On the 2nd of September, 1666, at around 1 in the morning the Farriner Family had all gone to bed. All except the 23 year old daughter of the family, who went downstairs to grab a candle. When Thomas, the patriarch, testified to authorities later on, he claimed that nothing was out of the ordinary and that the fire in the oven of the bakery he owned. However, modern historians doubt this claim, and they suspect that a stray ember had ignited some twigs that were being stored nearby.
Thomas Jr woke up and noticed that the ground floor was on fire and quickly alerted his family but it was too late. The Farriners were trapped on the second floor by the billowing smoke, forcing them to escape via an upstairs window and onto a neighbour’s roof, raising the alarm that a fire had broken out.
A similar looking house to the architecture of Farriner Bakery on fire in the present day
Soon the fire spread upstairs, claiming the Farriner maid as the first victim of the fire, and sparks flew to other houses on the street. Due to the architecture of 17th Century London, houses were tightly packed, which allowed for more space in homes but also fore the fire to spread more quickly. Not only that but the old Tudor style of building houses out of Wattle and Daub, essentially tightly woven stick panels glued with a mud like mixture, increased the spreadability of the fire. Despite the mud providing a fire proof cover for the wood, the poorer areas of London, where the fire started, were very decrepit, leaving the wood exposed.
One of the main documenters of the fire was Samuel Pepys, a diarist and naval administrator. His account showed that the fire did not bother that many Londoners in the slightest.
Some of our [maids] sitting up late last night to get things ready against our feast to-day, Jane called us up about three in the morning, to tell us of a great fire they saw in the City. So I rose and slipped on my [nightgown], and went to her window, and thought it to be on the backside of Marke-lane at the farthest; but, being unused to such fires as followed, I thought it far enough off; and so went to bed again and to sleep.
Samuel Pepys diary entry, September 2nd, 1666
Pepys’ experience was apparently the experience of many others too, who did not think the fire was that serious. However, what had initially appeared to be a relatively small fire had been transformed by a combination of unusually dry conditions, strong easterly winds and the densely packed streets of the City of London. Most of the buildings were constructed primarily from timber, with houses often projecting over the narrow streets and leaving very little space between them. The conditions were almost perfect for a fire to spread.
As the flames moved from building to building, thousands of Londoners began fleeing their homes. Many attempted to save whatever possessions they could carry, while others loaded their belongings onto carts and boats along the River Thames. The narrow streets quickly became clogged with people attempting to escape. The authorities initially struggled to respond effectively. London did not possess a professional fire brigade in the modern sense. Firefighting was largely the responsibility of local parishes, watchmen and private individuals. Leather buckets, ladders, hooks and primitive water pumps were used to fight the flames, but these methods were proving increasingly ineffective against a fire being driven forward by the wind.
An illustration of the firefighters
The Lord Mayor of London, Sir Thomas Bloodworth, arrived at the scene but initially underestimated the seriousness of the situation. According to later accounts, he believed the fire could be dealt with relatively easily. By the time it became obvious that the fire was beyond the capabilities of ordinary firefighting, the flames had already spread considerably. King Charles II and his brother, James, Duke of York, eventually became personally involved in directing the response. The King encouraged Londoners to demolish buildings in the path of the flames in order to create firebreaks. Buildings could be pulled down using fire hooks before the fire reached them, creating gaps which the flames would struggle to cross.
This was an extremely controversial measure. Many property owners were reluctant to allow their houses to be destroyed, even if doing so might prevent the fire from spreading. In some areas, however, the authorities resorted to forcibly demolishing buildings. Meanwhile, the fire continued to advance. By September 3rd, the flames had reached the northern and western parts of the City. The wind pushed the fire towards the heart of London, while burning debris was carried through the air and ignited buildings some distance away. The River Thames provided an important obstacle on the southern side of the City, although warehouses and buildings along the riverfront caught fire and allowed the flames to spread further. Large quantities of highly flammable materials were stored along the waterfront, including coal, timber, oil and other goods. The fire was therefore not simply consuming houses. It was consuming the commercial heart of London.
A painting of the old St Paul’s Cathedral ablaze
By September 4th, some of London’s most recognisable landmarks were threatened. St Paul’s Cathedral, one of the largest and most important buildings in the city, caught fire after flames reached the surrounding area. Its destruction became one of the defining images of the disaster. The flames also destroyed thousands of homes and businesses, while churches, guildhalls and other public buildings were consumed. By now, the authorities had accepted that the only realistic way to stop the fire was to create sufficiently large firebreaks. Large sections of London were deliberately demolished.
The strategy began to work. As the wind weakened and the gaps created by the demolitions prevented the flames from jumping between buildings, the fire gradually began to lose its momentum. By September 5th, much of the main blaze had been brought under control. On September 6th, the Great Fire was finally extinguished.
London had been devastated. Approximately 13,200 houses and 87 parish churches had been destroyed, alongside numerous public buildings and businesses. Around 80 percent of the City of London had been damaged or destroyed. Despite the enormous scale of the disaster, the official death toll was remarkably low, with only a handful of deaths recorded. The true number may have been higher, particularly among poorer inhabitants whose deaths may never have been recorded. Tens of thousands of people were left homeless. Many fled the City and established temporary camps outside London’s walls, carrying whatever possessions they had managed to rescue. Others attempted to rebuild their businesses almost immediately, knowing that the economic life of the capital could not simply stop. The Great Fire was therefore both a human catastrophe and a financial disaster.
A map superimposing the spread of the fire onto a modern day image of the city
Yet it also created an opportunity to rebuild London. The medieval City had been a maze of narrow streets, wooden buildings and overcrowded neighbourhoods. The destruction gave the government and city authorities the opportunity to impose new building regulations. Rebuilding increasingly favoured brick and stone rather than timber, while streets were widened and buildings were constructed with greater consideration for fire safety. The rebuilding of St Paul’s Cathedral under Sir Christopher Wren would eventually become one of the defining architectural achievements of post-fire London. The disaster also demonstrated the inadequacy of London’s existing approach to firefighting. Although a fully professional London Fire Brigade would not be established until centuries later, the Fire of 1666 encouraged the development of better firefighting equipment, organised insurance-based fire services and eventually more professional methods of responding to fires.
The Great Fire had therefore destroyed much of the old City, but it also helped create the foundations of a safer and more modern one. At the time, however, few Londoners could have appreciated this future. For them, the week had been defined by panic, destruction and displacement. The medieval City of London had effectively ceased to exist. Out of its ashes, a new London would emerge.
By the autumn of 1642, England was at war. After raising his royal standard at Nottingham in August, King Charles I set about building an army capable of defeating Parliament before the rebellion could gather momentum. Travelling through the Midlands to Derby before turning west through Staffordshire and into Shrewsbury, Charles recruited noblemen, local militias and volunteers wherever he could. By October he had assembled an army of roughly 14,000 men. Although inexperienced, it included many members of the English aristocracy who remained fiercely loyal to the Crown.
A painting of Charles’ standard at Nottingham Castle
Among the King’s commanders was his twenty-two-year-old nephew, Prince Rupert of the Rhine. A veteran of the Thirty Years’ War, Rupert possessed far more battlefield experience than most English officers. Bold, aggressive and supremely confident, he quickly became commander of the Royalist cavalry. His reputation was enhanced almost immediately after the war began when, at the Battle of Powick Bridge near Worcester, his cavalry routed a Parliamentarian force under Colonel John Brown. Although only a small engagement, it gave the Royalists confidence that their cavalry could dominate the battlefield.
With his army assembled at Shrewsbury, Charles believed he had a chance to end the war before it truly began. His objective was simple: march on London, defeat Parliament’s main field army, and reclaim control of his capital. If London fell, many believed Parliament’s resistance would collapse with it. Standing in his way was Robert Devereux, 3rd Earl of Essex, the commander of Parliament’s army. Essex anticipated Charles’s advance and marched north-west from London to intercept him before he could reach the capital. The two armies manoeuvred across Warwickshire, each attempting to gain the advantage without exposing themselves to unnecessary risk.
A painting of Devereux
On October 22nd, Royalist scouts under Prince Rupert discovered Parliamentarian forces camped around the village of Kineton. Additional reconnaissance confirmed that Essex’s entire army was nearby. Charles immediately abandoned any thoughts of bypassing his opponent and instead concentrated his forces atop the high ground of Edge Hill. Essex deployed his army on the plain below. Neither commander had intended to fight there, but by the morning of October 23rd, England’s first major pitched battle in nearly three centuries had become unavoidable.
The battle began with an exchange of artillery fire, though the guns proved largely ineffective. The uneven ground made accurate shooting difficult, and neither side suffered significant losses from the bombardment. As the cannon fell silent, Prince Rupert launched the attack. Leading the Royalist right wing, Rupert ordered his cavalry to charge downhill at full speed. The Parliamentarian horse struggled to withstand the impact. Within minutes they broke and fled, pursued relentlessly across the countryside by Rupert’s troopers. On the opposite flank, Royalist cavalry achieved similar success, driving Parliament’s horsemen from the field. It appeared that Charles’s army had gained a decisive advantage.
A painting of the Royalist cavalrymen breaking formation and chasing the Roundhead wagon trail
Yet Rupert’s greatest strength became his greatest mistake. Rather than reforming and returning to support the infantry, many of his cavalry continued chasing fleeing soldiers for several miles. Some attacked Parliament’s baggage train at Kineton, while others scattered in pursuit of plunder. By the time they turned back towards the battlefield, the decisive phase of the battle was already underway. In the centre, thousands of infantry collided in brutal hand-to-hand combat. Musketeers fired disciplined volleys before retreating behind ranks of pikemen, whose eighteen-foot pikes formed dense forests of sharpened steel. Once formations became entangled, the fighting dissolved into desperate close-quarters combat with swords, pikes and the butts of muskets. Casualties mounted rapidly as neither side managed to gain a clear advantage.
The absence of Rupert’s cavalry was keenly felt. Parliament’s infantry, though battered, held together under Essex’s leadership, while fresh Parliamentarian cavalry gradually returned to the battlefield. Had Rupert’s horse been available to strike the Parliamentarian infantry in the flank at the height of the fighting, many historians believe the Royalists might have won a decisive victory. Instead, both armies became exhausted after hours of combat.
An illustration of the Cavalier army at Edgehill
As darkness fell, the fighting petered out. Neither side possessed the strength to launch another assault, and the battlefield was left littered with thousands of dead and wounded. During the night, both armies remained in position, uncertain whether the battle would resume at dawn. Instead, the Royalists withdrew the following morning and continued their march towards London, while Essex claimed possession of the field. The Battle of Edgehill ended without a clear victor. Around 1,500 men had been killed, and both sides claimed success. Yet strategically, Parliament had achieved the more important objective. Charles had failed to destroy Essex’s army, meaning London remained defended. The hope of ending the Civil War with one decisive battle had vanished. Instead, Edgehill marked the beginning of a conflict that would continue for almost seven years, transforming England’s monarchy, government and society forever.
King Charles I became King of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1625 following the death of his father, James VI of Scotland and I of England. James had united the crowns of England and Scotland under the House of Stuart in 1603 after the childless Elizabeth I died, although the two kingdoms remained politically separate and continued to have their own parliaments and laws. Like his father, Charles firmly believed in the Divine Right of Kings: the idea that monarchs were appointed by God and therefore answered only to Him. In Charles’ view, questioning the authority of the King was not merely political opposition but an affront to God’s will itself. Many members of Parliament, however, believed that the King’s authority should be balanced by England’s ancient laws and customs. It was a disagreement that would shape the next two decades.
A painting of King Charles I
Unlike today, Parliament did not govern England directly. Executive power rested almost entirely with the King, who could summon or dissolve Parliament whenever he wished. However, Parliament controlled one thing the King desperately needed: taxation. Without parliamentary approval, raising large sums of money for government or war became extremely difficult. This uneasy balance between royal authority and parliamentary control had existed for centuries, but under Charles it would be tested like never before.
Almost immediately, Charles began to alienate many of his subjects. Shortly after his accession he married Henrietta Maria, the Catholic sister of King Louis XIII of France. Although intended to strengthen relations with France, the marriage caused deep anxiety in a country that had embraced Protestantism during the Reformation and still remembered the persecution of Protestants under Queen Mary I less than a century earlier. At the same time, Europe was being consumed by the Thirty Years’ War, a vast religious and political conflict centred on the Holy Roman Empire. Many English Protestants wanted Charles to intervene decisively in support of their Protestant allies, particularly his brother-in-law Frederick V, the exiled Elector Palatine. Instead, Charles launched two costly military expeditions against Spain and France that ended in humiliation, leaving both Parliament and the public questioning his judgement.
A painting of the aftermath of the plundering of Wommelgem during the Thirty Years War
Religious tensions only continued to grow. Charles increasingly relied upon William Laud, the Archbishop of London who later became Archbishop of Canterbury in 1633. Laud promoted Arminian theology within the Church of England, placing greater emphasis on ceremony, elaborate churches and the authority of bishops. Although Laud remained a Protestant, many Puritans believed these reforms resembled Roman Catholicism far too closely. Combined with the influence of Queen Henrietta Maria and several Catholic advisers at court, fears spread that Charles intended to steer England back towards Catholicism.
Financial disputes soon made matters worse. Parliament repeatedly refused to grant Charles the money he requested, believing he was wasting public funds on unsuccessful foreign wars. Rather than accept Parliament’s decision, Charles resorted to forced loans and imprisoned those who refused to pay. In response, Parliament drafted the Petition of Right in 1628. Championed by MPs such as John Pym and Sir Edward Coke, the document declared that the King could not levy taxes without Parliament’s consent, imprison subjects without lawful cause, quarter soldiers in private homes or impose martial law in peacetime. Charles reluctantly accepted the petition in order to secure funding, but relations between Crown and Parliament had already deteriorated beyond repair.
An image of two pages of the Petition of Right
The following year, after another bitter confrontation, Charles dissolved Parliament altogether. From 1629 until 1640 he governed without it in a period later known by his critics as the Personal Rule, or the Eleven Years’ Tyranny. To supporters of the King, the country appeared peaceful and stable. To his opponents, Charles was ruling as an absolute monarch. Without Parliament to approve taxation, Charles was forced to find alternative sources of income. He revived long-forgotten medieval laws, imposing fines on landowners for ancient offences and selling monopolies that granted individuals exclusive rights to manufacture or trade particular goods. Prices rose while competition declined, angering merchants and ordinary consumers alike. Most controversial of all was Ship Money, a tax that had traditionally been collected from coastal towns during wartime to fund the Royal Navy. Charles expanded the tax to inland counties and collected it even during peacetime. Although technically legal, many believed the measure violated centuries of constitutional tradition. When Buckinghamshire landowner John Hampden refused to pay in 1637, the ensuing court case became a national symbol of resistance to the King’s growing authority.
Religious controversy continued to undermine Charles’ popularity. Laud’s reforms became increasingly strict, and critics were punished harshly. Three prominent Puritan writers – William Prynne, Henry Burton and John Bastwick – published pamphlets condemning the King’s religious policies. They were convicted of seditious libel, fined heavily, imprisoned and publicly mutilated by having their ears cut off. Rather than intimidating Charles’ opponents, the punishments transformed the three men into martyrs for the Protestant cause.
An illustration of Prynne being pilloried
Charles’ greatest mistake, however, came north of the border. Hoping to create greater religious unity across his kingdoms, he attempted to impose a new English-style Book of Common Prayer upon the Presbyterian Church of Scotland in 1637. The reaction was immediate. According to tradition, a market trader named Jenny Geddes hurled a stool at the minister during the first reading of the new prayer book in Edinburgh’s St Giles’ Cathedral, triggering riots throughout the country. Scottish opposition quickly organised itself through the National Covenant, a movement dedicated to defending Scotland’s Presbyterian Church against royal interference. When Charles attempted to crush the Covenanters by force, the resulting Bishops’ Wars ended in disaster. The Scottish army defeated the King’s forces and occupied parts of northern England. Under the Treaty of Ripon in 1640, Charles was forced to pay the occupying Scottish army £850 every day until a permanent settlement could be reached.
The enormous financial burden left Charles with no choice but to recall Parliament after eleven years. The assembly that met in April 1640, later known as the Short Parliament, refused to grant the King money until their grievances had been addressed. Furious, Charles dissolved it after only three weeks. Without parliamentary funding, however, he suffered another humiliating defeat against the Scots and was forced to summon Parliament once again in November. This second assembly became known as the Long Parliament, and it immediately began dismantling much of Charles’ system of government.
An illustration of Parliament in the 17th Century
The Long Parliament passed the Triennial Act, requiring Parliament to be summoned at least once every three years, and abolished the Star Chamber, a powerful royal court widely associated with arbitrary justice. Archbishop Laud was arrested, while Thomas Wentworth, Earl of Strafford and Charles’ most trusted political adviser, was impeached for treason and eventually executed despite the King’s desperate attempts to save him. By late 1641 Parliament issued the Grand Remonstrance, a lengthy catalogue listing over two hundred grievances against Charles’ government. It passed by only a narrow margin, demonstrating just how deeply divided even Parliament itself had become.
Charles believed these actions threatened not only his authority but the monarchy itself. On January 4th 1642 he entered the House of Commons accompanied by several hundred armed men, intending to arrest five leading MPs, including John Pym, on charges of treason. Warned in advance, the five members escaped before the King arrived. When Charles asked the Speaker where they were, Speaker William Lenthall famously knelt before him and replied:
May it please Your Majesty, I have neither eyes to see nor tongue to speak in this place but as this House is pleased to direct me.
William Lenthall, Speaker of the House of Commons, repsonding to Charles’ demand
A painting of Charles (right, in shadow) and Speaker Lenthall kneeling during the attempted arrest of the Parliamentarians
The failed arrest destroyed what little trust remained between King and Parliament. Fearing unrest in London, Charles left the capital and travelled north to gather loyal supporters. Parliament, meanwhile, began raising its own army. Families, towns and entire counties found themselves divided between loyalty to the Crown and loyalty to Parliament. Few people believed they were fighting against England; both sides claimed they were fighting to save it. Yet compromise had become impossible. On August 22nd 1642, Charles raised the royal standard at Nottingham, formally declaring war. England had entered one of the bloodiest and most transformative conflicts in its history: the English Civil War.
On November 5th 1605, the entire English government was nearly brought down by 2,500 kg of explosives. Whilst nowadays the date is now remembered as a day of fireworks, bonfires and apple dipping, there were complex political moves and sectarian wars that created that annual tradition. Since the separation of the England from the Roman Catholic Church under King Henry VIII, tensions between Catholics and Protestants had been mounting. During the Reformation, Henry VIII transformed England’s relationship with the Roman Catholic Church. His original dispute with Rome was largely political and dynastic rather than a straightforward attempt to introduce Protestantism. After Pope Clement VII refused to annul Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, Henry increasingly challenged papal authority over England. Parliament passed a series of laws transferring ecclesiastical authority from Rome to the English Crown, culminating in the Act of Supremacy of 1534, which declared Henry the “Supreme Head” of the Church of England. Henry subsequently ordered the Dissolution of the Monasteries between 1536 and 1540, closing religious houses and transferring their lands, buildings and wealth to the Crown and, in many cases, to private purchasers. The policy strengthened royal authority and generated enormous revenues, although Henry’s religious reforms did not immediately turn England into a Protestant country. Many traditional Catholic beliefs and practices remained during his reign, even as England became institutionally separated from Rome.
A painting of Henry VIII, Cardinals and his wife, Catherine of Aragon, during his divorce proceedings
Henry’s religious settlement was reversed after his death. His son, Edward VI, pushed England further towards Protestantism, but when Edward died in 1553, his Catholic half-sister Mary I became queen. Mary repealed much of the Protestant legislation introduced by Edward and restored England’s communion with Rome. She also revived medieval heresy laws that allowed people convicted of certain forms of religious heresy to be executed.
Between 1555 and 1558, approximately 280 Protestants were burned at the stake for heresy, including prominent figures such as Thomas Cranmer, Hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley. The executions were intended to suppress Protestantism and restore Catholic religious conformity, but instead generated widespread hostility towards Mary’s government and helped give her reign its enduring reputation as the period of “Bloody Mary.” At the same time, hundreds of Protestant exiles fled England for continental Europe, where some encountered more radical forms of Reformed Christianity.
A depiction of the burning of John Rogers, the first victim of the Protestant burnings of Mary I
When Mary died without children in 1558, her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth I succeeded her. Elizabeth restored the break with Rome through the Act of Supremacy of 1559, although she adopted the more cautious title of Supreme Governor of the Church of England rather than Supreme Head. A new Act of Uniformity also required attendance at Church of England services, creating a religious settlement that attempted to impose Protestant worship while retaining some elements of traditional Catholic practice.
Catholics who refused to conform became known as recusants and were increasingly subjected to fines and other penalties. The government initially distinguished between Catholic belief and political disloyalty, but this distinction became increasingly difficult to maintain as Elizabeth’s reign progressed. The arrival of Catholic missionary priests, the papal excommunication of Elizabeth in 1570, the Northern Rebellion and a series of Catholic-backed plots against the Queen convinced the government that some Catholics represented a potential threat to national security. By the 1580s and 1590s, Parliament had introduced increasingly severe measures against Catholic worship, recusancy and missionary priests, with priests who entered England to minister to Catholics eventually facing execution for treason.
A depiction of Parliament during the Elizabethan period
Whilst James personally was a Protestant, Catholics believed that what they viewed as a martyrdom of his mother by Elizabeth I – Mary, Queen of Scots, was executed in 1587 for plotting to kill her cousin and claim the English throne – that James would too convert to Catholicism. His policy regarding Catholics certainly softened. In contrast with his predecessor, he was much more moderate, rejecting capital punishment for Catholics and favouring exile, stating that: “I would be glad to have both their heads and their bodies separated from this whole island and transported beyond seas.” He also negotiated a ceasefire with Spain, as they were warring under Elizabeth’s reign.
However, his lack of action on the continent became an increasing source of contention. The religious conflict in England was part of a much wider struggle across Europe. During the French Wars of Religion, France was torn apart by conflicts between Catholics and Protestants. In 1589, King Henry III was assassinated by Jacques Clément, a Catholic League sympathiser who believed that the King had betrayed the Catholic cause. The assassination became an important example in the increasingly controversial European debate over whether a ruler could legitimately be killed if he became a tyrant. A decade later, the Spanish Jesuit scholar Juan de Mariana published De Rege et Regis Institutione (On Kings and the Education of Kings) in 1599. Mariana argued that, under certain extreme circumstances, a tyrannical ruler could legitimately be removed and even killed. His argument was considerably more qualified than the simple idea that anyone could assassinate a monarch they disliked, but the book nevertheless became notorious in Protestant Europe for its discussion of tyrannicide.
A porait of Mariana
One of these men who began thinking about such ideas was Guy Fawkes. An English Catholic soldier, Fawkes joined the Spanish Army of Flanders and fought against the Dutch Republic, whose Protestant revolt against Spanish rule had become one of Europe’s defining religious and political conflicts. During his time in the army, he had gained a great deal of knowledge regarding handling explosives and, by 1604, was in Flanders. In Flanders, he met Thomas Winter, who had been dispatched by Robert Catesby to the continent. Catesby was a key organiser of a plot to murder James I and instate his Catholic daughter, Princess Elizabeth, on the throne in his stead. He had been involved in the rebellion by the Earl of Essex in 1601 against Elizabeth I, which he believed would instate a Catholic monarch in England. However, the rebellion collapsed, Catesby was wounded and imprisoned, being forced to pay a fine of 4,000 Marks, almost £700,000 in today’s money.
Catesby had initially hoped that James would ease the persecution of English Catholics. Instead, after a brief period of relative toleration, James reinstated recusancy fines and ordered Catholic priests to leave the country. For Catesby, this was proof that peaceful appeals to the Crown had failed. He increasingly concluded that the only way to secure a Catholic future for England was to remove the King by force. He later stated that the plan was to blow up “the Parliament House with Gunpowder […] in that place have they done us all the mischief, and perchance God hath designed that place for their punishment.” Catesby already had Fawkes’ name down as “a confidant gentleman” who could possibly join their ranks. Fawkes was eventually recruited into the conspiracy.
Their plan was a simple one. The king had planned to recall Parliament to sit sometime in February 1605. As a part of the ceremony, the Lord Chancellor would read out a declaration explaining why the king had recalled Parliament before James himself would read out a speech written by themselves often directly demanding funds, explaining royal foreign policies and warning MPs against meddling in state affairs and the divine right of God to appoint the monarch as ruler. In addition to the monarch and the Lord Chancellor, every member of Parliament – Commons and Lords – the king’s family, the Privy council and many senior government advisors would also be present for the State Opening of Parliament. This was not an emergency recall as was sometimes common but had been planned long in advance. This allowed the men, now 13 strong, to plan.
The precession taking Charles II to a state opening of Parliament
The conspirators therefore needed a royal survivor around whom they could build a new regime. Their target was the King’s nine-year-old daughter, Princess Elizabeth. Once James and the other members of the government had been killed, they intended to seize Elizabeth and proclaim her queen, governing in her name until she reached adulthood. They began by establishing a network in the Midlands. They thought that they could organise a plot to kidnap the then nine-year-old Princess Elizabeth upon hearing of the explosion and instate her as the next heir to the throne. They set up weapons caches in Warwickshire, Staffordshire and Worcestershire, while Catesby organised Sir Everard Digby to stage a hunting party that would march onto Coombe Abbey from an inn at Dunchurch and kidnap the princess.
The conspirators initially attempted to dig a tunnel beneath Parliament to place the gunpowder, but abandoned the idea when they obtained access to a room beneath the House of Lords. In stark contrast with the airport-esque security apparatus in Parliament today, the Palace of Westminster was a constant struggle between different tenants, landlords and businesses. As a result, the security was incredibly lax. When the old widow who was using the undercroft as storage began moving out, Thomas Percy, another one of the conspirators, rented the room for himself, allowing Fawkes to place the gunpowder down there.
A map of the Houses of Parliament with the Lords highlighted in red, the Thames to the right
By this time, fear of a plague outbreak had delayed the opening twice – initially to October 3rd and then to November 5th. Despite the setbacks, the plan was set to go ahead and everything was in place. Upon lighting the fuse, Fawkes would cross the Thames and the rebellion in the Midlands would help to ensure the capture of the King’s daughter. Fawkes would then leave for the continent, to explain events in England to the European Catholic powers. The King would die on November 5th 1605. If it wasn’t for one letter.
On October 26th, Lord Monteagle received the following anonymous letter from a servant at his house in Hoxton
My Lord, out of the love I bear to some of your friends, I have a care of your preservation. Therefore I would advise you, as you tender your life, to devise some excuse to shift your attendance at this parliament; for God and man hath concurred to punish the wickedness of this time. And think not slightly of this advertisement, but retire yourself into your country where you may expect the event in safety. For though there be no appearance of any stir, yet I say they shall receive a terrible blow this Parliament; and yet they shall not see who hurts them. This counsel is not to be condemned because it may do you good and can do you no harm; for the danger is passed as soon as you have burnt the letter. And I hope God will give you the grace to make good use of it, to whose holy protection I commend you.
Anonymous letter sent to Lord Monteagle on October 26th, 1605
The letter sent to Monteagle
At the time, James was hunting in Cambridgeshire, so the letter was initially kept from him. In the meantime, it was passed between several officials in Whitehall. The Earl of Salisbury deliberately kept the investigation discreet. Rather than immediately confronting the conspirators, he allowed them to believe that their preparations had gone unnoticed while the authorities gathered more information. When the King returned, he fixated on the word “blow” and felt that it hinted at “some strategem of fire and powder.” On November 3rd, a search was ordered of the grounds “both above and below” of the Houses of Parliament, which was carried out in the afternoon of November 4th
During their search, they discovered a large pile of firewood in the undercroft beneath the House of Lords, accompanied by what they presumed to be a serving man, who told them that the firewood belonged to his master, Thomas Percy. However, the mention of Percy’s name aroused suspicions, as he was already known as a Catholic agitator. Furthermore, the servants answers were considered somewhat suspicious by the men. In addition, James personally believed that the large quantity of wood was concealing something. The King ordered another, more thorough search, where they again found the man at around midnight, this time dressed in a cloak and hat, and wearing boots and spurs. He was arrested, whereupon he gave his name as John Johnson. He was carrying a lantern and a search of his person revealed a pocket watch, several slow matches and touchwood. Thirty-six barrels of gunpowder were discovered hidden under piles of coal. He was taken to the King early on the morning of November 5th.
A painting of the capture of “Johnson”
Johnson insisted on his initial story upon questioning, despite the guards knowing multiple names involved in the conspiracy such as Catesby, Winter and others. It was eventually decided that Johnson and his gunpowder should be moved to the Tower of London. Johnson was tortured, a practice that was only permitted by the King. James authorised the use of torture in order to extract information from the prisoner, although the surviving records suggest that the authorities initially questioned him without torture. Johnson remained remarkably defiant, refusing to reveal his real name or identify his accomplices. Only after several days of interrogation and torture did he finally begin providing information about the conspiracy, including his real name: Guy Fawkes
The authorities initially used relatively mild forms of torture before escalating their methods. Fawkes was eventually subjected to the rack, where the victim’s limbs were stretched by ropes and pulleys until the pain became unbearable. The King’s instructions reportedly stated that the torture should increase gradually, beginning with the “gentler tortures” and progressing to more severe measures if Fawkes continued to refuse to speak. His signature on his final confession changed dramatically from the confident “Guido Fawkes” he had initially used to a barely legible signature, demonstrating the physical condition he was in after the interrogation.
By then, however, several of the conspirators had already fled London. Catesby had received word that the plot had failed and attempted to rally his supporters in the Midlands. The conspirators travelled towards Holbeche House in Staffordshire, hoping to gather Catholic supporters and begin the wider uprising they had planned. Almost nobody joined them. The news of the failed attack had spread quickly, and the rebellion that Catesby had imagined simply did not materialise. The conspirators were now fugitives. They attempted to obtain weapons and supplies from several Catholic households, but their cause attracted little support. Some of their own former allies refused to help them, while others alerted the authorities. The group eventually reached Holbeche House, where they decided to make their last stand against the pursuing government forces.
A modern day image of Holbeche House
On November 8th, government troops arrived. Catesby and Thomas Percy stood together and fired upon the soldiers. During the ensuing confrontation, both men were shot and killed. Their bodies were subsequently exhumed and beheaded, with their heads displayed publicly as a warning to anyone contemplating rebellion against the Crown. The deaths of Catesby and Percy effectively ended the armed element of the conspiracy. Others were captured and brought to trial. Winter, one of Catesby’s closest associates and one of the original conspirators, was among those arrested. Unlike Fawkes, Winter had survived the confrontation at Holbeche House and was eventually interrogated and tortured. He eventually confessed to his involvement, although he attempted to minimise his own responsibility. Several other conspirators, including Thomas Bates, Robert Wintour and John Grant, were also captured.
The surviving conspirators were tried in Westminster Hall in January 1606. They were found guilty of high treason and sentenced to one of the most brutal punishments available under English law: hanging, drawing and quartering. The sentence required the condemned men to be hanged until nearly dead, cut down while still alive, disembowelled and emasculated, and finally beheaded and divided into quarters. Their remains were then displayed in different parts of the country as a warning to potential traitors. Fawkes was among the first group executed on January 31 1606. He was taken to the Old Palace Yard at Westminster and climbed the scaffold. According to the traditional account, Fawkes jumped from the scaffold himself, breaking his neck and dying instantly, thereby avoiding the full horror of the punishment. His body was nevertheless quartered and his remains were sent to different parts of the kingdom. No-one has been identified conclusively as the author of the letter to Lord Monteagle. The Gunpowder Plot was over. But its consequences were only beginning.
The heads of the conspirators on pikes
The government used the failed conspiracy to reinforce the argument that Catholicism represented a potential threat to the security of the state. Parliament passed the Popish Recusants Act 1605, imposing additional restrictions on Catholics and strengthening penalties against those who refused to attend Church of England services. Catholics were prevented from voting, holding certain public offices and practising law, while recusants faced increasingly heavy financial penalties. The government’s response was not simply about punishing the conspirators. The Gunpowder Plot became a powerful piece of political propaganda. Fawkes and Catesby were portrayed as representatives of a wider Catholic conspiracy to destroy the Protestant kingdom and murder the King. The fact that the plot had been directed against Parliament itself made the story particularly powerful: the conspirators had not merely attempted to assassinate James, but to destroy the country’s political establishment in one enormous explosion.
Parliament subsequently established November 5th as an annual day of thanksgiving. The Observance of 5th November Act required churches to hold services commemorating the King’s survival. For centuries, bells were rung, sermons were preached and bonfires were lit to celebrate the failure of the plot. Over time, the religious character of the commemoration diminished. Guy Fawkes Night, or Bonfire Night, became a popular tradition involving fireworks, bonfires and the burning of effigies of Guy Fawkes. Although the original purpose was to celebrate the survival of James I and the Protestant state, the event gradually became a largely secular British tradition.
A burning effigy of Fawkes on Bonfire Night
The plot also left a lasting mark on the way Parliament is physically protected. Although the modern security system bears little resemblance to the arrangements of 1605, the memory of Fawkes hiding explosives beneath the House of Lords became embedded in parliamentary tradition. Even today, the Yeomen of the Guard ceremonially search the cellars of the Palace of Westminster before the State Opening of Parliament, a ritual traditionally understood as a continuation of the searches conducted before the opening of Parliament in 1605. The search is now entirely ceremonial rather than a genuine security measure.
The Gunpowder Plot also produced one of the most enduring phrases in the English language. Fawkes’s attempt to destroy Parliament has ensured that his name became synonymous with rebellion and political subversion. Centuries later, the image of Guy Fawkes was revived by popular culture, most famously through the Alan Moore graphic novel and it’s subsequent movie adaptation V for Vendetta, in which Fawkes became a symbol of resistance against authoritarian government. The stylised Guy Fawkes mask subsequently became associated with protest movements around the world.
A pair of panels from the comic V for Vendetta
Yet the historical Fawkes was considerably more complicated than the revolutionary icon that emerged centuries later. He was not attempting to establish democracy, overthrow a dictatorship or give political power to ordinary people. He was a committed Catholic militant who participated in a conspiracy to assassinate the King, destroy Parliament and install a new regime centred around a Catholic monarch. The conspirators’ failure nevertheless transformed Fawkes into something far beyond the man he had been in life.
More than four centuries later, November 5th remains one of Britain’s most recognisable traditions. Every year, fireworks illuminate the sky and effigies of Guy Fawkes are burned on bonfires across the country. What began as a failed attempt to destroy the British political establishment has instead become a celebration deeply embedded within British culture. The Gunpowder Plot failed spectacularly – but its legacy has proved remarkably difficult to extinguish.
