Francis Tresham
Encyclopedia
Francis Tresham eldest son of Sir Thomas Tresham
and Merial Throckmorton, was a member of the group of English
provincial catholic
s who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot
of 1605, a conspiracy to assassinate King James I of England
. Tresham was imprisoned for his part in the Earl of Essex
's failed rebellion against the government in 1601, and only his family's intervention and his father's money saved him from being attainted. The incident did not stop him from becoming involved in two missions to Catholic
Spain to seek support for English Catholics (then heavily persecuted) – and finally with the Gunpowder Plotters.
According to his confession, Tresham joined the plot in October 1605. Its leader Robert Catesby
asked him to provide a large sum of money and the use of Rushton Hall
, but Tresham apparently provided neither, instead giving a much smaller amount of money to fellow plotter Thomas Wintour
. Tresham also expressed his concern that two of his brothers-in-law would be killed if the plot succeeded. An anonymous letter delivered to one of them, William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
, was handed over to Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
, and eventually proved decisive in foiling the conspiracy.
Historians have long suspected that Tresham wrote the letter, a hypothesis that remains unproven. Catesby and Wintour also thought that Tresham was the letter's author and threatened to kill him, but he was able to convince them otherwise. Tresham was arrested on 12 November and confined in the Tower of London
. In his confession he sought to allay his involvement in the plot, but never mentioned the letter. He died of natural causes on 23 December 1605.
, of Rushton
in Northamptonshire
, and Meriel Throckmorton, daughter of Sir Robert Throckmorton
of Coughton in Warwickshire
. According to the antiquary Anthony Wood
, Tresham was educated in Oxford
at either St John's College
or Gloucester Hall
or both, although biographer Mark Nicholls mentions that there appears to be no other evidence to corroborate the claim. With his wife Anne Tufton, daughter of Sir John Tufton of Hothfield in Kent, whom he married in 1593, he had three children, twins Lucy and Thomas (b.1598), and Elizabeth. Thomas died in infancy, Lucy became a nun in Brussels, and Elizabeth married Sir George Heneage of Hainton, Lincolnshire.
Tresham's father, born near the end of Henry VIII
's reign, was regarded by the Catholic community as one of its leaders. He was received into the Catholic Church in 1580, and in the same year allowed the Jesuit Edmund Campion
to stay at his house in Hoxton
. For the latter, following Campion's capture in 1581, he was tried in Star Chamber
. Thomas refused to fully comply with his interrogators, the beginning of years of fines and spells in prison. He proclaimed the accession of James I
to the English throne, but the king's promises to Thomas of forestry commissions and an end to recusancy
fines were not kept. His finances were seriously depleted by fines of £7,720 for recusancy, and the spending of £12,200 on the marriages of six daughters meant that when he died in 1605, his estate was £11,500 in debt.
Author Antonia Fraser
suggests that as a young man Francis became "resentful of his father's authority and profligate with his father's money." Authors Peter Marshall and Geoffrey Scott describe him as possessing a "somewhat hot-headed nature", while another source calls him a "wild unstayed man". The Jesuit priest Oswald Tesimond
wrote that he was "a man of sound judgement. He knew how to look after himself, but was not much to be trusted". While still young he assaulted a man and his pregnant daughter, claiming that their family owed his father money. Tresham spent time in prison for this offence.
On 8 February 1601 Tresham joined the Earl of Essex
in open rebellion against the government. Essex's aim was to secure his own ambitions, but the Jesuit Henry Garnet
described the young men who accompanied him as being interested mostly in furthering the Catholic cause. Captured and imprisoned, Tresham appealed to Katherine Howard
, but was rebuked. His sister, Lady Mounteagle, alerted his cousin John Throckmorton, who turned to "three most honorable parsons and one especiall instrument" for help. The identity of these individuals is unclear, but Tresham was promised freedom on the condition that over the next three months his father pay £2,100 to William Ayloffe, to "save his lyef attainder in bloode." He was released on 21 June, but was not dissuaded from engaging in further conspiracies; in 1602 and 1603 he was involved in the missions to Catholic Spain made by Thomas Wintour
, Anthony Dutton (possibly an alias of Christopher Wright) and Guy Fawkes
, later dubbed by the English government as the Spanish Treason. However, upon James's accession to the throne, he told Thomas Wintour (secretary to Tresham's brother-in-law William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
), that he would "stand wholly for the King", and "to have no speech with him of Spain."
, as he appeared to be more moderate toward Catholics than his predecessor, but Robert Catesby
, a religious zealot also imprisoned for his involvement in the Essex rebellion, had grown tired of James's supposed perfidy and planned to kill the king. This he would achieve by blowing up the House of Lords with gunpowder, and then inciting a popular revolt to install James's daughter Princess Elizabeth
as titular Queen.
Catesby had recruited 11 fellow Catholics to his cause but was running out of money. Even with his debts, with an annual income of over £3,000 Tresham was one of the wealthiest people known to the plotters, and Catesby's mother was Anne Throckmorton, an aunt of Tresham's. The two cousins had been raised together, and shared a close relationship.
Despite this and their earlier involvement with Tresham in the Spanish Treason, the plotters chose not to reveal the plot to him until 14 October 1605, shortly after his father died, and just weeks before the planned explosion. According to his confession, the meeting took place in Clerkenwell
at the home of Tresham's brother-in-law, Lord Stourton. Tresham claimed to have questioned Catesby on the morality of the plot, asking if it was spiritually "damnable". Catesby replied that it was not, at which point Tresham highlighted the danger that all Catholics would face should the plot succeed. Catesby replied, "The necessity of the Catholics" was such that "it must needs be done". He wanted two things from Tresham: £2,000, and the use of Rushton Hall
; Catesby received neither. Tresham had no money to spare, his father's debts having reduced his inheritance. Following the meeting, he hurried back to Rushton Hall and closed his household taking care to hide family papers (not discovered until 1838), before returning to London with his mother and sisters. Tresham did, however, pay a small sum to Thomas Wintour on the understanding that he was travelling to the Low Countries
. On 2 November he also acquired a licence to travel abroad with his servants and horses.
, and Edward Stourton, 10th Baron Stourton
. Catesby's answer to this was that "the innocent must perish with the guilty, sooner than ruin the chances of success." However, as the last few details were being finalised that month, on Saturday 26 October Monteagle received an anonymous letter while at his house in Hoxton
. It contained the following message:
Uncertain of its meaning, Monteagle delivered it to the English Secretary of State
, Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
.
Tresham has long been suspected as the letter's author. Mark Nicholls states that Tresham almost certainly wrote it, pointing to the fact that when Catesby was made aware of its existence he immediately suspected Tresham and went with Thomas Wintour to confront him. The two threatened to "hang him", but "with such oaths and emphatic assertions" Tresham managed to convince the pair of his innocence, and the next day urged them by letter to abandon the plot. Antonia Fraser suggests that Catesby and Wintour's decision to believe him should not be disregarded. While making his deathbed confession in the Tower of London
Tresham failed to mention the letter; an omission which in her opinion makes no sense if Tresham is to be regarded as its author, especially considering that its recipient was by then being credited as the country's saviour. Author Alan Haynes views Tresham as the most likely culprit, but raises the possibility that Salisbury penned the letter himself, to protect a source.
in 1567. The following day members of the Privy Council visited the king to inform him that a search would be made of the Houses of Parliament, "both above and below". Meanwhile Tresham again warned Catesby and Wintour to abandon the scheme, to no avail. Fellow plotter Thomas Percy said he was ready to "abide the uttermost trial", and subsequently on 4 November Catesby and several others left London for the Midlands to prepare for the planned uprising.
Fawkes was discovered guarding the explosives shortly after midnight on 5 November 1605, and was immediately arrested. Calling himself John Johnson, he was at first interrogated by members of the King's Privy Chamber, but on 6 November the king ordered that "John Johnson" be tortured. His defiance was broken at some point on 7 November, when he revealed his true identity. On 8 November he began to name some of those with whom he was associated, but Tresham was not identified until the following day, and was attributed with only a minor role. On hearing the news that Fawkes had been captured those plotters still in London had fled for the Midlands but Tresham had stayed in the city, where he was arrested on 12 November. He was transferred to the Tower three days later. Catesby and several other plotters were killed on 8 November, during an armed siege at Holbeche House
in Staffordshire
.
His health began to rapidly decline in December. He suffered from a strangury
caused by an inflammation of the urinary tract. Lieutenant of the Tower William Waad, wondering if Tresham would live long enough for justice to take its course, described his condition as "worse and worse". Tresham preferred the services of a Dr Richard Foster over those of the Tower's regular doctor Matthew Gwinne
; apparently Foster understood his case, indicating that it was not the first occasion on which he had treated him. Three more doctors and a nurse attended him during his last days along with William Vavasour, a rumoured illegitimate child of Thomas Tresham, and therefore possibly Francis's half-brother. Vavasour wrote Tresham's deathbed confession as his wife, Anne, was apparently too upset to do so herself, and also an account of Tresham's last hours. Tresham apologised to the Jesuit priest Henry Garnet
for implicating him in the Spanish Treason, and used the rest of his deathbed confession to pronounce his innocence. Anne and Vavasour read prayers at his bedside and he died at 2:00 am on 23 December. Despite not being tried, his head joined those of Catesby and Percy on display at Northampton while his body was thrown into a hole at Tower Hill
. His estates passed to his brother Lewis. Tresham's apology never reached its intended target, and the letter along with the discovery of Garnet's Of Equivocation, found among the "heretical, treasonable and damnable books" at Tresham's chamber in the Inner Temple
, was used to great effect by Sir Edward Coke
in Garnet's trial. The priest was executed in May 1606.
Thomas Tresham II
Sir Thomas Tresham was a Catholic recusant politician at the end of the Tudor dynasty and the start of the Stuart dynasty in England....
and Merial Throckmorton, was a member of the group of English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
provincial catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
s who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot
Gunpowder Plot
The Gunpowder Plot of 1605, in earlier centuries often called the Gunpowder Treason Plot or the Jesuit Treason, was a failed assassination attempt against King James I of England and VI of Scotland by a group of provincial English Catholics led by Robert Catesby.The plan was to blow up the House of...
of 1605, a conspiracy to assassinate King James I of England
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
. Tresham was imprisoned for his part in the Earl of Essex
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, KG was an English nobleman and a favourite of Elizabeth I. Politically ambitious, and a committed general, he was placed under house arrest following a poor campaign in Ireland during the Nine Years' War in 1599...
's failed rebellion against the government in 1601, and only his family's intervention and his father's money saved him from being attainted. The incident did not stop him from becoming involved in two missions to Catholic
Catholic
The word catholic comes from the Greek phrase , meaning "on the whole," "according to the whole" or "in general", and is a combination of the Greek words meaning "about" and meaning "whole"...
Spain to seek support for English Catholics (then heavily persecuted) – and finally with the Gunpowder Plotters.
According to his confession, Tresham joined the plot in October 1605. Its leader Robert Catesby
Robert Catesby
Robert Catesby , was the leader of a group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605....
asked him to provide a large sum of money and the use of Rushton Hall
Rushton, Northamptonshire
Rushton is a small village and civil parish in Northamptonshire. It is north-east of Rothwell. At the time of the 2001 census, the parish's population was 452 people. The village has a primary school and a pub opposite the village cricket pitch. The village is home to Rushton Triangular Lodge.-...
, but Tresham apparently provided neither, instead giving a much smaller amount of money to fellow plotter Thomas Wintour
Thomas Wintour
Robert Wintour and Thomas Wintour , also spelt Winter, were members of the Gunpowder Plot, a failed conspiracy to assassinate King James I. Both were related to other conspirators, such as their cousin, Robert Catesby, and a half-brother, John Wintour, also joined them following the plot's failure...
. Tresham also expressed his concern that two of his brothers-in-law would be killed if the plot succeeded. An anonymous letter delivered to one of them, William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
William Parker, 13th Baron Morley, 4th Baron Monteagle was an English peer, Lord of Morley, Hingham, Hockering, &c., in Norfolk, the eldest son of Edward Parker, 12th Baron Morley , and of Elizabeth Stanley, daughter and heiress of William Stanley, 3rd Baron Monteagle .When quite a youth he...
, was handed over to Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, KG, PC was an English administrator and politician.-Life:He was the son of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley and Mildred Cooke...
, and eventually proved decisive in foiling the conspiracy.
Historians have long suspected that Tresham wrote the letter, a hypothesis that remains unproven. Catesby and Wintour also thought that Tresham was the letter's author and threatened to kill him, but he was able to convince them otherwise. Tresham was arrested on 12 November and confined in the Tower of London
Tower of London
Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...
. In his confession he sought to allay his involvement in the plot, but never mentioned the letter. He died of natural causes on 23 December 1605.
Family and life before 1605
Born in about 1567, Francis Tresham was the eldest son of Sir Thomas TreshamThomas Tresham II
Sir Thomas Tresham was a Catholic recusant politician at the end of the Tudor dynasty and the start of the Stuart dynasty in England....
, of Rushton
Rushton, Northamptonshire
Rushton is a small village and civil parish in Northamptonshire. It is north-east of Rothwell. At the time of the 2001 census, the parish's population was 452 people. The village has a primary school and a pub opposite the village cricket pitch. The village is home to Rushton Triangular Lodge.-...
in Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire
Northamptonshire is a landlocked county in the English East Midlands, with a population of 629,676 as at the 2001 census. It has boundaries with the ceremonial counties of Warwickshire to the west, Leicestershire and Rutland to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshire to the south-east,...
, and Meriel Throckmorton, daughter of Sir Robert Throckmorton
Robert Throckmorton
Sir Robert Throckmorton of Coughton Court, MP, KG was a distinguished English Tudor courtier.-Overview:...
of Coughton in Warwickshire
Warwickshire
Warwickshire is a landlocked non-metropolitan county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, although the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare...
. According to the antiquary Anthony Wood
Anthony Wood
Anthony Wood or Anthony à Wood was an English antiquary.-Early life:Anthony Wood was the fourth son of Thomas Wood , BCL of Oxford, where Anthony was born...
, Tresham was educated in Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
at either St John's College
St John's College, Oxford
__FORCETOC__St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Oxford, one of the larger Oxford colleges with approximately 390 undergraduates, 200 postgraduates and over 100 academic staff. It was founded by Sir Thomas White, a merchant, in 1555, whose heart is buried in the chapel of...
or Gloucester Hall
Worcester College, Oxford
Worcester College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. The college was founded in the eighteenth century, but its predecessor on the same site had been an institution of learning since the late thirteenth century...
or both, although biographer Mark Nicholls mentions that there appears to be no other evidence to corroborate the claim. With his wife Anne Tufton, daughter of Sir John Tufton of Hothfield in Kent, whom he married in 1593, he had three children, twins Lucy and Thomas (b.1598), and Elizabeth. Thomas died in infancy, Lucy became a nun in Brussels, and Elizabeth married Sir George Heneage of Hainton, Lincolnshire.
Tresham's father, born near the end of Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
's reign, was regarded by the Catholic community as one of its leaders. He was received into the Catholic Church in 1580, and in the same year allowed the Jesuit Edmund Campion
Edmund Campion
Saint Edmund Campion, S.J. was an English Roman Catholic martyr and Jesuit priest. While conducting an underground ministry in officially Protestant England, Campion was arrested by priest hunters. Convicted of high treason by a kangaroo court, he was hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn...
to stay at his house in Hoxton
Hoxton
Hoxton is an area in the London Borough of Hackney, immediately north of the financial district of the City of London. The area of Hoxton is bordered by Regent's Canal on the north side, Wharf Road and City Road on the west, Old Street on the south, and Kingsland Road on the east.Hoxton is also a...
. For the latter, following Campion's capture in 1581, he was tried in Star Chamber
Star Chamber
The Star Chamber was an English court of law that sat at the royal Palace of Westminster until 1641. It was made up of Privy Counsellors, as well as common-law judges and supplemented the activities of the common-law and equity courts in both civil and criminal matters...
. Thomas refused to fully comply with his interrogators, the beginning of years of fines and spells in prison. He proclaimed the accession of James I
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...
to the English throne, but the king's promises to Thomas of forestry commissions and an end to recusancy
Recusancy
In the history of England and Wales, the recusancy was the state of those who refused to attend Anglican services. The individuals were known as "recusants"...
fines were not kept. His finances were seriously depleted by fines of £7,720 for recusancy, and the spending of £12,200 on the marriages of six daughters meant that when he died in 1605, his estate was £11,500 in debt.
Author Antonia Fraser
Antonia Fraser
Lady Antonia Margaret Caroline Fraser, DBE , née Pakenham, is an Anglo-Irish author of history, novels, biographies and detective fiction, best known as Antonia Fraser...
suggests that as a young man Francis became "resentful of his father's authority and profligate with his father's money." Authors Peter Marshall and Geoffrey Scott describe him as possessing a "somewhat hot-headed nature", while another source calls him a "wild unstayed man". The Jesuit priest Oswald Tesimond
Oswald Tesimond
Oswald Tesimond was a Jesuit born in either Northumberland or York who, while not a direct conspirator, had some involvement in the Gunpowder Plot....
wrote that he was "a man of sound judgement. He knew how to look after himself, but was not much to be trusted". While still young he assaulted a man and his pregnant daughter, claiming that their family owed his father money. Tresham spent time in prison for this offence.
On 8 February 1601 Tresham joined the Earl of Essex
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex
Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, KG was an English nobleman and a favourite of Elizabeth I. Politically ambitious, and a committed general, he was placed under house arrest following a poor campaign in Ireland during the Nine Years' War in 1599...
in open rebellion against the government. Essex's aim was to secure his own ambitions, but the Jesuit Henry Garnet
Henry Garnet
Henry Garnet , sometimes Henry Garnett, was a Jesuit priest executed for his complicity in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Born in Derbyshire, he was educated in Nottingham and later at Winchester College, before moving to London in 1571 to work for a publisher...
described the young men who accompanied him as being interested mostly in furthering the Catholic cause. Captured and imprisoned, Tresham appealed to Katherine Howard
Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk
Admiral Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk, KG, PC was a son of Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk by his second wife Margaret Audley, Duchess of Norfolk, the daughter and heiress of the 1st Baron Audley of Walden....
, but was rebuked. His sister, Lady Mounteagle, alerted his cousin John Throckmorton, who turned to "three most honorable parsons and one especiall instrument" for help. The identity of these individuals is unclear, but Tresham was promised freedom on the condition that over the next three months his father pay £2,100 to William Ayloffe, to "save his lyef attainder in bloode." He was released on 21 June, but was not dissuaded from engaging in further conspiracies; in 1602 and 1603 he was involved in the missions to Catholic Spain made by Thomas Wintour
Thomas Wintour
Robert Wintour and Thomas Wintour , also spelt Winter, were members of the Gunpowder Plot, a failed conspiracy to assassinate King James I. Both were related to other conspirators, such as their cousin, Robert Catesby, and a half-brother, John Wintour, also joined them following the plot's failure...
, Anthony Dutton (possibly an alias of Christopher Wright) and Guy Fawkes
Guy Fawkes
Guy Fawkes , also known as Guido Fawkes, the name he adopted while fighting for the Spanish in the Low Countries, belonged to a group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605.Fawkes was born and educated in York...
, later dubbed by the English government as the Spanish Treason. However, upon James's accession to the throne, he told Thomas Wintour (secretary to Tresham's brother-in-law William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
William Parker, 13th Baron Morley, 4th Baron Monteagle was an English peer, Lord of Morley, Hingham, Hockering, &c., in Norfolk, the eldest son of Edward Parker, 12th Baron Morley , and of Elizabeth Stanley, daughter and heiress of William Stanley, 3rd Baron Monteagle .When quite a youth he...
), that he would "stand wholly for the King", and "to have no speech with him of Spain."
Introduction
English Catholics had hoped that the persecution of their faith would end when James succeeded Elizabeth IElizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...
, as he appeared to be more moderate toward Catholics than his predecessor, but Robert Catesby
Robert Catesby
Robert Catesby , was the leader of a group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605....
, a religious zealot also imprisoned for his involvement in the Essex rebellion, had grown tired of James's supposed perfidy and planned to kill the king. This he would achieve by blowing up the House of Lords with gunpowder, and then inciting a popular revolt to install James's daughter Princess Elizabeth
Elizabeth of Bohemia
Elizabeth of Bohemia was the eldest daughter of King James VI and I, King of Scotland, England, Ireland, and Anne of Denmark. As the wife of Frederick V, Elector Palatine, she was Electress Palatine and briefly Queen of Bohemia...
as titular Queen.
Catesby had recruited 11 fellow Catholics to his cause but was running out of money. Even with his debts, with an annual income of over £3,000 Tresham was one of the wealthiest people known to the plotters, and Catesby's mother was Anne Throckmorton, an aunt of Tresham's. The two cousins had been raised together, and shared a close relationship.
Despite this and their earlier involvement with Tresham in the Spanish Treason, the plotters chose not to reveal the plot to him until 14 October 1605, shortly after his father died, and just weeks before the planned explosion. According to his confession, the meeting took place in Clerkenwell
Clerkenwell
Clerkenwell is an area of central London in the London Borough of Islington. From 1900 to 1965 it was part of the Metropolitan Borough of Finsbury. The well after which it was named was rediscovered in 1924. The watchmaking and watch repairing trades were once of great importance...
at the home of Tresham's brother-in-law, Lord Stourton. Tresham claimed to have questioned Catesby on the morality of the plot, asking if it was spiritually "damnable". Catesby replied that it was not, at which point Tresham highlighted the danger that all Catholics would face should the plot succeed. Catesby replied, "The necessity of the Catholics" was such that "it must needs be done". He wanted two things from Tresham: £2,000, and the use of Rushton Hall
Rushton, Northamptonshire
Rushton is a small village and civil parish in Northamptonshire. It is north-east of Rothwell. At the time of the 2001 census, the parish's population was 452 people. The village has a primary school and a pub opposite the village cricket pitch. The village is home to Rushton Triangular Lodge.-...
; Catesby received neither. Tresham had no money to spare, his father's debts having reduced his inheritance. Following the meeting, he hurried back to Rushton Hall and closed his household taking care to hide family papers (not discovered until 1838), before returning to London with his mother and sisters. Tresham did, however, pay a small sum to Thomas Wintour on the understanding that he was travelling to the Low Countries
Low Countries
The Low Countries are the historical lands around the low-lying delta of the Rhine, Scheldt, and Meuse rivers, including the modern countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and parts of northern France and western Germany....
. On 2 November he also acquired a licence to travel abroad with his servants and horses.
Monteagle letter
Tresham attended a meeting later in October with several other conspirators, at which the fates of several notable Catholic peers were discussed. Foremost in Tresham's thoughts were the lives of two brothers-in-law, William Parker, 4th Baron MonteagleWilliam Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle
William Parker, 13th Baron Morley, 4th Baron Monteagle was an English peer, Lord of Morley, Hingham, Hockering, &c., in Norfolk, the eldest son of Edward Parker, 12th Baron Morley , and of Elizabeth Stanley, daughter and heiress of William Stanley, 3rd Baron Monteagle .When quite a youth he...
, and Edward Stourton, 10th Baron Stourton
Edward Stourton, 10th Baron Stourton
Edward Stourton, 10th Baron Stourton was a younger son of Charles Stourton, 8th Baron Stourton. He succeeded his brother John in 1588....
. Catesby's answer to this was that "the innocent must perish with the guilty, sooner than ruin the chances of success." However, as the last few details were being finalised that month, on Saturday 26 October Monteagle received an anonymous letter while at his house in Hoxton
Hoxton
Hoxton is an area in the London Borough of Hackney, immediately north of the financial district of the City of London. The area of Hoxton is bordered by Regent's Canal on the north side, Wharf Road and City Road on the west, Old Street on the south, and Kingsland Road on the east.Hoxton is also a...
. It contained the following message:
Uncertain of its meaning, Monteagle delivered it to the English Secretary of State
Secretary of State (England)
In the Kingdom of England, the title of Secretary of State came into being near the end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I , the usual title before that having been King's Clerk, King's Secretary, or Principal Secretary....
, Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury
Robert Cecil, 1st Earl of Salisbury, KG, PC was an English administrator and politician.-Life:He was the son of William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley and Mildred Cooke...
.
Tresham has long been suspected as the letter's author. Mark Nicholls states that Tresham almost certainly wrote it, pointing to the fact that when Catesby was made aware of its existence he immediately suspected Tresham and went with Thomas Wintour to confront him. The two threatened to "hang him", but "with such oaths and emphatic assertions" Tresham managed to convince the pair of his innocence, and the next day urged them by letter to abandon the plot. Antonia Fraser suggests that Catesby and Wintour's decision to believe him should not be disregarded. While making his deathbed confession in the Tower of London
Tower of London
Her Majesty's Royal Palace and Fortress, more commonly known as the Tower of London, is a historic castle on the north bank of the River Thames in central London, England. It lies within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, separated from the eastern edge of the City of London by the open space...
Tresham failed to mention the letter; an omission which in her opinion makes no sense if Tresham is to be regarded as its author, especially considering that its recipient was by then being credited as the country's saviour. Author Alan Haynes views Tresham as the most likely culprit, but raises the possibility that Salisbury penned the letter himself, to protect a source.
Revealed
The secretary of state was aware already of certain stirrings even before he received Monteagle's letter, but he did not yet know the exact nature of the plot or who was involved. He had therefore elected to watch and see what would happen. When the letter was shown to the king on Friday 1 November, James felt that it hinted at "some strategem of fire and powder", perhaps an explosion exceeding in violence the one that killed his father, Lord DarnleyHenry Stuart, Lord Darnley
Henry Stewart or Stuart, 1st Duke of Albany , styled Lord Darnley before 1565, was king consort of Scotland and murdered at Kirk o'Field...
in 1567. The following day members of the Privy Council visited the king to inform him that a search would be made of the Houses of Parliament, "both above and below". Meanwhile Tresham again warned Catesby and Wintour to abandon the scheme, to no avail. Fellow plotter Thomas Percy said he was ready to "abide the uttermost trial", and subsequently on 4 November Catesby and several others left London for the Midlands to prepare for the planned uprising.
Fawkes was discovered guarding the explosives shortly after midnight on 5 November 1605, and was immediately arrested. Calling himself John Johnson, he was at first interrogated by members of the King's Privy Chamber, but on 6 November the king ordered that "John Johnson" be tortured. His defiance was broken at some point on 7 November, when he revealed his true identity. On 8 November he began to name some of those with whom he was associated, but Tresham was not identified until the following day, and was attributed with only a minor role. On hearing the news that Fawkes had been captured those plotters still in London had fled for the Midlands but Tresham had stayed in the city, where he was arrested on 12 November. He was transferred to the Tower three days later. Catesby and several other plotters were killed on 8 November, during an armed siege at Holbeche House
Holbeche House
Holbeche House is a mansion located near Kingswinford, on the borders of Staffordshire. It is the building in which some of the central Gunpowder plotters were captured, and the rest killed.-Gunpowder Plot:...
in Staffordshire
Staffordshire
Staffordshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. Part of the National Forest lies within its borders...
.
Death
Tresham at first refused to cooperate but on 13 November he began to confess, outlining his version of events to his interrogators. Moving his family from the safety of Rushton was, he pointed out, not the action of a man who believed he was taking them into "the very mouth and fury" of the plot. He admitted to the government that he was guilty only of the plot's concealment, denying that he had ever been an active member of the conspiracy, although by the end of the month he had admitted his involvement in the Spanish Treason of 1602–1603. He claimed to have persuaded Thomas Wintour and Thomas Percy to postpone the explosion, while planning to inform the king's secretary Thomas Lake of a "Puritan conspiracy". Fraser views much of his confession as "highly partial ... not only for his own sake but for that of his wife and children", and important in serving to highlight his unreliability.His health began to rapidly decline in December. He suffered from a strangury
Strangury
Strangury is the symptom of painful, frequent urination of small volumes that are expelled slowly only by straining and despite a severe sense of urgency, usually with the residual feeling of incomplete emptying. These 'drops' of urine are 'squeezed out' in what sufferers describe as painful...
caused by an inflammation of the urinary tract. Lieutenant of the Tower William Waad, wondering if Tresham would live long enough for justice to take its course, described his condition as "worse and worse". Tresham preferred the services of a Dr Richard Foster over those of the Tower's regular doctor Matthew Gwinne
Matthew Gwinne
-Life:He was of Welsh descent, son of Edward Gwinne, grocer, and was born in London. On 28 April 1570 he entered Merchant Taylors' School. He was elected to a scholarship at St. John's College, Oxford, in 1574, and afterwards became a fellow there. He proceeded B.A. 14 May 1578, and M.A. 4 May 1582...
; apparently Foster understood his case, indicating that it was not the first occasion on which he had treated him. Three more doctors and a nurse attended him during his last days along with William Vavasour, a rumoured illegitimate child of Thomas Tresham, and therefore possibly Francis's half-brother. Vavasour wrote Tresham's deathbed confession as his wife, Anne, was apparently too upset to do so herself, and also an account of Tresham's last hours. Tresham apologised to the Jesuit priest Henry Garnet
Henry Garnet
Henry Garnet , sometimes Henry Garnett, was a Jesuit priest executed for his complicity in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Born in Derbyshire, he was educated in Nottingham and later at Winchester College, before moving to London in 1571 to work for a publisher...
for implicating him in the Spanish Treason, and used the rest of his deathbed confession to pronounce his innocence. Anne and Vavasour read prayers at his bedside and he died at 2:00 am on 23 December. Despite not being tried, his head joined those of Catesby and Percy on display at Northampton while his body was thrown into a hole at Tower Hill
Tower Hill
Tower Hill is an elevated spot northwest of the Tower of London, just outside the limits of the City of London, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Formerly it was part of the Tower Liberty under the direct administrative control of Tower...
. His estates passed to his brother Lewis. Tresham's apology never reached its intended target, and the letter along with the discovery of Garnet's Of Equivocation, found among the "heretical, treasonable and damnable books" at Tresham's chamber in the Inner Temple
Inner Temple
The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, commonly known as Inner Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court in London. To be called to the Bar and practise as a barrister in England and Wales, an individual must belong to one of these Inns...
, was used to great effect by Sir Edward Coke
Edward Coke
Sir Edward Coke SL PC was an English barrister, judge and politician considered to be the greatest jurist of the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras. Born into a middle class family, Coke was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge before leaving to study at the Inner Temple, where he was called to the...
in Garnet's trial. The priest was executed in May 1606.