Gunpowder Plot was a plan to blow up England’s House of Lords on Nov. 5, 1605, when King James I was there to open a new session of Parliament. A group of Roman Catholics led by Robert Catesby formed the plan because they resented the English government’s hostility toward Catholics. They aimed to take over the country and to install a leader sympathetic to Catholics.
Catesby’s group rented a cellar beneath the House of Lords and filled it with barrels of gunpowder. The plot was exposed when Lord Monteagle, a member of the House of Lords, received an anonymous letter warning him to avoid Parliament. Monteagle alerted the government. On November 4, government officials searched the cellar and found the gunpowder and Guy Fawkes, the conspirator who was in charge of setting off the explosion (see Fawkes, Guy). Four conspirators were killed trying to escape arrest. One died in prison. The rest, including Fawkes, were tried and executed for treason.
The Gunpowder Plot led Parliament to pass more anti-Catholic laws, and hostility in England toward Catholics remained strong for more than a century. The British hold a festival every November 5, when they burn Guy Fawkes in effigy. By custom, guards search the vaults beneath the Houses of Parliament before each new session.
