remember remember the fifth of November the gunpowder treason and plot I know of
no reason why the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot or so the rhyme
goes for us Brits the fit of November our bonfire night as
it's commonly known is a fun time to spend with family and friends drinking
mulled wine around the toasty bonfire and watchin dazzling fireworks explode
into a thousand sparkling colors in the night sky but actually we forget what
this annual celebration stands for, for on this day in 1605 one of Britain's
biggest ever terrorist plots was uncovered when the English Catholic Guy
Fawkes was found secreated it in a storeroom into the houses of parliament
36 barrels of gunpowder in hand today Guy Fawkes has become synonymous with
the Gunpowder Plot but of course he was not acting alone he was just a small
part of a large-scale Catholic conspiracy to blow up an oppressive
Protestant King and his government what caused these Catholics to take such
drastic action and what exactly did the Gunpowder Plot entail we're taking a
look in this very short introductory video it's the year 1605 in a Scottish
King sits on the throne of England being the son of Mary Queen of Scots in the
great grandson of Henry the seventh of England he was well placed as becoming
the first Monarch to hold the dual crowns of England and Scotland he is James the
sixth for Scotland and James the first of England the English crown whoever sits
heavy on the king's head for the kingdom has experienced decades of religious
intolerance and infighting the King has a tough decision to make
he wishes to mend relations with Catholic Spain but being a Protestant
King in a Protestant England he wishes to have all his subject conform to the
state religion Spain has vowed to protect English Catholics and James knows
that if he continues to suppress his Catholic subjects he risks compromising
any treaty with Spain the king Ponder's whether he could impose further
sanctions against Catholics and still have his peace with Spain
the current tensions in England can be traced back to the turbulent role of
Henry the eighth the official state religion in England
had historically been Catholicism but following the Protestant Reformation
that swept through Europe in the 1530s Henry took the decision to formally
break with Rome the act of Supremacy in 1534 formally replaced Catholicism as a
state religion with Protestantism the suppression of Catholics had begun but
when Henry's daughter Mary Tudor ascended to the throne
in 1553 she repealed the act of Supremacy the following year and sought
to return the country to Catholicism Mary however was brutal she earned her
nickname Bloody Mary by brutally burning thousands of
Protestants fortunately her rule was short and she was succeeded by her
half-sister Elizabeth the first a Protestant like their father once
again the act of Supremacy was issued in the official state religion returned to
Protestantism on the Queen Elizabeth the persecution of Catholics worsened
Elizabeth was responsible for passing a series of harsh statutes aimed at
forcing Catholics to conform to the Church of England Catholics who refused
to conform were fined intimidated and imprisoned furthermore foreign priests
sent to England to maintain the Catholic faith were at risk of being tortured and
even murdered this led to Catholics having to practice their faith in secret
this anti-catholic sentiment had been partly fueled by Mary's treatment of
Protestants the fear of foreign invasion as a pope sought to reaffirm his
influence in England had also been a factor
either way under the rule of Elizabeth the situation for Catholics worsened and
anyone found to be practicing the Catholic faith were punished after years
of oppression and mistreatment English Catholics were optimistic when Elizabeth
Scottish cousin James acceded to the English throne in 1603 it was hoped he
would usher in a period of greater religious tolerance but after two years
on the throne it was clear that nothing was going to change
James was keen to remedy the situation at home and although reluctant to pass
further laws capable of marginalizing Catholics he continued on the path whose
predecessor the situation for English Catholic
was dire they believe they followed the one true faith from the relationship
between them and the Protestant establishment was at breaking point
something had to be done Robert Catesby was an English nobleman who grow up in
Warwickshire the only surviving son of influential Catholics Sir William catsby
and Anne Throckmorton he inherited his father's vast wealth when he died in
1598 like his father catsby was well known to the Protestant establishment
for flouting the law and refusing to conform to the state religion in fact a
plot against Queen Elizabeth in 1601 involving the Earl of Essex
saw cats bake been injured and imprisoned he was lucky to escape prison
with his life but after paying a substantial fine his freedom was granted
Catesby was desperate to return England to Rome like many other prominent
Catholic he saw the only way forward as involving violence he was a man at his
wits end and following the huge fines he had been made to pay also on the verge
of financial ruin Catesby decided to blow up Parliament and
everybody in it he began meeting in secret with close friends and
like-minded English gentlemen among these initial conspirators were his
cousin Thomas winter and a fellow nobleman John Wright catsby was keen to
attract as much support as possible and organised for winter to travel to
Flanders under Spanish control at the time to petition the king of Spain for
help the king however whilst sympathetic to the plight of English Catholics was
so preoccupied with securing a peace treaty with England that he refused to
offer any assistance the trick was not entirely without its merits however as
Catesby was able to recruit the assistance of English Patriot and
experienced soldier Guido Fawkes Fawkes was a veteran of the eighty years war
having fought on the side of Spain against Dutch Protestant reformers in the Low
Countries he had a particular skill set including an expert knowledge of
explosives Foawkeswas a devout Catholic and hated everything Scottish on the 24th
May 1604 Catesby been met with winter Wright Fawkes and new recruits
Thomas Percy at a pub in London Percy was an employee and distant relative of
the Earl of Northumberland and subsequently
well-connected during this meeting Catesby formally unveiled his plan to blow up
the king in Parliament he chosen the State Opening of Parliament to execute
this plan has not only with the King and his wife present but also key ministers
nobles and high-ranking members of the Church of England it was the perfect
opportunity to cause maximum disruption Catesby hoped that following the blast
key catholic nobles would rise up and take control of the government he also
planned to kidnap the king's daughter and third in line for the throne
Princess Elizabeth and insert her on the throne as a proxy Queen the five
plotters were all agreed and swore an oath of secrecy on a prayer book by
stroke of luck and his plans developed Thomas Percy was appointed by his patron
the Earl of Northumberland to a prestigious troop of royal bodyguards
this gave him cause a secure base in London and he managed to secure a house
only a stone's throw away from Parliament he was then joined by Fawkes
who posed as his servant and adopted the pseudonym John Johnson fortunately for
Catesby he also had a house on the other side of the river and he began
using it's a stockpile gunpowder Thomas Percy then managed to secure a storage
vault under the House of Lords and applauses began to smuggle in with 36
barrels of gunpowder necessary to the level Parliament due to the State
Opening of Parliament being delayed a number of times a new date of November
the fifth was set around 13 Englishmen were now involved in a plot to kill the
king they all sat back and awaited the State Opening nothing could go wrong or
so they thought Guy Fawkes had been chosen as the man to ignite the Gunpowder
the reason for this was that he was largely unknown to the authorities and
was an explosives expert unbeknown to him and his co-conspirators however and
an anonymous letter sent a Catholic Lord Monteagle urging him not to attend the
State Opening of Parliament had been intercepted by the Kings Chief Minister
Robert Cecil a search of Parliament's undercroft had been ordered and Fawkes
was discovered with the Gunpowder matches and kindling he was subsequently
arrested and following being tortured gave up the names of his fellow
conspirators the game was up but for Catesby Wright and Percy they
were determined to make one stand in the Midlands during a gun
battle they were subsequently shot and killed their fate had been far less
gruesome than that of the remaining plotters who were all rounded up and
tried as traitors their punishment was to be hanged drawn and quartered Fawkes was
condemned to the same fate however the story goes that he managed to jump from
the scaffold and break his neck it's quite incredible how close our plot has
got to actually pulling off that plan had Lord Monteagle letter not been
intercepted and acted upon then lord knows what England might have looked
like today the United Kingdom certainly may not have existed an official state
religion may well have been Catholicism who knows