Gunpowder Plot

“ CHAPTER III. THE OPINION OF CONTEMPORARIES AND HISTORIANS. We have now for so long a period been accustomed to accept the official story regarding the Gunpowder Plot, that most readers will be surprised to hear that at the time of its occurrence, and for more than a century afterwards, there were, to say the least, many intelligent men who took for granted that in some way or other the actual conspirators were but the dupes and instruments of more crafty men than themselves, and in their mad enterprise unwittingly played the game of ministers of State. ”

“ Regarded from this point of view, the words addressed by Salisbury to Edmondes on October 17, 1605, ‘more than a week,’ as Father Gerard says, ‘before the first hint of danger is said to have been breathed,’ [263] are seen to be perfectly in character, without imagining that the writer had any special information on the Gunpowder Plot, or any intention of making use of it to pave the way for more persecuting legislation than already existed. ”

“ It is, indeed, plain, as the Edinburgh Review has shown, that Father Gerard is unversed in the methods of historical inquiry which have guided recent scholars. Yet, for all [Pg 4] that, he gives us hard nuts to crack; and, till they are cracked, the story of Gunpowder Plot cannot be allowed to settle down in peace.
It seems strange to find a writer so regardless of what is, in these days, considered the first canon of historical inquiry, that evidence worth having must be almost entirely the evidence of contemporaries who are in a position to know something about that which they assert. ”

“ And it was out of this intolerance that the famous Gunpowder Plot grew. The scheme was to blow up with gunpowder the Parliament House, while Parliament was in session, and so destroy the king and members of Parliament. There was a vault under the building which the conspirators hired as a salesroom for wood and coal. They put in stealthily thirty-six barrels of gunpowder and then covered these with the wood and prepared a train so that the whole could be fired at once. ”

“ I venture, therefore, to offer the following explanation of the proceedings that led up to the delivery of the letter at Hoxton. Garnet, recognizing that in any event, successful or unsuccessful, the Gunpowder Plot would bring forth the most disastrous consequences upon the Jesuit mission in England, the reputation of the whole of the English Roman Catholics, and the position of the Holy See itself, determined finally to prevent the Plot taking place. In arranging his plans to stop the Plot, he knew that he had no power to get such men as Catesby, Faukes, and Winter to withdraw. ”

“ In the present instance the presumption raised against it is even stronger than it would commonly be. If the Gunpowder Plot were in reality what was represented, why was it deemed necessary, in Cecil's own phrase, to pervert and disguise its history in order to produce the desired effect? A project so singular and diabolical in its atrocity, prepared for on so large a scale, and so nearly successful, should, it would appear, have needed no fictitious adjuncts to enhance its enormity ”

“ Although apparently innocent of actual complicity in the Gunpowder Treason, he was hand-in-glove with several of the conspirators in their attempts to induce Spain to invade England, and when living at Brussels, he maintained an active correspondence with men like Stanley, Hugh Owen, and Garnet, to such an extent that he and Owen were denounced by Cecil as having been accessories to the Gunpowder Plot from the beginning. ”

“ It gave them a better chance of coming upon the conspirators preparing for the action, and if their knowledge was, as I hold it was, confined to the Monteagle letter, they may well have thought it better not to frighten them into flight by making premature inquiries. No doubt there was a danger of gunpowder exploding and blowing up not only the empty House of Lords, but a good many innocent people as well; but there had been no explosion yet, and the powder was in the custody of men whose interest it was that there should be no explosion before the 5th. ”

“ There can be no doubt that the issue of the Gunpowder Plot was eminently calculated to work such [Pg 107] an effect; and even more would seem to have been anticipated from it than was actually realized, for the secretary, we are told, promised King James that in consequence of it not a single Jesuit should remain in England.
In the accounts supplied to us as to the manner of the "discovery," we obtain much interesting information from the utterances of the government itself. ”

“ How sad to think that such a man should have so missed his way in the journey of life as to become so demoralized as to join in the Gunpowder Treason Plot; nay, in intention, to be the most deadly agent in that Plot. ”

“ The means how to have compassed so great an act, was not to be performed by strength of men, or outward violence, but by a secret conveyance of a great quantity of gunpowder in a vault under the Upper House of Parliament, and so to have blown up all out of a clap, if God out of his mercy and just revenge against so great an abomination had not destined it to be discovered, though very miraculously, even some 12 hours before the matter should have been put into execution. ”

“ Some persons in chief power suspecting the king would be very indulgent to Catholics, several stratagems were made use of to exasperate him against them, and cherishing the Gunpowder Plot is thought to be a masterpiece in this way. ”

“ There is every reason to believe that the Jesuit lay-brother, Nicholas Owen, alias Littlejohn, actually died upon the rack. [Vide Father Gerard's Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, p. 189.]
Finally we have the king's instructions as to Faukes [Gunpowder Plot Book, No. 17] . "The gentler tortours are to be first usid unto him, et sic per gradus ad [Pg 260] ima tenditur, [458] and so God speede your goode worke." [459] Guy's signature of November 9th is sufficient evidence that it was none of the "gentler tortours" which he had endured. ”

“ To this the government again bear witness, for they found it advisable to issue an official version of the history, in the True and Perfect Relation, and the Discourse of the Manner of the Discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, the appearance of which was justified expressly on the ground that "there do pass from hand to hand divers uncertain, untrue, and incoherent reports and relations," and that it is very important "for men to understand the birth and growth of the said abominable and detestable conspiracy." ”

“ OF the thirteen misguided men who are known for certain to have been engaged in hatching the Gunpowder Plot, and who duly paid forfeit for their treason with their lives, the fate of one only has excited an expression of regret from his posterity. This one is Sir Everard Digby, Kt., who is popularly considered to have been cajoled into joining the conspiracy, after much hesitation, against his better and prior inclinations to have nothing whatever to do with the deed ”

“ Before going to Rheims and Rome Edward Oldcorne had studied medicine.
Who among these unparalleled conspirators is then the most likely, either through fear or remorse or both feelings, to have first put into motion the stupendous machinery whereby the Gunpowder conspiracy was revealed? Only34 an energy practically superhuman would be, or could be, sufficient for the accomplishment of such an end, as — well-nigh at the eleventh hour — speedily to swing round on its axis a project so diabolical and prodigious as the Gunpowder Plot. ”

“ Catesby,' says Father Gerard in his Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot, 'was a gentleman of an ancient and great family in England, whose chief estate and dwelling was in Warwickshire, though his ancestors had much living in other shires also. Some of his ancestors had borne great sway in England. But commonly the greatest men are not the best. ”

“ At the present day, we should object to receive [Pg 54] evidence from a man who had been tortured once and might be tortured again; but as this declaration adds nothing of any importance to our previous knowledge, it is unnecessary to recur to first principles on this occasion. [90]
Winter’s examination of the 23rd, as treated by Father Gerard, raises a more difficult question. The document itself is at Hatfield, and there is a copy of it in the ‘Gunpowder Plot Book’ in the Public Record Office. ”

“ The mind of each of the thirteen Gunpowder conspirators affords the intellectual philosopher and the moral philosopher rich food for thought. What a reflection from human nature is not the soul of these men, one and all — especially Catesby, Thomas Percy, Thomas Winter, Guy Fawkes, Ambrose Rookwood, and Christopher Wright. ”

“ The brothers had two sisters,—Martha, the wife of their co-traitor, Percy; and another who was the mother of a certain William Ward, spoken of as Wright’s nephew. (Gunpowder Plot Book, articles 44, 47, 52, 90.)
By Greenway, Gerard, or both, it is asserted of nearly every one of the conspirators that they were very wild in youth, and became persons of exemplary virtue after their perversion to Popery. ”

“ The writers plainly contradict themselves. They begin by denouncing the Powder Plot as impious and abominable, and they do so most righteously, and they declare its authors to have been turbulent spirits and not religious, in which also they are right. But they go on to approve the design of murdering Cecil. What sense is there in this? If the one design be impious and detestable, with what [Pg 223] colour or conscience can the other be approved? There is no difference of principle, though in the one case many were to be murdered, in the other but a single man. ”

“ Thus we read [164] of "the deep [Pg 76] [Pg 75] cunning [of the conspirators] in throwing open the vault, as if there had been nothing to conceal;" while another writer [165] tells us, "The place was hired by Percy; 36 barrels of gunpowder were lodged in it; the whole covered up with billets and faggots; the doors of the cellar boldly flung open, and everybody admitted, as though it contained nothing dangerous." On the top of the barrels were likewise placed "great bars of iron and massy stones," in order "to make the breach the greater."
arches from the "cellar" under the house of lords. ”

“ Among the Hatfield MSS., however, there is a letter addressed [Pg 254] to Sir Everard, by one G.D., and dated June 11th, 1605, which treats ostensibly of a hunt for "the otter that infesteth your brooks," to be undertaken when the hay has been cut, but has been endorsed by Cecil himself, "Letter written to Sir Everard Digby—Powder Treason;" the minister thus attributing to him a knowledge of the Plot, more than three months before it was ever alleged that he heard of it.
APPENDIX G. (p. 94) . Henry Wright the Informer.
1. Letter to Sir T. Challoner, April, 1604. [Gunpowder Plot Book, n. 236.] ”

“ The Gunpowder Conspirators were eminently men of this stamp, and notoriously so. So well was their character known, that when, in 1596, eight years before the commencement of the Plot, Queen Elizabeth had been unwell, the Lords of the Council, as a precautionary measure arrested some of the principal amongst them, Catesby, the two Wrights, Tresham, and others, as being persons who would certainly give [Pg 36] trouble should a chance occur. ”

“ Their mistress was Mrs Perkins, the widowed sister of Mr Mease, a Berkshire farmer. It was quite true they were Catholics, all allowed; and Elizabeth Shepherd admitted that mass had been performed in the house. But what connection could there be between the Gunpowder Plot and worthy Mr Mease the faimer, or innocent Mrs Perkins the widow?
Many persons would have resigned the search: but not so Sir William Wade. Sir William Wade, the Keeper of the Tower, had an uncommonly keen scent for a heretic which term was in his eyes the equivalent of a Jesuit. ”

“ The blame of the Gunpowder Treason does not lie on ‘the papists.’ It lies, at the most, on a small body of conspirators, and even in their case, the Government must bear a share of it, not because it invented or encouraged the plot, but because, by the reinforcement of the penal laws, it irritated ardent and excitable natures past endurance. ”

“ Let us deal with the inferences from the Evidence, and ascertain to what further suggestions those inferences give rise.
Now, among the first things that must strike the reader of the list of actors in the Gunpowder tragedy is the large number that were, directly or indirectly, connected with the far-stretching, prolific province of Yorkshire. Of the whole thirteen conspirators, four first drew the breath of life in that grandest and fairest of English Counties, namely: Thomas Percy, John Wright, Christopher Wright, and Guy (or Guido) Fawkes. ”

“ Again, since “he who acts through another acts through himself,” it is unnecessary for me to treat at large in the Text concerning my supposal respecting the part that Brother Ralph Ashley played in the great drama of the Gunpowder Plot. ”

“ For “skin for skin all that a man hath will he give for his life.”
Hence, from the silence of one and all of the survivors — a silence as unbroken as that of the grave — we can, it stands to reason, draw but this one conclusion, namely, that the nine surviving Gunpowder conspirators were stayed and restrained by the omnipotence of the impossible from declaring that anyone of them had saved his King and Parliament. ”

“ Father Gerard’s first objection to this is, that whilst they were mining, ‘ridiculous as is the supposition, the conspirators appear to have been ignorant of the existence of the “cellar,” and to have fancied that they were [Pg 106] working their way immediately beneath the Chamber of Peers.’ The supposition would be ridiculous enough if it were not a figment of Father Gerard’s own brain. He relies on what he calls ‘Barlow’s Gunpowder Treason,’ [175] published in 1678, and on a remark made by Tierney in 1841, adding that it is ‘obviously implied’ by Fawkes and Winter. ”