Guy Fawkes, Thomas Bates, Robert Catesby, Edward Digby, Henry Garnet, John Gerard, John Grant, Oswald Greenwel, John Gerard, Robert Keys, Thomas Percy, Ambrose Rookwood, Oswald Tesmond, Francis Tresham, Robert Winter, Thomas Winter, Christopher Wright, John Wright; the Gunpowder Plot

 

 

The main section of this book had been published in 1605 as His Maiesties Speach in this Last Session of Parliament as Neere his very Words as Could be Gathered at the Instant: Together with a discourse of the maner of the discouery of this late intended treason, ioyned with the examination of some of the prisoners. The main bibliographical interest of this edition (apart from Thomas Lord's preface) is Edward Digby's letters, which are published here for the first time.

The accused in the Gunpowder Plot were as shown below:

Catesby, Percy, the Wright brothers, the Winter brothers and Guy Fawkes had been in on the plot from the beginning. Digby, Rookwood, Tresham, Grant and Keys were made privy to the plot later on. It was probably Tresham's letter to his brother-in-law Lord Mounteagle, warning him not to attend Parliament on November 5th, that gave the plot away, although there is some suspicion that he was planted as a double agent, and the government had known the details of the plot through him all along. The Jesuits, Henry Garnet, John Gerard and Oswald Tesmond (Greenwell) were implicated mainly because the plotters made confession to them and/or sought spiritual advice from them during the formative stages of the plot. Gerard and Tesmond evaded capture by the authorities, but Henry Garnet, Superior of the Jesuits in England, was tried and executed. Catesby, Percy and the Wright brothers were killed when the plotters were captured in Worcestershire. Fawkes himself had been captured at the time of the seizure of the gunpowder in the House of Parliament. He and the other conspirators (except Francis Tresham, who died in the Tower of London before being tried) were executed. It was rumoured that Tresham was poisoned by Mounteagle, feeding suspicions that he was indeed a double agent, killed before the trial to prevent him giving evidence that might expose the government's role as agent provocateur. 

 

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