The Rest Is History - 115. The Gunpowder Plot

Episode Date: November 4, 2021

‘Remember, remember / the Fifth of November / Gunpowder, treason & plot.” But what is it exactly we are remembering on Bonfire Night? Tom & Dominic explore what - if it had succeeded - would have been the most spectacular terrorist attack in British history: its background, its legacy, & the controversies that still bedevil our understanding of it. *The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*: Tom and Dominic are back on tour this autumn! See them live in London, New Zealand, and Australia! Buy your tickets here: restishistorypod.com Twitter:  @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thank you for listening to The Rest Is History. For weekly bonus episodes, ad-free listening, early access to series, and membership of our much-loved chat community, go to therestishistory.com and join the club. That is therestishistory.com. Remember, remember the 5th of November.

Gunpowder, treason and plot. I see no reason why gunpowder treason should ever be forgot. Welcome to The Rest Is History. We are, of course, talking about the gunpowder plot and Bonfire Night, which is tomorrow, Tom Holland. Are you a Bonfire Night aficionado? Well, I'm not because I'm very worried about hedgehogs. about the gunpowder plot and bonfire night which is tomorrow tom holland are you looking for are you are you a bonfire night aficionado uh well i'm not because i'm very worried about hedgehogs oh yes yeah i read this hedgehogs hibernate uh so they're you know this is exactly the time of

the year they're looking for a large collection of you know brushwood or something to settle down in so they they find you know these large bonfires and they think oh excellent here's a place to stay for the winter. And then the next thing they know, they're being burnt to death. So I'm very worried about that. Well, I think surely the answer to this is look out for hedgehogs,

but you should have a bonfire because it's very important to remember this shocking moment in 1605 when Guy Fawkes and co. tried to blow up the House of Parliament. Do you not think? Well, so that was the question, wasn't it? In the doggerel that you just quoted,

the famous doggerel. Yeah, no reason. Should it be remembered? Of course it should. I mean, it's interesting. I guess it should be remembered because it is an amazing story. It's absolutely kind of prototypical terrorist attack.

Great drama. Yeah. But it's also fascinating for the various ways in which it's been remembered. So the gunpowder plot. Now, I am conscious that we have lots of overseas listeners who unaccountably won't know what the gunpowder plot is. What? They don't celebrate it overseas?

Shockingly, in Catholic countries, they don't tend to celebrate it. So basically, 1605, this is a plot by Catholic conspirators with a man called Guy Fawkes, much to the fore to blow up the houses of parliament Guy Fawkes is discovered and the plot is foiled and Tom we have celebrated its defeat ever since have we not yes and overseas listeners may have seen the film V for Vendetta which is themed around Guy Fawkes night and there's a kind of mask with a figure with a beard, moustache, which has become very kind of popular with, I mean, all kinds of kind of protest movements. So you may have seen it with that. Anyway, it has been, I suppose, to a degree, is still a big deal in England. And I would guess you could say that today, in a country that's becoming ever less overtly Protestant, and the whole

narrative is about Protestants and Catholics, that it is actually starting to be forgot. Do you know, Tom, it saddens me, but I think you're right. As a stout-hearted Englishman. I'm a complete traditionalist, Rick and Mr. Bonfire Knight. You know, when I read about people in Lewes burning, they burn Pope Paul V or something, do they, in Sussex? Well, no, in Lewes, they do. they always burn him but and they burn guy fawkes and donald trump but also yes they they burn people who are in the news i i utterly approve of that i i i want to see

apprentices constructing effigies of national enemies you know do you think that they should they should put cats inside the uh i probably draw the line the cats so they then howl as they as the effigy burns which they used to do did they used i didn't know they used to put cats you're not that much of a traditionalist there's amazing stuff actually we'll come to in the second half of this about uh rioting 19th century and stuff. And also Bonfire Night celebrations in America, which is... That's a weird thing, isn't it? I mean, that really... Well, it's only weird, only seems weird now,

but of course it wouldn't have seemed weird in the 18th century. We'll come to all that, because it's always thought that Bonfire Night is a peculiarly British, if not English, thing. But of course, for a long time, it wasn't. So it did spread to the colonists and so on. But we'll get onto that that because we should probably kick off with the plot itself because it is an absolutely fantastic story, isn't it? Well, yes, except that it's complicated, isn't it?

It is complicated, as all good terrorist plots are. Well, it's very Le Carre. It's very Le Carre. And it's very Le Carre-esque, I guess, for two reasons. Firstly, that it's never entirely clear who the goodies and the baddies are. That's right. Yeah. Obviously, for most of 17th and 18th and into the 19th century in England, it was clear who the baddies were. The baddies were the evil Catholics who were trying to blow up Parliament. But actually, there's kind of skullduggery and oppression on both sides. But the second reason why it's very Le Carre-esque is that there's a kind of murk, and you're never entirely sure whether the details of how the plot came to be discovered are true.

That's right. Really, whether the entire thing was fabricated or not. I mean, I don't think it was. I think it was absolutely a genuine plot. But it has been argued that it was completely fabricated by Cecil. Yes, the spymaster. James I, the son of Lord Burley, who was Elizabeth I's minister. So it is a kind of thrillingly complicated story.

So let's give a bit of context, first of all. Maybe I'll say a bit about the context. So we're in the late 16th, early 17th century. So England has been through the Reformation. In Elizabeth's reign, there has been this sort of fear of Catholic conspiracy, hasn't there? There's been sort of Fox's Book of Martyrs, which is this huge saga of sort of Protestant martyrs being killed by evil Catholics. There's this sense of Jesuit conspirators flooding into England. I mean, actually, there's not many of them,

but there's this sort of general paranoia about them. There's this, unbelievably to our sort of 21st century eyes, there's this sense of a kind of evil empire. I think one historian called James Sharp calls it in his book, Remember, Remember. He sort of says, you know, there's this sense of an overarching Catholic conspiracy that involves the King of Spain, the Pope, all kinds of fifth columnists in England. Well, and that's the Le Carre angle as well. And yet the thing is that this isn't completely, this isn't completely mad.

Of course not, because within Elizabeth's reign, the Spanish Armada had come. Right. And there are Spanish troops across the Channel in the Netherlands. In Flanders. Yeah, exactly. And of course, there's also been a huge massacre of Protestants in Paris in 1572 in the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre. The Dutch guy, William the Silent, has been assassinated in 1584. And on top of that, perhaps the key thing is in 1570, the Pope Pius V had excommunicated Elizabeth as a heretic and had essentially said that it was the duty of any Catholic to get rid of her, perhaps to assassinate her. And so there was this... So I think understandably,

there is jitteriness and paranoia among Elizabeth's regime and among Protestants more generally. And there's this kind of terrible... When the question that's always put to Catholics, the bloody question, whose side would you take if the Bishop of Rome or other prince by his authority

should invade the realm by an army, which is a kind of impossible question for a good Catholic and a patriotic Catholic to answer because totally split loyalties. My wife is Catholic. And I often ask her that question. Mine is too. I should, you should,

you should, because it's good to know you need to know, you know, you don't want to find out that you're harboring a traitor in your own household, Tom. No, that would be shocking, wouldn't it? But of course, so now there aren't many Catholics in England.

What are the 40,000 maybe? I mean, it's very, very... That's the estimate of John Bossie, who was... That's right. That's very contested, exactly how many there are. There are some in the north, in Yorkshire and Lancashire. There are gentry Catholics. So it's the gentry that's the key, isn't it, for this story?

Because basically there are swinging fines imposed on people who don't go to the Church of England services. Yeah, recusants, as they call it. Recusants. And so essentially, increasingly, it becomes very, very expensive to be a Catholic. And, of course, also it's gentry with houses where they can build priest holes and build up the apparatus that enables particularly the Jesuits, but not only the Jesuits, priests who are coming over from Dowie, which is this kind of seminary that's being built for English priests to go back there. So they provide it.

And the key figures in this tend to be women. And they kind of leverage the fact that in the opinion of the government, the kind of institutions that patrol how people are behaving, it's assumed that men are the head of the household and it's less significant what women are up to. but actually it's women who are taking the lead in this um and that they play a kind of key role in providing links between the various recusant members of the gentry particularly in the midlands and and it's it's a midland focused conspiracy as it emerges it is i also wonder whether there's an element though tom that if you're a man and you're from

the gentry, so you're from, I mean, for people who don't know, I mean, how would you describe that? That's sort of, let's say the upper middle class for want of a better phrase. Then you might want to be a lawyer or you might want to be an MP or you might want to be a teacher or one of these things. And you can't do any of those things as a Catholic because you have to swear the oath of supremacy so basically if you're practicing believing Catholic you as a man you are shut out of public life a lot of public life unless you swear the oath now the one thing about these laws is often they're not very harshly

enforced because they're dependent on kind of local enforcement and lots of kind of local bigwigs basically turn a blind eye they know the catholic down the road is fine you know and in the 1590s so you know that the spanish armada has come and gone things are starting to ease off um things slightly kind of cool so it's it's less stressful and also the other thing that catholics have to look forward to is the prospect of Elizabeth dying. Yeah. And a new king from... Or perhaps a queen. Well, there's, yes, there's a bit of uncertainty.

Yeah, there's a bit of uncertainty. So James VI of Scotland, son of Mary Queen of Scots, who was a Catholic, but has himself been raised a Protestant, is the obvious heir. But there is another possibility, the Infanta,

who's the daughter of Philip IIilip ii who catholics in england are very excited the thought that she might i think she's descended from john of gaunt or something like that something very i think yeah so they they are kind of they're clinging to the hope either that the infanta will succeed elizabeth that's that's a long stretch and it turns out not to work or that james as the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, will be more favourable to Catholics than Elizabeth had been. Which is not wrong because James, so James, people regularly listen to us. Friend of the show. Well, no, James is a friend of the show.

Slobbering, tongue too big for his mouth, wisest fool in Christendom. But very smart. Loves a theological debate. And the thing about James is he's a Calvinist. So he's, you know, he's a Scottish Calvinist. But he's also a believer in the divine rights of kings and absolute monarchy. So he is not keen on kind of ultra-Protestant political ideology. And Catholics think, well, he's a bit ambiguous. James is a great man for unity and he wants a consensus. So maybe when he comes in as you say his mother was a catholic so he maybe represents you know he'll relax a lot of these laws and also um the the

guy who said that james was the wisest fool in christendom was henry the fourth of france well exactly so two points so he'd been a protestant who then becomes a catholic paris is worth the mass is his famous quip about that. But he does, he ends up being assassinated. Yeah, so exactly. Who's the fool there? James is actually, I think, a very smart, smart operator. And one of the things that he does very effectively is to kind of keep his options open yeah so so in the um in in the in in the months and the weeks before

elizabeth's death um a prominent catholic thomas percy who i think is the second cousin of the earl of north yeah he's a big relative of the duke one of the great great kind of nobles in england uh rules the north effectively thomas percy goes up to meet james and james kind of prevaricate says yeah okay i might i might you know get rid of the recusancy laws might might make it legitimate for catholics to worship um and thomas percy comes back and he spreads this and catholics in england want to believe this so they are looking forward to james's accession in a spirit of hope, which that spirit of hope then gets dashed when James becomes King of England and heads south. Yeah, because he's not going to, it would actually have been politically very foolish for him, I think, to have relaxed these laws, because obviously he's coming down south. There's a lot of suspicion and, you know, scotophobic, if that's a word hostility this scottish guy is pitching up is he going to change everything and obviously at first quite sensibly he doesn't want

to change everything there is a there are two other plots a couple of plots the gunpowder plot there's a plot called the bi plot for example where a load of catholics have a plan that they'll kind of kidnap james and force him to relax the laws. Is it Catholic? I'm not sure it is Catholics. Oh, is it not Catholics? No, because Walter Raleigh, there are two plots. You're right, there is a Walter Raleigh.

One of them, Walter Raleigh is involved in it as well. He's the main plot, I think, isn't he? But the chief Jesuit, Father Henry Garnet, the friend of the show because we mentioned him in the Macbeth episode, I think that he kind of tips the nod on that, one of them that's right he does he's somehow he gets to know about it and he's he he tips the knob so so james because of those plots is is twitchier than he might have been yeah and and basically he just decides that he's he's not going to go with it and lurking in the shadows we have we have a question um from fiona Did Robert Cecil know Instigate, Enable, Encourage, Smile,

knowingly in the months and weeks before? We might come to that. But Robert Cecil, who is the son of Lord Burley, Elizabeth's great kind of right-hand man, he essentially is the kind of the power behind the throne. He's very short, isn't he? He's five feet tall. Do you know what Elizabeth used to call him?

She called him her little elf. I know that James called him a pygmy. A pygmy. They were more forthright times, weren't they? I like to think that... I hope John Bercow's not listening to this podcast. So Robert Cecil is kind of lurking in the background. Yeah.

And he's essentially, you know, he doesn't want, he wants to keep things as they are. And I think essentially that a group of young noblemen, young kind of members of the gentry in the Midlands basically decide that this is a terrible thing. And the key figure not guy forks it's a guy called robert catesby yes he's from warwick show originally warwickshire gentry born in 1573 um he'd been off to do i hadn't he been to this seminary over the

over the channel and then he'd come back um and he's basically he's married a protestant he's married a protestant heiress she died she died then goes back to catholicism but this time he's kind of being radicalized yeah it's fascinating isn't it you know we read so much now about people being radicalized and becoming terrorists um he clearly has been radicalized but he's not he doesn't fit the pattern of the 21st century radicalized person i don't think because he's not, he doesn't fit the pattern of the 21st century radicalised person, I don't think, because he's from a, well, I mean, his life isn't that terrible for him. I mean, his wife has died and stuff. But, I mean, he's got lots going for him. He's very charismatic, very popular.

The whole group that he gets around him are basically, they're kind of massive lads. They're the kind of Bullington Club. They are. That's the extraordinary thing, isn't it? They fence, they gallop. And I think that a part of it is, you know, you mentioned that essentially their careers are going nowhere. And these are the kind of guys who assume that their careers

should be going somewhere. So their hopes of advancement are frustrated. So I'm sure that's an element they meet they cook it up they even cook it up in the pub i mean where is it the uh the duke and drake in the strand are on the 20th of may 1604 so it's catesby and i think five others um one of whom is is thomas percy yeah so he's gonna be thomas percy and and he comes in and he walks into the pub and he says, shall we always, gentlemen, talk and never do anything? That's the motto of this podcast, Tom.

When I read that, I thought, that's me and Tom Holland. But, I mean, that's a kind of, you know, that's a very familiar kind of phrase from terrorist groups. Yeah. We talk and talk and talk and never do anything. We never actually do anything. And it's also that sort of worship of the deed for its own sake because they don't really have a very good plan i don't think so their plan is basically they're going to blow up the houses

of parliament of the state opening a parliament so you've got james you've got the house of lords you've got the mps you've got basically House of Lords, you've got the MPs, you've got basically the entire political establishment blown sky high. And then there's that question that hangs in the air that lots of our listeners have asked, what are they going to do next? And their plan is they're going to get James's third child, who is Elizabeth, who's what, eight, nine? Yeah.

They're going to go, she's up in Coventry. God knows why, but she's in Coventry. You've been to Coventry on knows why but she's in coventry you've been to coventry on one of your trips wonderful yeah um so she's sort of tom holland of of stewart princesses she's in coventry they're gonna go up to coventry they're gonna kidnap her and they're gonna use her but i mean it's such a stupid idea it's such a it's a terrible idea isn't it it is a terrible idea i mean i was thinking what you would compare it to. And it's, it's worse than the Stauffenberg plot. So it's a bit like the Stauffenberg plot in the 1944,

get rid of Hitler. So it's decapitate the leadership, but the Stauffenberg plot has had a real sense of how they would seize power in Berlin, what they would do next and so on. These guys in the pub, I don't think they have a very good. It's also slightly that they're kind of, it's, it's young men impatient with their elders,

which is also something that you see now with a lot of, say, Islamist-inspired terrorist attacks. You'll get kind of their parents saying, we have no idea. And pretty much the same there. Yeah. I think even at the time, Tom, one of them, a guy called Thomas Winter,

when Catesby brings up the idea of the pan, he says, this is a terrible idea. But in that classic way that happens when a group of kind of five blokes and, you know, young blokes are together, the others kind of shout him down. He says, oh, OK, fine, I'll go along with it. And Catesby, as you said, everybody says he's unbelievably charismatic, so charismatic that he gets played by Kit Harington, a.k.a. John Snow. Is Kit Harington that charismatic, though, though is he not a trifle wooden yes i thought he was a trifle wooden i i thought he didn't measure up to the charisma of kate's b but also kate's b has i mean so they say why are we going to blow up parliament and he says um basically it's it's the place that they have done all the mischief or something to that effect you know this is the place where they're

they're doing us down and there's a kind of simplicity to that isn't there kind of stuff i suppose so it was a start in the stuarts but of course the plot as now what you need with any good story of a plot is a series of shambles and delays and you get that yes but also you need someone um presumably if you're going to blow it up with gunpowder you need opportunity and you need someone who knows how to handle gunpowder. So the opportunity comes from the fact that Northumberland, the Earl of Northumberland, is able to pull strings and get Thomas Percy appointed to some kind of honorary position. Gentleman pensioner. A gentleman pensioner. A gentleman pensioner.

What a great thing to me. Which means that he has ready access to the Houses of Parliament. And that means that he can start bringing in barrels of gunpowder. Yeah. And no one's going to ask questions. And they're not put in a cellar, are they? That's what we always say. It's actually a kind of stable.

I was surprised at that, yeah, when I started my in-depth research. It's actually a ground floor storeroom. But Dominic, who do they employ as their gunpowder expert? Well, he's Guy Orghido-Fawkes, isn't he? Yeah, it is. So he's a Yorkshireman. He's a Yorkshireman. And he's a very dashing fellow, Guy Fawkes.

Yeah, he really is. So he came from school in York that is still going strong today, St. Peter's School. And in 1992, the head boy of St. Peter's School said that Guy Fawkes was not exactly a role model. But in a way, he is. So he's born Protestant, becomes Catholic as a boy, I think, and goes off and really makes a name for himself in Flanders, fighting with the Spanish. He's very brave, isn't he?

He's very brave, very charismatic, got a sensational kind of red beard. Big hat. Big hat, all the works. And he gets employed by Catholic conspirators to go to Spain to see if they can persuade Philip III, son of Philip II, who sent the Armada to basically invade England. And the King of Spain says no. But that is when Guy changes his name to Guido. Right.

I didn't know that because I was puzzled about the... Now, one thing about the gunpowder, an interesting thing, the reason they're able to get there, you were saying about sort of means, motive and opportunity. One reason they're able to get the gunpowder is that England had been at war with Spain. And James, when he became king, basically called it off because he said it's going nowhere. It's a complete waste of time. So actually this gunpowder is on the market and it's cheap. There's no need for it. So they're able to get all this gunpowder and they bring it in.

But the gunpowder is there too long. Because there's plague, right? Because so often in 17th century England, 16th, 17th century England, there's a plague. So Parliament gets prorogued. It gets pushed back. So they thought it was going to be earlier. It's like a COVID delay.

Yeah, exactly. There's been a bit of a lockdown-style scenario. The opening of Parliament is postponed to the 5th of November, 1605. So a lot later than they were hoping. Anyway, the gunpowder just kind of sits there, doesn't it, in this sort of storeroom. Buried beneath wood. Yeah, tons of wood. And you would think, well, why doesn't somebody find it?

But the Palace of Westminster and that complex is a completely different beast from what there is today. It's just this great rambling, sprawling mess of buildings and there's no security. You know, there's people going in and out all the time. The storerooms are full of clutter. So it's completely understandable why nobody detects all this. And then you get this letter. Now, this is such an interesting story. The Mont Eagle letter. Yes so mont eagle is is a nobleman with catholic sympathies yeah i think that's right is he a catholic himself i can't

remember but he's he's kind of he's he's floating basically he's floating around on the edge of of catholic conspiracies that's right i think he had been a catholic and now possibly and i think i i think he's like the earl of northumberland who is catholic in his heart right say yeah um so he shortly before uh parliament is due to open um his servant comes in says he's he's been handed a letter by a mysterious figure and this letter when it's deciphered um says you should you should keep away from parliament they shall receive a terrible blow, this Parliament. Terrible blow. And yet they shall not see who hurts them.

And Monteagle takes it to Robert Cecil, who by this point has become the Earl of Salisbury. Yeah. Good to see Salisbury getting a name check. Good to see Salisbury. So I'm all over him. And Cecil takes it to james uh and so it is that um people are sent down to uh to inspect and they find the gunpowder and they find a shadowy figure but they don't at first though

no they inspect it first and they don't see it they say it was just a load of old wood who cares yeah fine or do they i mean this is all part of the Le Carre Merc. Are they waiting so that they can capture the people responsible? Yeah, because they say at the time they see a tall and very desperate fellow. But they're like, oh, it's fine. There's probably nothing wrong with it. And then James says, well, again, this is unclear. The propaganda basically says, James says, no, no, go back and check again.

In a Scottish accent. And back they go. So it's the sort of early hours of the 5th of November, a Scottish accent and um back they go so it's the sort of early hours of the 5th of November isn't it when back they go and they find a booted cloaked hatted figure with three fuses yeah called John Johnson good alias who is he he's Guy Fawkes oh my goodness you've blown it Dominic um well I mean unlike Guy Fawkes ironically um yeah so they find guy fawkes and uh and of course so much of this could be untrue right that's what's so fascinating so go back to the letter yeah it's often thought that the letter is sent to lord i mean the letter is such a dopey thing to do sent to lord mount eagle by his brother-in-law francis tresham who's one of the conspirators

and who's been very reluctant about it yeah who doesn't want his brother-in-law, Francis Tresham, who's one of the conspirators. And who's been very reluctant about it. Yeah, who doesn't want his brother-in-law to get blown up. And express reservations. But some people say that this may not be the case, that Lord Mount Eagle may have dictated the letter himself. So Antonia Fraser, who's written the great narrative account of the gunpowder plot, that's her thesis. And is that because she thinks Tresham has told Mount Eagle personally and they just want to find a way for Mount Eagle to yeah to pass it

on basically that if that if Mount Eagle knows about it because he's been on the edge of the conspiracy um he needs to kind of cover his back yeah so that he can explain how it is that he knows about the uh about the conspiracy and this. And the letter is crucial to the whole story that then gets revealed to a shell-shocked Protestant nation about what's been going on. So it's really, he gets a pension, all kinds of things. So you can't in any way have Mount Eagle being kind of fingered as a suspect.

But also that letter is the 26th of October and they wait and wait and wait the authorities before pouncing at the very last minute. And so ever since, lots of people have said, do they wait and wait and wait? Because Robert Cecil is basically looking for the most melodramatic possible story to tell to the public. Does he know about it? Or indeed, did he devise the plot? Was it a kind of false flag operation? I mean, I think no, but I think it's entirely plausible that he may have scoped out the fact. And this is, you mentioned about the delay. Yeah. That the gunpowder had been there for quite a few months.

Basically, it turns out that the plot would never have worked because the gunpowder had decayed. So it was not such a good story. Is it when you, nothing happens. No. And so perhaps, you know, it's,

I mean, totally feasible that Cecil had, had, had checked it out and realized that there wasn't any danger. And therefore it was absolutely fine to leave it there and they could catch them all red handed. Although Tom, the counter argument to that is that what's in it for Cecil to cook this up,

because it's not like he uses the gunpowder plot for some hideous crackdown on Catholics. You know, it's not a kind of rice stag fire kind of event, is it? I mean, they don't use it, I guess, politically at Rallis support for the regime. But it doesn't it's not like he can use this for some repressive purpose of his own. Yes. I mean, also, well,ames's key interest at the moment when this happens is is uh forging a union between england scotland that's his focus he's not really interested in issues about catholics or whatever um so it it has been argued that cecil who was more interested in that might have used it to try and get james back on track and so that's very good at um you

know he takes the letter to james and allows james to decipher it and pretend that he's worked it out yeah so settle plays a very kind of astute game here um but we don't know and that's that that is part of the fascination of it uh you know who are the who who's deceiving who who who who who whose plot is it essentially um and i think i think we should take a break here. And when we come back, we should look at what happens after John Johnson, a.k.a. Guy Fawkes. I gave it away. I'm gutsy with myself now.

You did, you did, you did, you did. I mean, no one would have known before this. And then look at the reverberations of the plot right the way through the centuries up to the present day. Splendid. We shall see you fireworks in hand after the break. I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. And together we host The Rest Is Entertainment. It's your weekly fix of entertainment news, reviews, splash of showbiz gossip. And on our Q&A, we pull back the curtain on entertainment and we tell you how it all works.

We have just launched our Members Club. If you want ad-free listening, bonus episodes, and early access to live tickets, head to therestisentertainment.com. That's therestisentertainment.com. Hello, welcome back to The Rest Is History. This is a 5th of November Guy Fawkes Bonfire Night special. And in the first half, we left the scene absolutely hanging. John Johnson, a.k.a. Guy Fawkes, has been discovered.

He gets taken to the Tower of London, where he is tortured to try and find out his identity. He's incredibly, I mean, he's very, very brave. He holds out for a long time. And in the meanwhile, however, Cecil's agents are going out there. They're kind of working out what's been going on. And immediately on the 5th of November, an arrest warrant is issued for Thomas Percy, who it is said on this arrest warrant, privy to one of the most horrible treasons that ever was contrived. And while Guy Fawkes is being tortured in the Tower of London, Percy, Catesby, various others of the conspirators are galloping northwards. Parliament hasn't blown up, but they are still committed to trying to seize Princess Elizabeth. Yeah. So this is an element of shambles, isn't it? Just on Guy Fawkes being tortured, you know what he, of course, he says to James, he says, I want to blow all you Scots back to Scotland.

He does. Yes. And we've got a question here on that from Annie Scott. Did Guy Fawkes hate the Scots? If so, why? And if he was certain that the two nations could not be reconciled for long, is he a most unlikely champion for Scottish independence? He did hate the Scots.

Did he hate the Scots? That's very strong. He said there is a natural host independence? He did hate the Scots. Did he hate the Scots? That's very strong. He said there is a natural hostility between the English and the Scots. All right, fair enough. Well, I mean, probably a lot of, I mean, some listeners would probably agree with him. He was very, very scotophobic. Right. And as you said, yes, he told his Scottish inquisitors that he wanted to blow them back to Scotland.

Anyway, sorry, I sidetracked you. You were talking about them. So, yeah, this is an interesting thing, and this comes to the counterfactual element that lots of people have asked about. What would have happened if the plotters had succeeded? Because actually the conspirators, as they ride across the country, at first they don't tell people it's failed.

They sort of say, hurrah. They race the country. They try to race the country. And obviously, you know, there's this dreadful sort of sequence of events where they're riding to various country houses and banging on the door will you rise up and join us people was like no go away shut the door on their faces yeah so they end up basically doing this peregrine tom holland style peregrination across the midlands of england where they they don't get to coventry don't they pitch up near dudley uh stourbridge very i mean i as a man of the West Midlands,

I have to say a slightly unglamorous location. Possibly it was more glamorous then. Maybe. They're a place called Hull Beach House in the end, aren't they, in Staffordshire on the 8th of November near Dudley. And there, there is an explosion. Yeah, there's all kinds of stuff. They accidentally set off some gunpowder.

And I think some of them get killed, some of them get injured. And then there's all kinds of stuff they accidentally set off some gunpowder and i think some of them get killed some of them get injured um and then there's a massive shootout there's a very wild west style shootout wild west shootout uh and there's a there's one of the um the guys who come to arrest them with a single bullet shoots both percy and catesby but catesby you know how he dies now i i find this too good to be true. He supposedly dies clutching with, he's got a crucifix, and he's cradling a picture of the Virgin Mary. Yeah. I think that's maybe, I mean, maybe real, real experts on this will say,

no, this is absolutely true, but that seems too good to be true for me. It's a very Hollywood kind of ending, isn't it? Well, Catesby's death basically means that we, it's because Catesby dies dies that we know you know that the shadow so much remains in shadow yeah because he was the he was the kind of the motor the inspiration the organizer of the entire plot so that is why it then becomes all the more important for the inquisitors to work out from from guy forks what's been going on and he holds out very very bravely um but he gets broken um you're not supposed to torture people are you it's against the common law yeah but they do anyway and to be fair uh the protestant authorities

are very very twitchy about it because um the accusation against the catholic powers in Europe is that they torture whereas free-born Englishmen don't torture people. But with this, they make an exception. And you can be manacled. So you basically hang from your wrists and slowly get stretched. And then you go on the rack. And everyone is always broken on the rack. And by the end, I mean, famously, Guy Fawkes has a kind of swaggering signature to begin with and

by the end it's just a kind of broken squiggle yeah and then um so they they're put on trial there's eight survivors left aren't they they're put on trial in january 1606 the presiding judge is sir edward cook who's the great father of the common law and um you know he makes sure that the whole thing is is blown into this wider conspiracy that the jesuits are behind and he he sure that the whole thing is blown into this wider conspiracy, that the Jesuits are behind. He says in the course of the prosecution that people will find this an extraordinary story, that people will not – they won't believe it could ever have happened.

Yeah, but he clearly does believe it happened. Well, at least he purports to believe it's happened. So they're sentenced to be hanged, drawn courted we all know what that means hanged brought down mutilated your privy parts are cut off and burned we haven't had some genital mutilation for a while so no luckily for guy forks he's been so you know ravaged by torture that he dies straight pretty much straight away he breaks his neck so he so four of them get get hanged by st paul's um and the other four get hanged actually in in parliament by in in westminster the yard westminster yard outside parliament uh and i i think guy forks yeah he breaks his neck yeah so he dies on the on the scaffold and then there's a further which

we talked a further uh execution which we talked about um in the macbeth episode which is henry garnett the uh the head of the jesuits in in england who gets arrested um interrogated sentenced uh harmed or uncourtered uh and the question with him that that also is kind of unclear is the degree to which he was involved because he he does know about he knew about it he he gets he says it's it's the it's the uh it's the confessional he can't reveal it uh and he says that he has tipped off you know people in rome the pope to try and to try and stop it um but against that there's the fact that uh he you know

he had tipped off um the authorities about the earlier plot when james came to the throne counts for nothing that's um you got to keep doing it you got to keep tipping off you can't tip off and then stop tipping off yeah so it's it's it's it's unclear so there's a lot of murk there but what's interesting though right is that what i found fascinating was that um james himself who who was the you know the the projected target he does not inflate this afterwards into a general attack on catholic he doesn't so he gives a speech to parliament on the 9th of november and he says um you know no foreign power was involved in this you know he doesn't take the opportunity i suppose because he's just concluded peace with sp. So he thinks, well, I'm not going to stir things up again.

But also he goes out of his way to say, you know, most English Catholics are just a bit misguided. They're very loyal. They wouldn't, you know, they wouldn't be party to any of this. So in that, rather like George Bush after 9-11, desperate not to blame it on American Muslims. But unlike George Bush, in that Bush, of course, does blame it on on on yeah american muslims but unlike george bush in that bush of course does blame it on foreign power um yes but he's kind of interesting this is not true catholicism he doesn't do that he doesn't do that you know catholicism is a religion of peace he doesn't go into that no no but he and i mean i think it's worth asking it i mean i think that's impressive because the the the scale of what was being plotted really was horrific.

So we've got a question from Simon Girdleston. Has anyone ever worked out if the gunpowder had gone off, how big the explosion would have been? The answer to that question is very unexpected, isn't it, Tom? It's very unexpected indeed. It's a top historian who you wouldn't necessarily, who you wouldn't predict. Top historian, it's top gear. It's top gear's Richard Hammond,

who in the ITV special gunpowder plot, exploding the legend, got experts in to work that out. And the answer was, it would have blown everything up. So it would have blown up the House of Parliament, Westminster Hall, Westminster Abbey would have come crashing down. So it would have blown up the house of parliament uh westminster hall westminster abbey would have come crashing down so it would have been absolute carnage um it's 36 barrels of gunpowder i mean that's a lot that's a lot yeah if it had gone off but of course it was never going to go off but if they got their way we're talking about hundreds certainly hundreds of people um and not just the great and the good either i mean this is where your sort of 9-11 comparison comes in you know there would have been all kinds of servants

guards the carnage would have been absolutely people scurrying about with petitions passers-by sightseers you know traders yeah all these kinds of people which in turn then then begs the obvious question which um simon james jones asked if it had been successful would it have initiated the catholic revolution um and he correctly says he attempts to create one despite the plot failure suggests there was no appetite for it and then simon hodge what's the hope of some kind of catholic seizure of power if the plot had succeeded realistic or even plausible i usually assume success would just have meant even worse repression afterwards this is what so the person who's actually dealt with this in a really nice essay on the bbc website is our previous guest professor ronald hudson and he goes into this and he says well we know because the plotters wrote about the

countryside saying that the plot had worked and nobody rose up so even if the plot had worked the same would have happened they would have written about the countryside and people would not have risen up and actually he says i think utterly plausibly what would have happened is in the hours and days after the plot there would have been a colossal and very bloody repression of english catholics and the person who would have become king because henry the prince of wales uh charismatic protestant here protestant hero already he would have died in the explosion, which would have left James's younger son, Charles, to become Charles I.

As he later, much later does in reality. But a very different reign, a very different person. So Ronald Hutton suggests, again, it seems to be completely plausibly that Charles, growing up against the background of this attack, this murder of his family, would have become both an absolutist, which in a sense, Charles did, but a radical Protestant absolutist, which would have got the radical Puritan opinion that in due course, go to war with him and end up putting him on the block, would absolutely got, he'd have generated enormous

radical Protestant enthusiasm. And there would have been a kind of absolutist Protestant regime. And then Hutton suggests there would, in the long run, have been a revolution. Yeah, it's great. I love a bit of counterfactual history. Yeah, I love a bit of counterfactual. Even though we dissed it in our counterfactual episode, but we reserve the right to change our minds when Ronald Hudson is involved. So yes.

And what's also interesting about this? So that's the plot. That's the counterfactual. Now the commemoration. The commemoration, the movement to commemorate it starts straight away. So January 1606, a fellow called Sir Edward Montagu,

he introduces a bill for public thanksgiving, and they say, let's have an annual service. And that annual service of thanksgiving remains in the prayer book for 250 years or so, until 1859, and is then shamefully, in my view, taken out. Is that where it all went wrong for the Church of England? Yeah, absolutely it is. I mean, I think it should have been every month frankly not every year um anyway they uh so yes so straight away but what's interesting is that the beginning i mean they do have so things they often had bells and bonfires and things like that in the 17th century but guy forks is not part of

the story really at that stage indeed not part of the story for a very long time well the thing the thing i love about the commemorations is is that um charles i obviously you know he he fights civil war head gets chopped off you get the protectorate um and and so many of the kind of traditional Christian festivals punctuate the year get banned. But Boniface Knight doesn't. So throughout the Protectorate, they're celebrating the escape of Charles I's father, the king, from people who wanted to kill him, which is kind of fabulous.

But even at that stage, they have fireworks and they have bonfires. Yes, they do. Peep sees them, doesn't he? Well, Peep's in 1660. I mean, obviously you that stage, they have fireworks. And they have bonfires. Yes, they do. Peeps sees them, doesn't he? Well, Peeps. So Peeps in 1660. I mean, obviously, you can see where they do it in 1660. The monarchy has been restored.

Charles II is back. You know, this is his grandfather. His grandfather's escaped. They have a huge bonfire and fireworks. And Peeps records it in his diary. And then in 1664, do you know what he does on Bonfire Night, Tom? He goes to see Macbeth. Of course.

Yes. Perfect. Yeah. He goes to see Macbeth. Of course. Yes. Perfect. Yeah. He goes to see Macbeth. On the way home, their coach has to be diverted because there are so many bonfires. I mean, it all adds up. But then November the 5th, 1666, doesn't he say, I've seen no bonfires? Because obviously, having huge bonfires a few months after the Great Fire of London. It would not be sensitive timing at all.

It would be poor form. It would be very poor form. The other thing that kind of swells the mood of Protestant celebration that you're celebrating on the 5th of November is that 1688, the Glorious Revolution, when the Catholic James II is forced to flee following the invasion of the Dutch Prince of Orange. This is your moment now to talk about the Dutch. Yes.

For the duration of this podcast series. This is the allotted time to talk about the Dutch. The Stadtholder, descendant of William the Silent, who'd been assassinated, leader of a Protestant war against the the catholic absolutism of um louis the 14th and he lands at torbay on the 5th of november and his birthday is the 4th of november yeah bishop gilbert burnett a year later on the 5th of november he preaches to the House of Lords and he says, all this proves, and this is a direct quote, we are God's favourite people. Because God has chosen this day and he just gives us everything. It's the day that keeps on giving.

The defeat of plots, the arrival of Dutchmen, you know, what's not to like? So it's very much the idea of England as a chosen nation and a Protestant nation. And it kind of cements in anti-popery as the kind of the great vibrant English kind of British tradition. Because obviously, William III goes on to invade Ireland to defeat Catholic armies there. And so the legacy of that endures to this day in Northern Ireland. But in England, it does start to become complicated because certainly by the beginning of the 19th century, the idea that Catholics are the inveterate enemies of Protestant England has been complicated by the fact that lots of Catholics have been executed in Paris

under the French Revolution. And Protestant Englishmen have kind of woken up to the realisation that there might be kind of foes worse than Catholics. So this is the point at which I think Guy Fawkes comes in. Yes. So you can see there are lots of plays about Guy Fawkes in the early 19th century. And there's this sort of growing sense of Guy Fawkes becoming a bit of an anti-hero, you know, a swashbuckling romantic. Well, he's kind of a hero of pantomimes and things, isn't he? Yes, there's lots of comedies about him, bizarrely.

And it's nothing about the Protestant-Catholic divide. There's a revival of that in the 1850s when the um catholic hierarchy is reintroduced into but what about when when so 1829 the catholic emancipation i don't think that did make a big massive well maybe it did and i just haven't picked up on it one thing we haven't mentioned of course is the export of this so what's really fascinating is that throughout the 18th century people are celebrating it with such gusto in America. So there's all sorts of, they call it Pope Day in New York, and they burn effigies of the Pope, the devil, and Bonnie Prince Charlie.

That's a good range. It's a good, but it's a range that makes sense, right? They're all on the same team. They're on Team Antichrist. Yes. And in Boston, the rival North and South Ends, kind of working class districts, they both produce popes. And there's a big thing in Boston on Bonfire Night where you try and grab the other person's,

the other district's pope and burn that as well as your own. Great fun. So it becomes a massive punch up to try and get the other side's pope and then burn it. That's better than the Super Bowl, isn't it? The fact that Boston has turned its back on that tradition I find very sad. I know they've had a lot of Irish and Italian immigration

and there's a lot of Catholics now, but come on they can put their confessional stuff to one side. I suppose also they've had a revolution that's got rid of the British. Yes, so you know what George Washington said about Bonfire Night? No, what did George Washington say? A ridiculous and childish custom. I mean, that just confirms my view that George Washington

is one of the most boring men who ever lived. Very dull man. Well, we cancelled him, didn't we? Yeah, we did. His statue deserves to come down for his attitude to Bonfire Night alone. And I see that they've cancelled Thomas Jefferson as well. Yeah, probably another Bonfire Night sceptic. We were ahead of the curve there.

Right, anyway, so we are alienating all our american listeners well i'll tell you who we should please therefore we need to win listeners in guildford to make up for it because uh guildford was the head was was a real bonfire night place in the mid-19th century so throughout the 1850s and 60s yeah it's a commuter town, basically, now. It would be taken over by people called the Guildford Guys, who were a mob. And it was a no-go area for the police. The Guildford Guys were rampaged.

I can't imagine Guildford as a no-go area for the police. A no-go area because the mob would take it over upon finding it, smashing stuff up and fighting. And in 1863, they had to send in infantry and dragoons to deal with the people of Guildford because they were so overexcited about Bonfire Knight. Well, the character of Surrey Towns really changed, didn't they? Yeah.

So, obviously, Guy Fawkes, I think, ends up looming larger and larger. So, Penny for the Guy. Small boys. They make kind of figures kind of human figures which they call the guy and they put him in go-karts didn't they i put around i did yeah i did yeah so did i i i'd loved the penny for the guy i'm very sorry that it and this is where american listeners can can can feel pleased because basically there was a tradition where small boys would push this guy around in

a go-kart and essentially extort money so yeah a penny for the guy but that tradition now has been taken over by the american custom of halloween yeah so the guys i mean nobody i haven't seen a guy for no no no um also the other tradition i remember from so this is 1970s is the tradition was that fireworks have become quite domestic you know you bought fireworks you did them in your back garden the tradition was that of the 20 fireworks 10 didn't go off yeah and the other 10 basically went off in your father's face yeah and it was just it was basically you know it was it was kind of party season at a and e because it was just full of middle-aged men lost an eye because a firework had gone off in their face or something.

So I suppose the decline of that might be down to health and safety. I think, yeah. I'm sure it must also be down to sensitivities over anti-Catholic celebrations. Do you think that's really true? I think a bit. Even among the drippiest, most pious. No, I think it is a bit. And I think that, I think it's also been complicated

by nervousness about, isn't this terrorism? A bit. Really? Do you think so? I do. I do think that. I think the idea of celebrating

what is essentially a kind of sectarian festival has become, dare I say, problematic. I'm going to two Bonfire Nights. Of course you are. Of course you are, because you're the robust voice festival has become, dare I say, problematic. I'm going to two Bonfire Nights. Of course you are. Of course you are, because you're the robust voice of Middle England. I'm going to warn you.

The first one is, it's at Soho Farmhouse. You can't get much more robust Middle England. Where Harry met Meghan. I'm sure Meghan doesn't approve of it. Oh, she'd be. I mean, so how is she? They could well end up on the lewis bonfire because in lewis which is this place it's in sussex isn't it lewis yeah um so they get gideon mantel who we talked about in the dinosaur episode right they get 80 000 people lining the

streets because they have these colossal effigies they've had margaret thatcher they've had george bush they've had osama bin laden they've had jerry halliwell they've had all the big names they've had margaret thatcher they've had george bush they've had osama bin laden they've had jerry halliwell they've had all the big names they've had david cameron wayne rooney donald trump they had six donald trump's one year um and they always pick people who've been in the news and set them on fire and then it's always sort of a little bit of outrage in the newspapers afterwards how could you possibly burn wayne rooney or whoever um so i i wouldn't be surprised to see harry and and Meghan on that. I'm not saying I agree with it, for those listeners who are big Meghanophiles. But do you not think that's plausible, Tom?

I think it's plausible, yeah. Who would you like to burn? Who would you burn if you had to do a... Oh, that's a good question. Do you know, it's going to sound very witty. I'm not really the burning type. I know you're not. I knew you wouldn't answer the question.

Who would you like to burn? Oh, God, so many people. Who's head of your long list? Oh, I don't know. To be honest, I find it very hard to narrow it down. Okay. I'd probably burn some of our rival history podcasters. How about that? That's a good one. Yes, I like that okay so we've we've ducked that for our very

different reasons um but one a bit one way in which guy fawkes has kind of endured so we mentioned earlier about um beef vendetta yes uh which is um alan moore's comic. Very good comic. So in the 80s. Although, I mean, you can't... Because it revolves around the whole premise. It's an alternative history of the 80s, isn't it? Yeah. In which the premise is that Michael Foot wins the general election in 1983.

Yeah, very implausible. That was never going to happen. No. So Michael Foot wins the election in 1983. I'm so glad we've got Michael Foot into this podcast. He unilaterally disarms Britain. There's then a nuclear war. Britain escapes the nuclear war because of Michael Foot.

But then there's a fascist takeover. Yeah. And there's a kind of evil dictator. And there's a shadowy figure who's basically Guy Fawkes who ends up blowing up Parliament. That's right. There's a very poor film of this, but I think it's a really brilliant graphic novel.

A great window into the sort of paranoia of the 80s. It's very Wiltshire-phobic. Is it? Yes. Is that where there's a concentration camp in Wiltshire? Yes, at Lark Hill, which is just above Stonehenge. Oh, Tom. And you whinge about a tunnel and it's a concentration camp.

No, that wasn't a concentration camp. He's made it up. He's made it up. He's made it up. So I boycott it. I think it's unacceptable bigotry against Wiltshire. Okay, well. I think he... I didn't think that was the bigotry.

I think he chose Lark Hill because he'd been on a walking holiday at Salisbury Plain and somebody was rude to him and refused him a drink of water in Lark Hill. So he's immortalised it. Wow. Oh, and also in that, there's a kind of portent, which is also unsourceably plain, kind of portent down biological weapons centre, which leaks a kind of a plague.

God, he's really got it in for Wiltshire. He really has. Yeah, he really has. But there's a kind of COVID-y type scenario of a virus escaping from a government lab. But that kind of established, as I said, the idea that these masks, Guy Fawkes masks, and I think Anonymous used it, who are kind of a radical group online. That's right. The Occupy movement, we're very keen on it.

So those are on the left. And then on the right, you've got the Guido Fawkes website, which is a kind of conservative anarchist. That's a very good point. Yeah, so Guy Fawkes has become a sort of generic anti-establishment icon. So on the Guido Fawkes website, I think the tagline is the only honest man to enter Parliament. Yeah. The only man to enter parliament in with honest intention which is which is an old joke which has been kind of recycled

because the whole premise of the website is that it's gossip that's designed to of course the gun powder the gunpowder plotters were not libertarians anarchists no you know proto-socialists or any of these things no they uh a world world Robert Catesby's ideal world would presumably have been rather like 17th century France or something a more absolute monarchy with him in a leading position it's all about social advancement

yes well as you say it's Bullingdon Club boys they haven't got the jobs they wanted yes exactly so is that it yeah i think we've put the we have we have the the last embers are dying out i'm trying to think of a bonfire related it's not really it's not really working the hedgehogs have been taken to safety i think that's the notion which we should end we should anyone who's building a

bonfire remember to check it for hedgehogs yeah you should build a bonfire by the way yeah and absolutely you should commemorate bonfire night because it's old-fashioned and it's patriotic. Yeah, but also, as Ronald Hutton in our previous episode said, it's also very ancient. The tradition of lighting bonfires is actually much older than, around this time, it's much older. But look out for the hedgehogs and you'll make Tom Holland happy. Yeah, you will.

Brilliant. All right, well, so this is going out on the 4th of November, so 5th of November is tomorrow. I hope those listening who are going to Bonfire Nights have a wonderful time. Stand back from the fireworks. I hope those of you in foreign climes who don't have the fortune to celebrate this wonderful day don't feel too bad about it. Thanks very much for listening. Bye bye. Bye bye. Thanks for listening to The Rest Is History. For bonus episodes, early access, ad-free listening,

and access to our chat community, please sign up at restishistorypod.com. That's restishistorypod.com.