“Remember, remember the fifth of November, gunpowder, treason and plot”- so goes the old English chant associated with the yearly burning on thousands of village greens and in millions of private gardens throughout England every fifth of November of the effigy of Guy Fawkes. For November 5th celebrates the discovery of the famous plot to blow up the English House of Lords.
Guy Fawkes was a Catholic gentleman who played a major role in Robert Catesby’s plot to blow up King James I and his Parliament for failing to honors James’s pledge to extend more toleration to the Catholics.
Catesby apparently had vague ideas of a catholic take-over of the country.
There were five main conspirators, including Fawkes. In May 1604 they rented a house near the Parliament building and started to dig a passage which was design to reach a point just below the House of Lords. But in 1605 the conspirators were able to rent a neighboring cellar which was directly beneath the Palace of Westminster. They linked their passageway to this cellar and Fawkes was allotted the task of preparing the explosion. He gathered together at least twenty barrels of gunpowder in the cellar and covered them up with wood and coal.
All seemed set for the great day, which was the November opening of Parliament. By this time the number of conspirators had risen to thirteen, one of whom, Francis Tresham, had a brother, Lord Monteagle, in the House of Lords. Tresham sent a secret letter warning his brother that a “terrible blow” was to be delivered against Parliament and adding “yet they shall not see who hurts them”.
Monteagle took the letter to the King’s ministers. On November 4ththey had the cellars at Westminster searched and Guy Fawkes was discovered there with his gunpowder.
Picture credit: google