Life of the Week: Guy Fawkes

[Blackleaf]

Ahead of Bonfire Night tomorrow, we explore the life of the conspirator most closely associated with the foiled 1605 Gunpowder Plot…


Life of the Week: Guy Fawkes

On 5 November 1605, Guy Fawkes and 12 other men plotted to blow up the House of Lords in London in the hope of killing the Protestant king, James I and VI

Wednesday 4th November 2015
BBC History Magazine

Guy Fawkes was a conspirator in the gunpowder plot to destroy the Houses of Parliament, c1606. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)


Ahead of Bonfire Night on Thursday, we explore the life of the conspirator most closely associated with the foiled plot…

Born: cApril 1570 in York

Died: 31 January 1606 in Westminster, London

Remembered for: Conspiring against James I and VI and planning to blow up the House of Lords. Every year on 5 November people mark the anniversary of the failure of the Gunpowder Plot.

Family: Guy Fawkes’s father, Edward Fawkes, worked for the Church of England, and his mother was named Edith. In 1568, before Guy was born, Edith gave birth to a daughter who died several weeks later. Guy had two sisters who lived into adulthood, named Anne and Elizabeth.

Guy’s father died when he was a child, and after this his mother remarried. Guy’s stepfather was named Dionis Bainbrigge.

His life: The exact date of Guy Fawkes’s birth is unknown, yet there are records that he was baptised on 16 April 1570 at St Michael le Belfrey church in York.

Despite his parents being Protestants, Guy’s mother remarried after his father’s death in 1579, and Guy became influenced by his stepfather’s Catholic practices. Despite it being a crime to be a Catholic during Elizabeth I’s reign, Guy converted to Catholicism during his teenage years.

Guy attended St Peter’s School in York. After leaving school, he found a position in the household of Anthony Browne, 1st Viscount Montagu, and his successor Anthony-Maria Browne, 2nd Viscount Montagu.

In 1592, Guy sailed overseas to join the Catholic Spanish army, which was fighting the Protestant Dutch forces over the control of the Netherlands. By 1603, Guy had risen through the ranks of the Spanish military and was recommended for a promotion to captain.

It was during his time abroad that Guy adopted the Italian name 'Guido', and he developed a great knowledge of the use of gunpowder.

In 1603, Guy travelled to Spain and petitioned the Catholic king, Philip III, to wage war against England and the new Protestant king, James I and VI. However, Philip declined Guy’s petition.

The target: the Scottish Protestant James I (of England) and VI (of Scotland)

While fighting in Flanders for the Spanish in around 1604, Guy met Thomas Wintour, a fellow disgruntled English Catholic. Wintour encouraged Guy to join a group of conspirators in a plot to assassinate the king.

For 18 months, Guy and 12 others calculated a plan to blow up the House of Lords, kill the king, and replace him with a Catholic alternative. In order to do this, the group transported 36 barrels of gunpowder to the cellar below parliament, and planned to set the gunpowder alight when James I opened parliament on 5 November 1605.

The men involved in the gunpowder plot (left to right): Thomas Bates, Robert Winter (also spelt Wintour), Christopher Wright, John Wright, Thomas Percy, Guy Fawkes, Robert Catesby and Thomas Winter (also spelt Wintour). (Photo by: Universal History Archive/UIG via Getty Images)

However, the plot was foiled by Robert Cecil – James I’s dedicated minister. On 4 November 1605, Guy was caught in the cellar while guarding the gunpowder, and was arrested for his involvement in the plot.

During his imprisonment in the Tower of London, Guy was continuously tortured for two days. Finally, Guy admitted his involvement in the plot and signed a confession. He signed his name ‘Guido Fawkes’. After his confession, Guy apparently remarked that he had collected so much gunpowder in order to “blow you Scotch beggars back to your native mountains”.

Despite attempting to kill the new king of England, James I apparently praised Guy for being dedicated to his cause and for having a “Roman resolution”.

Guy was sentenced to death by being hanged, drawn and quartered – a typical ‘traitor’s death’ at the time. On 31 January 1606, Guy took to the scaffold in Westminster in London. It has been suggested that after the noose had been placed over his head, Guy purposely jumped from the scaffold in order to break his neck. By doing this, he avoided being cut down after being hanged and having his organs cut from his body while still alive.

Guy’s dead body was cut into quarters and sent to different parts of the country, where they were put on display for the public to see.

The story of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot has continued to be told ever since, and in the 19th century it became customary to burn an effigy of Guy Fawkes on a bonfire every year on 5 November to mark the failure of the plot.

Life of Guy Fawkes | History Extra

 

[EagleSmack]

myth

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

Fawkes is often called "the last honest man to enter Parliament."

 

[Ludlow]

sounds like a real fawker to me

 

[Blackleaf]

myth

What is? Guy Fawkes?

 

[Blackleaf]

Fawkes is often called "the last honest man to enter Parliament."

If you look at it that way, it's a shame the Canadian Parliament shootings were thwarted.

********************************************

That's him dealt with.

Like every 6th November, there's a pungent smell of burning and gunpowder in the air today after all the bonfires and fireworks last night.

There's a big field in front of my flat and many of us residents of Langford Gardens - the complex of flats where I live - set up a big bonfire on it. It was just thirty yards or so in front of my flat. It was a massive contruction of planks of wood, I think one or two old doors, some old car tyres and what ever crap was lying around. We brought out some armchairs and a settee and placed them around our vast construction and when we lit the bonfire we sat on the armchairs and settee around the huge conflagration on the dark field, illuminated by nothing but the bonfire, whilst we drank lager and vodka, had loud music playing and watched the fireworks whistling and banging all around us. Some other groups of people had another bonfire on another part of the field and you could just make out its orange glow in the dark.

There'll be even more fireworks and bonfires on Saturday night as most people will decide to celebrate Guy Fawkes Night then with it being a weekend.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

You should come over. You'd fit right into any trailer park in America.

 

[Blackleaf]

Yesterday marked the anniversary of the death of the Catholic Queen Mary I - aka Bloody Mary - the daughter of King Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon and the half-sister of King Edward VI and Queen Elizabeth I and who reigned from 1553 to 1558.

This is a brief history of her life...

Life of the Week: Queen Mary I

This week marks the anniversary of the death of the first queen regnant of England, Mary I, and the accession of her half-sister, Elizabeth I

Tuesday 17th November 2015
BBC History Magazine

Mary Tudor – the daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

For centuries, Mary has been known as a Catholic tyrant who burned nearly 300 people during her short, five-year reign. However, in recent years, historians have attempted to re-evaluate Mary’s reputation, and have argued that Mary deserves more recognition for her work than previously thought.

Here, we look back at the queen’s life…

Born: 18 February 1516 at the Palace of Placentia, London

Died: 17 November 1558 at St James's Palace, London

Remembered for: Being the first queen regnant of England and for burning nearly 300 Protestant men, women and children during her reign.

Ruled: 1553-1558

Family: Mary’s father was Henry VIII and her mother was Catherine of Aragon. After Henry’s divorce from Catherine in the 1530s, Henry married five more times. Mary had one half-sister, Elizabeth, and one half-brother, Edward. She also had an illegitimate half-brother called Henry Fitzroy, and it is possible that she had other illegitimate siblings that were not publically acknowledged by Henry VIII.

Mary married Philip of Spain (later King Philip II of Spain) in July 1554. The couple had no children, so Mary was succeeded by her half-sister Elizabeth.

Her life: Born in 1516, Mary received an impressive education from a young age. She was able to speak Spanish, French and Latin, and contemporaries commented that she was a remarkable dancer, and often showed off her talents to ambassadors when they visited Henry VIII at court.

When Mary was nine years old, Henry VIII sent his daughter to Wales with her own personal court to act as a royal representative. With this newfound position, many believed that Mary would succeed her father, despite being a girl.

However, by the end of the 1520s, Henry VIII had become frustrated with having no male heir to succeed him. The king hoped to get his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled in order for him to marry someone else and produce a male heir. During her parents’ divorce proceedings, Mary was forbidden from seeing her mother.

By 1533, Henry successfully divorced Catherine, made himself the head of the Church of England and married the noblewoman Anne Boleyn. As a result, Mary lost her title as ‘princess’, and was given the lesser title of ‘the Lady Mary’. After Anne gave birth to a baby girl called Elizabeth in September 1533, Mary was declared as illegitimate by an Act of Parliament and was removed from the line of succession. Mary was then forced to join Princess Elizabeth’s household, but frequently stated that she was too ill to attend court in order to avoid the new queen.

After Anne Boleyn’s fall from power and execution in May 1536, Mary was invited back to court. However, Mary, who was a staunch Roman Catholic, refused to accept her father’s position as the head of the Church of England. Eventually, Thomas Cromwell – Henry VIII’s chief minister – persuaded Mary to submit to Henry’s will and she returned to court during the late 1530s. Mary was then returned to the line of succession in 1544, where the Act of Succession stated she would ascend the throne if her younger brother Edward, who was born in 1537, were to die without issue.

After Henry VIII died in 1547, Edward ascended the throne at the age of nine. Mary and Edward had a tempestuous relationship as they differed greatly in their religious views – Edward was a Protestant, while Mary was a Roman Catholic. Shortly before his premature death in 1553, Edward VI removed both Mary and Elizabeth from the succession in favour of his cousin, the Protestant Lady Jane Grey. After Edward’s death in July 1553, Jane was proclaimed queen in London. Despite this, many did not recognise her as such, and saw Mary as the next legitimate heir.

Receiving the news of her brother’s death, Mary fled to Framlingham Castle in Suffolk, where she gathered her supporters and members of the local gentry. Mary then assembled troops and prepared to fight for her crown. In what many historians recognise as the only successful coup d’état of the 16th century in England, Mary demonstrated that she held great popularity with the public and proved that she was the legitimate heir to the throne. On 19 July 1553, Mary overthrew Lady Jane Grey and was officially proclaimed queen. Contemporary accounts state that people celebrated in the streets and bells were rung across the country.

‘An Allegory of the Tudor Succession', 1572. Mary is on the right of her father, Henry VIII. Her husband, Philip, stands beside her. (Photo by National Museum & Galleries of Wales Enterprises Limited/Heritage Images/Getty Images)

Mary was 37 and unmarried when she ascended the throne. She knew that in order to prevent her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth from succeeding her, she needed to marry and produce an heir to secure a Catholic succession. As a result, Mary and her closest aides quickly negotiated a marriage to the Catholic Philip of Spain – the heir to the Spanish throne.

However, members of Mary’s council and the public did not approve of this match. Prior to Mary and Philip’s marriage, in early 1554, a group of rebels assembled in London to demonstrate their retaliation to the marriage, led by prominent Protestant landowner Thomas Wyatt the Younger. Mary refused to hide away from this rebellion, and confronted the rebels by making an extraordinary speech at the Guildhall in London. Mary rallied the rebels to support her and asserted her authority as their anointed queen. As a result, the rebels dispersed, and Wyatt was later executed at Tower Hill. Despite these protestations, Mary married Philip of Spain on 25 July 1554 at Winchester Cathedral.

By the end of 1554, Mary was convinced that she was pregnant and preparations were made in the birth chamber at Hampton Court. In April 1555, bells rang and bonfires were lit around England as news spread that the queen had given birth to an heir. However, Mary was not pregnant. Despite this, she continued to claim that she was pregnant, and stayed in confinement until August 1555. After her physicians convinced her that she was in fact not pregnant, Mary eventually returned to court.

During her reign, Mary revived the heresy laws, which stated that a person who did not follow the faith of the realm would be burned to death. During three years of Mary’s reign, nearly 300 men, women and children were burned at the stake across England for not converting to Catholicism, including Thomas Cranmer, who had been the Archbishop of Canterbury during Henry VIII and Edward VI’s reigns.

However, Mary did make great advances during her reign. She restored the navy, renewed the coinage and increased crown revenue, and also established new hospitals, improved the education of the clergy and increased the authority of local government. Despite this, many of her achievements have been overlooked.

In 1557, England was dragged into a war with Spain against France. This was a disastrous campaign for Mary’s troops and England officially lost possession of Calais in January 1558, which was its last stakehold in France.

Soon after this, Mary’s health deteriorated and she died, possibly from cancer, on 17 November 1558, aged 42. Mary’s half-sister Elizabeth succeeded her. Mary was then buried in Westminster Abbey, despite claiming she wanted to be buried next to her mother in Peterborough Cathedral.


Queen Mary I: her life and facts | History Extra