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Bilal Atkinson, Hartlepool UK
Short Answer
Guy Fawkes was a member of a group of provincial English Catholics involved in the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605, an unsuccessful plan to blow up Westminster Palace with the Protestant King James I and his chief ministers inside during the state opening of Parliament. The group’s aim was to spark a Catholic revolution.
Okay, Tell Me More
Guy Fawkes was born in York in 1570, the son of Edward, a church lawyer and prominent Protestant in the city, and Edith, whose family included secret Catholics. At that time, it was dangerous to be of the Catholic faith and many plots and rebellions against Elizabeth I were led by Catholics, which led to severe reprisals. Catholic Priests who were caught leading secret services were tortured and executed.
To all outward appearances, the Fawkes were a law-abiding Protestant family, until Edward Fawkes died when Guy was 8 years old. His mother remarried, this time to a Catholic, Dionysius (Denis) Bainbridge. The young Guy was drawn strongly to his stepfather’s religion, and although he knew of the dangers, he converted to Catholicism.
He Has A Spanish Nickname
At the age of 21, Guy Fawkes set off to Europe to fight for Catholic Spain (where he was later known as “Guido Fawkes”), against Protestant Dutch reformers in the Netherlands. He spent his next ten years fighting for Spain and became an expert in the use of explosives.
Guy Fawkes’s future took a fateful turn when he met Englishman Thomas Wintour in Spain.
It’s All A Conspiracy
Wintour was scouting around for allies to join a group of Catholic conspirators based in England, led by his cousin Robert Catesby. The two men returned to England in 1604, where James I had acceded to the throne the previous year.
Along with Fawkes and cousins Catesby and Wintour, the plotters included Wintour’s brother Robert, their brother-in-law John Grant, Catesby’s second cousin Francis Tresham, his servant Thomas Bates, Fawkes’ childhood classmates Christopher and John Wright, their brother-in-law Thomas Percy, Everard Digby, Ambrose Rookwood, and Robert Keyes.
An Impressively Unoriginal Codename
One of the conspirators, Thomas Percy, was appointed a Gentleman Pensioner in June 1604, gaining access to a house in London that belonged to John Whynniard, Keeper of the King’s Wardrobe.
Fawkes was installed as a caretaker and began using the pseudonym ‘John Johnson’, servant to Percy.
We Have A Mole…
By December 1604, it is alleged the conspirators were busy tunnelling from their rented house to the House of Lords. They ceased their efforts when, during tunnelling, they heard a noise from above. Fawkes was sent out to investigate and returned with the news that the tenant’s widow was clearing out a nearby undercroft, directly beneath the House of Lords.
The plotters purchased the lease to the room, which also belonged to John Whynniard. It was considered an ideal hiding place for the gunpowder the plotters planned to store. According to Fawkes, 20 barrels of gunpowder were brought in at first, followed by 16 more on 20th July. On 28th July however, the ever-present threat of the plague delayed the opening of Parliament until Tuesday, 5th November.
Fawkes’s final role in the plot was later settled during a series of meetings in October 1605. He was to light the fuse that would ignite the gunpowder and then he was to escape across the river Thames and head for Flanders to raise forces who would join in the Catholic uprising in England.
A Mysterious Letter
A few of the conspirators were concerned about fellow Catholics who would be present at Parliament during the opening.
On the evening of 26th October, Lord Monteagle received an anonymous letter warning him to stay away, and to [“retyre youre self into yowre contee whence yow maye expect the event in safti for … they shall receyve a terrible blowe this parliament”]. Despite quickly becoming aware of the letter – informed by one of Monteagle’s servants – the conspirators resolved to continue with their plans, as it appeared that it “was clearly thought to be a hoax”.
Fawkes checked the undercroft on 30th October and reported that nothing had been disturbed. Monteagle’s suspicions had been aroused, however, and the letter was shown to King James. The King ordered Sir Thomas Knyvet to conduct a search of the cellars underneath Parliament, which he did in the early hours of 5th November.
He Gets Caught
Fawkes had taken up his station late on the previous night, armed with a slow match and a watch given to him by Percy “becaus he should knowe howe the time went away” [Northcote Parkinson, C. (1976), Gunpowder Treason and Plot, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, ISBN 0-297-77224-4].
Fawkes was discovered in the cellars, with a fuse, a small lamp and 36 barrels of gunpowder hidden under piles of firewood and coal.
Fawkes was arrested and taken to the Tower of London for interrogation. He first gave his name as ‘John Johnson’ and later admitted that his intention was to blow up the House of Lords and expressed his regret at failing to do so. King James ordered that ‘John Johnson’ be tortured to reveal the names of his co-conspirators.
Yeah, Maybe Skip This Part…
After being very cruelly tortured, Fawkes eventually named his co-conspirators and signed a confession. The conspirators were arrested and were later tried and found guilty of high treason on 27th January 1606.
The then Attorney General, Sir Edward Coke, told the court that each of the condemned would be drawn backwards to his death, by a horse, his head near the ground. They were to be “put to death halfway between heaven and earth as unworthy of both”. Their genitals would be cut off and burnt before their eyes, and their bowels and hearts removed. They would then be decapitated, and the dismembered parts of their bodies displayed so that they might become “prey for the fowls of the air” [Fraser, Antonia (2005) [1996], The Gunpowder Plot, Phoenix, ISBN 0-7538-1401-3].
On 31st January 1606, Fawkes and three others were dragged from the Tower to the Old Palace Yard at Westminster, opposite the building they had attempted to destroy. His fellow plotters were then hanged and quartered. Fawkes was the last to stand on the scaffold. He asked for forgiveness of the King and state, while keeping up his “crosses and idle ceremonies” (Catholic practices). Weakened by torture and aided by the hangman, Fawkes began to climb the ladder to the noose, but either through jumping to his death or climbing too high so the rope was incorrectly set, he managed to avoid the agony of the latter part of his execution by breaking his neck.
His lifeless body was nevertheless quartered and as was the custom,] his body parts were then distributed to “the four corners of the kingdom”, to be displayed as a warning to other would-be traitors [Guy Fawkes, York Museums Trust, archived from the original on 14 April 2010, retrieved 16 May 2010].
Bonfire Night Is Born
What unity English Protestants had shared in the plot’s immediate aftermath began to fade when, in 1625, James’s son, the future Charles I, married the Catholic Henrietta Maria of France. Puritans reacted to the marriage by issuing a new prayer to warn against rebellion and Catholicism, and on 5th November that year, effigies of the pope and the devil were burnt, the earliest such report of this practice and the beginning of centuries of tradition.
Gradually, however, such scenes became less popular. With little resistance in Parliament, the thanksgiving prayer of 5th November contained in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer was abolished, and in March 1859 the Anniversary Days Observance Act repealed the Observance of 5th November Act 1605 [Fraser, Antonia (2005) [1996], The Gunpowder Plot, Phoenix, ISBN 0-7538-1401-3].
By the 20th century Guy Fawkes Day had become an enjoyable social commemoration, although lacking much of its original focus. The present-day Guy Fawkes/Bonfire Night is usually celebrated at large organised bonfire and firework displays.
And Just In Case…
Since the Gunpowder Plot, whenever the reigning King or Queen visits Parliament, there is a tradition that the royal bodyguards, called the Yeoman of the Guard, search beneath the Houses of Parliament for any potential plotters hiding explosives.
About the author: Bilal Atkinson is Editor of the Christianity Section of The Review of Religions. He is a retired police officer having served in forensics of scenes of crime for over two decades. He is also serving as President of the Hartlepool Chapter of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community UK.
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