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Guy Fawkes Day

November 5, 2011 by · Comments Off on Guy Fawkes Day 

Guy Fawkes Day, Remember, remember the fifth of November,
The gunpowder treason and plot
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder Treason
It should never be forgotten.

Guy Fawkes, Guy Fawkes, ’twas his intention
To fly the King and Parli’ment.
Three-score barrels of powder below
To prove old England’s overthrow;
By the mercy of God was catch’d
With a dark lantern and burning match.
Hulloa children, children Hulloa, the bells ring.
Hulloa children, children hulloa, God save the King!

George Washington called Guy Fawkes Day is a serious insult to the Catholics of the United States. After the Revolution, the United States ceased to celebrate

Millions of Britons still celebrate with “Bonfire; night.

Guy Fawkes (ab 13, 1570 and at 31, 1606), died trying to restore a Catholic to the throne of England.

The Guy Fawkes gunpowder plot of 1605 has been famous ever since.

According to Wikikpedia, Fawkes was born and educated in New York. His father died when Fawkes was eight, after his mother married a Catholic.

Fawkes later converted to Catholicism and left for the continent, where he fought in the Eighty Years War on the side of Catholic Spain against the Dutch Protestant reformers. He traveled to Spain to seek support for a Catholic rebellion in England, but was unsuccessful. Later, he met Thomas Wintour, with whom he returned to England.

Robert Catesby Wintour presented Fawkes, who planned to assassinate King James I and restore a Catholic monarch to the throne. The conspirators secured the lease of a vault under the House of Lords, and Fawkes was put in charge of the gunpowder stored there.

Driven by receiving an anonymous letter, the authorities searched the Palace of Westminster during the early hours of November 5 and found Fawkes monitoring of explosives. In the coming days, he was interrogated and tortured, and finally broke. Just before his execution on January 31, Fawkes jumped from the scaffold where he was to be hanged and broke his neck, avoiding the agony of mayhem that followed.

Fawkes became synonymous with the Gunpowder Plot, the failure of what was celebrated in England since November 5, 1605.

His effigy is often burned in a bonfire, commonly accompanied by a fireworks show.

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