolerance under King James I had faded, leaving many English Catholics disappointed.

The thwarting of the Gunpowder Plot was commemorated for many years afterwards by special sermons and other public events such as the ringing of church bells, which evolved into the British variant of Bonfire Night of today.

Their eldest child, the nine-year-old Henry, was considered a handsome and confident boy, and their two younger children, Elizabeth and Charles, were proof that James was able to provide heirs to continue the Protestant monarchy.

He swore that he would not "persecute any that will be quiet and give an outward obedience to the law",[9] and believed that exile was a better solution than capital punishment: "I would be glad to have both their heads and their bodies separated from this whole island and transported beyond seas.

[11] James received an envoy from Albert VII,[7] ruler of the remaining Catholic territories in the Netherlands after over 30 years of war in the Dutch Revolt by English-supported Protestant rebels.

[16] In the absence of any sign that James would move to end the persecution of Catholics, as some had hoped for, several members of the clergy (including two anti-Jesuit priests) decided to take matters into their own hands.

That the Bye Plot had been revealed by Catholics was instrumental in saving them from further persecution, and James was grateful enough to allow pardons for those recusants who sued for them, as well as postponing payment of their fines for a year.

Some Members of Parliament made it clear that, in their view, the "effluxion of people from the Northern parts" was unwelcome, and compared them to "plants which are transported from barren ground into a more fertile one".

To John Gerard, these words were almost certainly responsible for the heightened levels of persecution the members of his faith now suffered, and for the priest Oswald Tesimond, they were a repudiation of the early claims that the King had made, upon which the papists had built their hopes.

[32] The conspirators' principal aim was to kill King James, but many other important targets would also be present at the State Opening of Parliament, including the monarch's nearest relatives and members of the Privy Council.

[41] Also present at the meeting was John Wright, a devout Catholic said to be one of the best swordsmen of his day, and a man who had taken part with Catesby in the Earl of Essex's rebellion three years earlier.

This role gave Percy reason to seek a base in London, and a small property near the Prince's Chamber owned by Henry Ferrers, a tenant of John Whynniard, was chosen.

[51] The building was occupied by Scottish commissioners appointed by the King to consider his plans for the unification of England and Scotland, so the plotters hired Catesby's lodgings in Lambeth, on the opposite bank of the Thames, from where their stored gunpowder and other supplies could be conveniently rowed across each night.

[57] By the time the plotters reconvened at the start of the old style new year on Lady Day, 25 March 1605, three more had been admitted to their ranks; Robert Wintour, John Grant, and Christopher Wright.

[60] In the second week of June, Catesby met in London the principal Jesuit in England, Henry Garnet, and asked him about the morality of entering into an undertaking which might involve the destruction of the innocent, together with the guilty.

Garnet answered that such actions could often be excused, but according to his own account later admonished Catesby during a second meeting in July in Essex, showing him a letter from the pope which forbade rebellion.

Tresham declined both offers (although he did give £100 to Thomas Wintour), and told his interrogators that he had moved his family from Rushton to London in advance of the plot; hardly the actions of a guilty man, he claimed.

Upon reading it, James immediately seized upon the word "blow" and felt that it hinted at "some strategem of fire and powder",[88] perhaps an explosion exceeding in violence the one that killed his father, Lord Darnley, at Kirk o' Field in 1567.

Fawkes visited Keyes, and was given a pocket watch left by Percy, to time the fuse, and an hour later Rookwood received several engraved swords from a local cutler.

The plot was to have blown up the King at such time as he should have been set on his Royal Throne, accompanied with all his Children, Nobility and Commoners and assisted with all Bishops, Judges and Doctors; at one instant and blast to have ruin'd the whole State and Kingdom of England.

In London, news of the plot was spreading, and the authorities set extra guards on the city gates, closed the ports, and protected the house of the Spanish Ambassador, which was surrounded by an angry mob.

[104] In a letter of 6 November James wrote: "The gentler tortours [tortures] are to be first used unto him, et sic per gradus ad ima tenditur [and thus by steps extended to the bottom depths], and so God speed your good work.

Bates left the group and travelled to Coughton Court to deliver a letter from Catesby, to Garnet and the other priests, informing them of what had transpired, and asking for their help in raising an army.

Although gunpowder does not explode unless physically contained, a spark from the fire landed on the powder and the resultant flames engulfed Catesby, Rookwood, Grant, and a man named Morgan, who was a member of the hunting party.

[111] On 30 January, Everard Digby, Robert Wintour, John Grant, and Thomas Bates were tied to hurdles—wooden panels[149]—and dragged through the crowded streets of London to St Paul's Churchyard.

[150] The following day, Thomas Wintour, Ambrose Rookwood, Robert Keyes, and Guy Fawkes were hanged, drawn and quartered, opposite the building they had planned to blow up, in the Old Palace Yard at Westminster.

[161] Poets made a point of describing it as an act so evil that not only was its evil, in John Milton's words, sine nomine in the English language, other neo-Latin poetry described it as (inaudito), unheard of, even among the most wicked nations of history:[162] Neither the Carthaginians infamous in the name of perfidy nor the cruel Scythian nor Turk or the dreaded Sarmatian, nor the Anthropophagi, nurslings of mad savagery, nor any nation as barbarous in the furthermost regions of the world has heard.Milton wrote a poem in 1626 that one commentator has called a "critically vexing poem", In Quintum Novembris.

Reflecting "partisan public sentiment on an English-Protestant national holiday",[163] in the published editions of 1645 and 1673, the poem is preceded by five epigrams on the subject of the Gunpowder Plot, apparently written by Milton in preparation for the larger work.

England might have become a more "Puritan absolute monarchy", as "existed in Sweden, Denmark, Saxony, and Prussia in the seventeenth century", rather than following the path of parliamentary and civil reform that it did.

Subsequent attempts to prove Salisbury's involvement, such as Francis Edwards's 1969 work Guy Fawkes: the real story of the gunpowder plot?, have similarly foundered on the lack of any clear evidence.

A three-quarter portrait of a middle-aged woman wearing a tiara, bodice, puffed-out sleeves, and a lace ruff. The outfit is heavily decorated with patterns and jewels. Her face is pale, her hair light brown. The backdrop is mostly black.
Elizabeth I , queen from 1558 to 1603
Painting
King James's daughter Elizabeth , whom the conspirators planned to install on the throne as a Catholic queen. Portrait by Robert Peake the Elder , National Maritime Museum .
Engraving
A contemporary engraving of eight of the thirteen conspirators, by Crispijn van de Passe . Missing are Digby, Keyes, Rookwood, Grant, and Tresham.
The medieval House of Lords was part of a complex of buildings alongside the north bank of the River Thames, in London. The building which the plotters planned to destroy was at the southern end of the complex of Parliamentary buildings, alongside a minor alley that led to a staircase known as Parliament Stairs.
The House of Lords (highlighted in red) on John Rocque's 1746 map of London , within the Old Palace of Westminster . The River Thames is to the right.
A monochrome illustration of several short buildings clustered in a small space. A yard in the foreground is filled with detritus.
An early 19th-century illustration of the east end of the Prince's Chamber (extreme left) and the east wall of the House of Lords (centre)
The medieval complex of Parliamentary buildings was mapped by William Capon around the turn of the 18th century. This image shows a plan view of the ground floor levels, where each building is clearly described in text. Reference is made in the House of Lords undercroft, to Guy Fawkes.
William Capon's map of Parliament clearly labels the undercroft used by "Guy Vaux" to store the gunpowder.
A monochrome illustration of a stone and brick-walled room. An open doorway is to the right. The left wall contains equally spaced arches. The right wall is dominated by a large brick arch. Three arches form the third wall, in the distance. The floor and ceiling is interrupted by regularly spaced hexagonal wooden posts. The ceiling is spaced by wooden beams.
The undercroft beneath the House of Lords, as illustrated in 1799. At about the same time it was described as 77 feet long, 24 feet and 4 inches wide, and 10 feet high. [ 61 ]
A damaged and aged piece of paper, or parchment, with multiple lines of handwritten English text.
An anonymous letter, sent to William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle , was instrumental in exposing the plot. Its author's identity has never been reliably established, although Francis Tresham has long been a suspect. Monteagle himself has been considered responsible, [ 77 ] as has Salisbury. [ 78 ]
In a stone-walled room, several armed men physically restrain another man, who is drawing his sword.
The Discovery of the Gunpowder Plot and the Taking of Guy Fawkes (c. 1823) by Henry Perronet Briggs .
The lantern which Guy Fawkes used during the plot.
Photo
A torture rack in the Tower of London
A three-quarter portrait of a white man, dressed entirely in black with a white lace ruff. He has brown hair, a short beard, and a neutral expression. His left hand cradles a necklace he is wearing. His right hand rests on the corner of a desk, upon which are notes, a bell, and a cloth carrying a crest. Latin text on the painting reads "Sero, Sed, Serio".
Robert Cecil,
1st Earl of Salisbury.
Painting by John de Critz the Elder, 1602.
A small irregular section of parchment upon which several lines of handwritten text are visible. Several elaborate signatures bookend the text, at the bottom.
Part of a confession by Guy Fawkes. His weak signature, made soon after his torture, is faintly visible under the word "good" (lower right).
A monochrome illustration of a large medieval building, with many windows, turrets, and chimneys. Sculpted bushes surround the house, which is surrounded by fields and trees.
Hindlip Hall in Worcestershire
Portrait of a man dressed in black with a white lace ruff
Edward Coke conducted the interrogations of those thought to be involved with the conspiracy.
A monochrome illustration of a busy urban scene. Medieval buildings surround an open space, in which several men are being dragged by horses. One man hangs from a scaffold. A corpse is being hacked into pieces. Another man is feeding a large cauldron with a dismembered leg. Thousands of people line the streets and look from windows. Children and dogs run freely. Soldiers keep them back.
Engraving of conspirators of the Gunpowder Plot being hanged, drawn and quartered in London.
"The Gunpowder Treason" in a Protestant Bible of the 18th century.
A night-time photograph of a blazing fire is silhouetted by dark figures.
Bonfires are lit in Britain every 5 November to commemorate the failure of the plot.
Viewed from a distance, with a telephoto lens, a large explosion is captured in its early stages. In the foreground, assorted building materials are visible. In the background, a hillside is partially covered by a forest.
A photograph of the explosion, moments after detonation