Why this Guy had the plot

THREE hundred and ninety-nine years and 11 months ago today, a tall, cloaked man was discovered lurking in a storeroom beneath the Palace of Westminster.

It was just past midnight, which made the man's presence questionable enough. He was wearing boots and spurs, as if he'd just been about to make his escape, which made him seem doubly suspicious.

Sir Thomas Knyvett, the Keeper of Whitehall Palace, had him arrested. The cellar was searched and, hidden amid the large quantity of firewood stored there, 36 barrels of gunpowder were found, along with fuses.

The Gunpowder Plot had been discovered.

The man arrested that night initially gave his name as John Johnson - but he was, of course, Guy Fawkes, son of York and old boy of St Peter's School. Had he succeeded in his mission to blow up Parliament, he would have wiped out the entire Royal Family, along with most of the House of Lords and the House of Commons.

Understandably enough, given the narrowness of the escape, King James decreed that henceforth November 5, the day on which the plot was discovered, should be a day of national celebration.

We still obey that decree every year when, on November 5, we 'burn a Guy' on bonfire night.

A month from today, the 400th anniversary of the foiling of the plot, you can expect those celebrations to be particularly enthusiastic. And nowhere more so than here in York, Guy Fawkes' birthplace.

A series of events has been organised for the days leading up to November 5, as the city becomes gripped by Guy Fawkes fever.

St Peter's, Fawkes' old school, will naturally enough be playing a big part - though it won't be burning a Guy. "The tradition is that we would never burn an Old Boy, whatever they had done," said spokeswoman Jackie Pyrah.

The school will, however, be staging a Gunpowder Plotters Ball on October 29, and is joining forces with St Michael le Belfry church (where Fawkes was baptised in 1570) to organise Guy Fawkes workshops for primary schools.

They will include historical guided walks for the children, and projects related to the period in which Fawkes lived. "They will not be making bombs, however," Jackie said. "Health and safety and all that."

Other events include a Guy Fawkes weekend at Barley Hall, a lecture on firework-making at St Peter's, and performances of a new play, Remember Remember, at the Friargate Theatre in York.

There will be a Gunpowder Plot festival concert at St Olave's School on November 4 and, on bonfire night itself, a city centre celebration including pyrotechnics, street entertainers, fire jugglers and a symphony of church bells. The climax will be a spectacular fireworks display visible from across the city.

Kay Hyde of York Tourism Bureau said York would be the best place to be in the whole of the UK on November 5 - and the city expects to be deluged with visitors.

But what exactly are we celebrating? And should York be proud or ashamed of Guy Fawkes? Was he a terrorist or a freedom fighter?

The aim of the Gunpowder Plot, according to York University history professor James Sharpe, whose new book Remember, Remember, The Fifth Of November is out next week, was to destroy Parliament, tear down the Royal Family and set up a Catholic regime in its place.

King James, son of the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots, had disappointed many Catholics persecuted under Elizabeth I after he took over the crown in 1603.

Their hopes that he might restore Catholicism in England were quickly dashed. Instead, Catholics in the England of King James were still subjected to "institutionalised oppression," said Prof Sharpe.

"If you were a Catholic who refused to attend Church of England services, you could be fined," he said. "If you were a Catholic priest, you could be executed for treason. If you were aiding a Catholic priest or spreading Catholic propaganda, you could be executed."

It wasn't a good time to be a Catholic, in other words. York's own Margaret Clitheroe had been pressed to death in 1586 - when Fawkes was 16 - for sheltering and aiding Jesuit priests, and matters hadn't changed much.

Fawkes and his fellow plotters would have seen themselves as holy martyrs or freedom fighters.

There are obvious parallels to September 11 and the London bombings, Prof Sharpe said, not least in that, while Fawkes would have claimed to be acting for all Catholics, most moderate Catholics of the day were appalled by his actions.

"It was very much a group of hard-liners," Prof Sharpe said. "There was not much support for Guy Fawkes."

The horror of 400 years ago has been diminished by time, so that the November 5 celebrations which once marked England's (and King James') deliverance from the plotters have now become little more than an annual excuse to have fun.

For most people, what November 5 is really about has been all but forgotten, despite the fact that we still ritually burn an effigy of Fawkes.

He is, Prof Sharpe acknowledged, now one of the few instantly recognisable people in English history, even though he himself was a comparatively small cog in the Gunpowder Plot.

So should we in York be proud of him?

Kay Hyde of York Tourism Bureau wouldn't go that far.

"But he is part of York's history," she said. "He has become a part of people's upbringing. I was brought up burning the Guy, asking for a penny for the Guy.

"York has a quite bloody and nasty history, people such as Dick Turpin, the Romans, the Vikings. Guy Fawkes is part of that.

"A key reason that people give for coming to York is the history. We want people to come to the city and enjoy the fireworks and the whole programme of events."

Just as long as we remember, remember on the fifth of November that the man we are commemorating was a terrorist.

Who was Guy Fawkes?

Fawkes was born a Protestant in York in 1570 and baptised at St Michael le Belfry church. His father died when the young plotter was nine, and his mother married into a family of secret Catholics. Fawkes later converted to Catholicism.

He attended St Peter's School along with fellow Gunpowder plotters John and Christopher Wright, and later fought for Catholics against Protestants in religious wars across Europe.

In 1601 he met up with his old St Peter's schoolfellow Christopher Wright in Madrid and was recruited into the plot to kill King James.

Even after his arrest, he remained defiant. Dragged into the presence of King James, who asked him "how he Fawkes could conspire so hideous a treason against his the King's children and so many innocent souls which never offended him," Fawkes, who was 'smiling scornfully' replied that "a dangerous disease required a desperate remedy".

He was tortured to force him to name his fellow conspirators, and became the last of them to be executed, hanged on January 31 1606. His body was drawn and quartered and sent to all four quarters of the kingdom as a warning.

What do youngsters at St Peter's School think about having such a notorious plotter as an Old Boy?

Hattie Coulter, 13: "I think it is right that we don't burn Guy Fawkes on a bonfire here. He was a terrorist, and what he did was not the best way of getting his views across. But he really believed in what he did."

Matthew Norell, 13: "He was a mixture of terrorist and freedom fighter, but he could have done things differently. I have burned a Guy on a bonfire, although I didn't know then he was an Old Boy. He was going to burn down lots of people!"

Josh Tankard, 14: "I think he had no other option, because it was an unfree society. I think he was different to what terrorists do today. They are more barbaric now. Cutting people's heads off is not very nice."

Sara Drake, 13: "He should not have done what he did. I think he should have tried something else - maybe even burning a church. With nobody in, of course. And not a Catholic church!"

Guy Fawkes 400 celebrations

Highlights include:

- October 29: Gunpowder Plotters Ball. Sold Out

- October 29-30: Guy Fawkes weekend, Barley Hall

- October 31: Fireworks, principles and practices, talk at St Peter's School by the Rev Ron Lancaster of Kimbolton Fireworks

- October 31 and November 2/7/9: Guy Fawkes workshops for primary schools, St Michael-le-Belfry. Fully booked

- November 1-4, York Dungeon: come face to face with Guy Fawkes

- November 1-5: Remember Remember... The Tragedy of the Gunpowder terror, Friargate Theatre

November 3: author Martin Stephen talks at St Peter's School on "The Desperate remedy: Henry Gresham and the Gunpowder Plot."

- November 4: Remember Remember the Fifth of November: talk by Professors James Sharpe and Lisa Jardine, St William's College

- November 4: Gunpowder Plot festival concert, St Peter's School

- November 5-6: Gunpowder, Treason & Plot - the real story of the plot, Clifford's Tower

- November 5: Gunpowder, Treason & Plot, music and words for November 5, Yorkshire Bach Choir, St Michael le Belfry

- November 5: City centre entertainment and skyline fireworks display.

Updated: 10:37 Wednesday, October 05, 2005