Did you know?
The Gunpowder Plot targeted Parliament during the planned State Opening of sixteen oh-five.
The State Opening planned for 5 November 1605 at Westminster offered the conspirators a single, devastating target: James I and England’s assembled Parliament.
2 min read
Why the State Opening?
The choice of occasion was chillingly practical. The State Opening would gather James I, the Lords and the Commons in the House of Lords at the Palace of Westminster. An explosion beneath that chamber could therefore destroy the monarch and much of England’s political leadership together.
By March 1605, the conspirators had rented an undercroft directly beneath the chamber. They eventually stored 36 barrels of gunpowder there. Guy Fawkes, a soldier experienced with explosives, was assigned to ignite it.
Catesby’s conspiracy
Fawkes became the familiar name, but Robert Catesby led the enterprise. In May 1604, he proposed destroying the king and Parliament. The conspiracy arose among a small group of Catholics angered by continuing religious repression and disappointed hopes under James; it was not a Catholic undertaking generally.
The intended sequel was a Midlands uprising and the seizure of James’s daughter Elizabeth, who would be proclaimed queen. Arrangements for government remained incomplete. The target, meanwhile, was England’s Parliament: although James also ruled Scotland, the two kingdoms and their parliaments were still separate.
The warning and the search
On 26 October, Lord Monteagle received an anonymous warning and passed it to Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury. Its author remains unidentified. Searches culminated around midnight on 4–5 November, when Sir Thomas Knyvett’s party discovered Fawkes, using the name John Johnson, and the gunpowder.
The conspiracy rapidly collapsed. Catesby and several accomplices died at Holbeach House in Staffordshire on 8 November. Eight surviving conspirators were tried on 27 January 1606 and executed on 30–31 January. The postponed State Opening had taken place on 9 November.
An enduring November anniversary
The plot’s failure intensified anti-Catholic suspicion and brought a new oath of allegiance. Parliamentary legislation established annual religious thanksgiving on 5 November; bonfires and fireworks became enduring features of the commemoration.
The familiar anniversary preserves the Julian date used in England at the time. Converting it to the contemporary Gregorian calendar produces 15 November, not 14 November: a distinction worth keeping clear, without rearranging Bonfire Night.