Gunpowder Plot

In 1605, a group of English Catholics led by Robert Catesby tried and failed to kill King James I of England (also James VI of Scotland). The plan, once known as the Gunpowder Treason Plot or the Jesuit Treason, aimed to blow up the House of Lords during the State Opening of Parliament on November 5. After the explosion, the conspirators hoped to start a rebellion in the Midlands and place James’s nine-year-old daughter, Elizabeth, on the throne.

Initial recruitment

Historians think Catesby turned to violence after his hopes for more religious tolerance under James faded, which disappointed many English Catholics. His co-conspirators included John and Christopher Wright, Robert and Thomas Wintour, Thomas Percy, Guy Fawkes, Robert Keyes, Thomas Bates, John Grant, Ambrose Rookwood, Sir Everard Digby, and Francis Tresham. Fawkes, who had ten years of military experience fighting in the Spanish Netherlands during the failed suppression of the Dutch Revolt, was put in charge of the explosives.

On October 26, 1605, an anonymous warning letter was sent to William Parker, the 4th Baron Monteagle, a Catholic member of Parliament. He immediately showed it to the authorities. During a search of the House of Lords on the evening of November 4, Fawkes was found guarding 36 barrels of gunpowder—enough to destroy the building—and was arrested. Learning the plot was exposed, most of the conspirators fled London, trying to gather support along the way.

Several made a final stand against the Sheriff of Worcestershire and his men at Holbeche House. In the gunfight that followed, Catesby was shot and killed. At their trial on January 27, 1606, eight surviving conspirators, including Fawkes, were found guilty and sentenced to be hanged, drawn, and quartered.

Trials

Some details of the plot were allegedly known by Henry Garnet, the leading Jesuit in England. Though Garnet was convicted of high treason and executed, it is unclear how much he actually knew.

Because he learned of the plot through confession, the absolute confidentiality of the confessional prevented him from telling the authorities. After the plot was uncovered, anti-Catholic laws were passed, but many important and loyal Catholics kept their high offices during the rest of James I’s reign. For many years, the failure of the Gunpowder Plot was marked by special sermons and public events like church bells ringing, which eventually became the British tradition of Bonfire Night.

Religion in England

Between 1532 and 1540, King Henry VIII broke the English Church away from Rome, starting decades of religious conflict. English Catholics struggled in a society dominated by the newly independent and increasingly Protestant Church of England. Henry’s daughter, Queen Elizabeth I, tried to manage the divide with the Elizabethan Religious Settlement, which required anyone in public or church office to swear loyalty to the monarch as head of both church and state.

Refusing brought severe penalties: fines for not attending church, and repeat offenders risked prison or execution. Catholicism was pushed to the margins, and its followers shrank to remote areas far from London. Despite the threat of torture or death, priests continued to practice their faith in secret.

Succession

Queen Elizabeth, unmarried and childless, refused to name an heir. Many Catholics thought her Catholic cousin, Mary, Queen of Scots, was the rightful heir, but Mary was executed for treason in 1587. England’s Secretary of State, Robert Cecil, secretly negotiated with Mary’s son and successor, King James VI of Scotland. In the months before Elizabeth’s death on March 24, 1603, Cecil prepared for James to take the throne.

Some exiled Catholics wanted Philip II of Spain’s daughter, Isabella, as Elizabeth’s successor. More moderate Catholics looked to James’s and Elizabeth’s cousin Arbella Stuart, who was thought to have Catholic sympathies. As Elizabeth’s health failed, the government detained the “principal papists,” and the Privy Council grew so worried that Arbella Stuart was moved closer to London to prevent her kidnapping by Catholics.

Despite competing claims, the transfer of power after Elizabeth’s death went smoothly. Cecil’s proclamation on March 24 announced James’s succession, which was widely celebrated. Leading Catholics, instead of causing trouble as expected, enthusiastically supported the new king. Jesuit priests, whose presence in England was punishable by death, also showed support for James, who was seen as embodying “the natural order of things.” James ordered a ceasefire with Spain, and though the two countries were still technically at war, King Philip III sent his envoy, Don Juan de Tassis, to congratulate James.

For decades, England had a monarch who refused to provide an heir, but James arrived with a family and a clear line of succession. His wife, Anne of Denmark, was the daughter of King Frederick II of Denmark. Their eldest child, nine-year-old Henry, was considered handsome and confident, and their two younger children, Elizabeth and Charles, proved James could produce heirs.