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94-557: Titus Oates (15 September 1649 – 12/13 July 1705) was an English priest who fabricated the " Popish Plot ", a supposed Catholic conspiracy to kill King Charles II . Titus Oates was born at Oakham in Rutland. His father Samuel (1610–1683), of a family of Norwich ribbon-weavers, was a graduate of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge , and became a minister who moved between the Church of England (sometime rector of Marsham, Norfolk ) and

188-638: A Catholic to learn about the secrets of the Jesuits and that, before leaving, he had heard about a planned Jesuit meeting in London. Oates and Tonge wrote a lengthy manuscript that accused the Catholic Church authorities in England of approving the assassination of Charles II. The Jesuits were supposed to carry out the task. In August 1678, King Charles was warned of this alleged plot against his life by

282-842: A Moses' face. Oates was involved with the Jesuit houses of St Omer in France and the Royal English College at Valladolid in Spain . He was admitted to the training course for the priesthood in Valladolid through the support of Richard Strange , head of the English Province, despite a lack of basic competence in Latin and later claimed, falsely, that he had become a Catholic Doctor of Divinity . His ignorance of Latin

376-656: A Spanish invasion. Three popes issued bulls judging Elizabeth, giving grounds to suspect English Catholics' loyalty. Following the Babington Plot, Mary was beheaded in 1587. This – and Elizabeth's support of the Dutch Revolt in the Spanish Netherlands – triggered Philip II of Spain's attempted invasion with the Spanish Armada (1588). This reinforced English resentment of Catholics, while

470-404: A cart, and whipped from Aldgate to Newgate . On the next day, he was whipped from Newgate to Tyburn . The presiding judge at his trial was Judge Jeffreys , who stated that Oates was a "shame to mankind", despite the fact he himself had helped to condemn innocent people on Oates's perjured evidence. Jeffreys recognised that evidence admitted in the second perjury trial had not been believed in

564-506: A degree. A less than astute student, he was regarded by his tutor as "a great dunce", although he did have a good memory. At Cambridge, he also gained a reputation for homosexuality and a "Canting Fanatical way". By falsely claiming to have a degree, he gained a licence to preach from the Bishop of London . On 29 May 1670 he was ordained as a priest of the Church of England. He was vicar of

658-516: A few days later, with the threat of a constitutional crisis , Parliament forced the release of Oates, who soon received a state apartment in Whitehall and an annual allowance of £1,200. Oates was heaped with praise. He asked the College of Arms to check his lineage and produce a coat of arms for him and subsequently received the arms of a family that had died out. Rumours surfaced that Oates

752-408: A good lawyer might have turned to his client's advantage. On 30 December, the evidence against Arundell and his three fellow prisoners was ordered to be in readiness, but their public proceedings stopped. In fact, the death of William Bedloe left the prosecution in serious difficulties, since one protection for a person accused of treason, that there must be two eyewitnesses to an overt act of treason,

846-411: A hero. Of the other informers, James II was content merely to fine Miles Prance for his perjury, on the grounds that he was a Catholic and had been coerced by threats of torture into informing. Thomas Dangerfield was subjected to the same savage penalties as Oates; on returning from his first session in the pillory , Dangerfield died of an eye injury after a scuffle with the barrister Robert Francis, who

940-472: A house nearby. This caused a panic, until it was discovered that he was simply the King's firework maker. Oates became more daring and accused five Catholic lords ( William Herbert, 1st Marquess of Powis , William Howard, 1st Viscount Stafford , Henry Arundell, 3rd Baron Arundell of Wardour , William Petre, 4th Baron Petre and John Belasyse, 1st Baron Belasyse ) of involvement in the plot. The King dismissed

1034-553: A mild punishment. Oates, for his part, received a state apartment in Whitehall and an annual allowance. He soon presented new allegations, claiming assassins intended to shoot the King with silver bullets so the wound would not heal. The public invented their own stories, including a tale that the sound of digging had been heard near the House of Commons and rumours of a French invasion on the Isle of Purbeck . The evidence of Oates and Bedloe

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1128-857: A number of contracts signed by the Superior General of the Jesuits. The contracts appointed officers that would command an army of Catholic supporters to kill Charles II and establish a Catholic monarch. To this day, no one is certain who killed Sir Edmund Godfrey, and most historians regard the mystery as insoluble. Oates' associate William Bedloe denounced the silversmith Miles Prance , who in turn named three working men, Berry, Green and Hill, who were tried, convicted and executed in February 1679; but it rapidly became clear that they were completely innocent, and that Prance, who had been subjected to torture , named them simply to gain his freedom (Kenyon suggests that he may have chosen men against whom he had

1222-405: A personal grudge, or he may simply have chosen them because they were the first Catholic acquaintances of his who came to mind). King Charles, aware of the unrest, returned to London and summoned Parliament . He remained unconvinced by Oates' accusations, but Parliament and public opinion forced him to order an investigation. Parliament truly believed that this plot was real, declaring, "This House

1316-411: A previous trial when sworn in contradiction to Oates's own evidence, and regretted that evidence now freshly presented had not been available, particularly at the trials of Ireland and of the five Jesuits (at the latter of which he presided) as, "it might have saved some innocent blood". So severe were the penalties imposed on Oates that it has been suggested by among others Thomas Babington Macaulay that

1410-525: A series of anti-Catholic pamphlets with Israel Tonge , whom he had met through his father Samuel, who had once more reverted to the Baptist doctrine. He is described by John Dryden in Absalom and Achitophel (published 1681) thus— Sunk were his eyes, his voice was harsh and loud, Sure signs he neither choleric was nor proud: His long chin proved his wit, his saint-like grace A church vermilion and

1504-542: A surprisingly good impression on the council. When he named "at a glance" the alleged authors of five letters supposedly written by leading Jesuits, the council were "amazed". As Kenyon remarks, it is surprising that it did not occur to the Council that this was useless as evidence if Oates had written all the letters himself. Others whom Oates accused included William Fogarty, Archbishop Peter Talbot of Dublin, Samuel Pepys MP , and John Belasyse, 1st Baron Belasyse . With

1598-485: Is of opinion that there hath been and still is a damnable and hellish plot contrived and carried out by the popish recusants for assigning and murdering the King." Tonge was called to testify on 25 October 1678 where he gave evidence on the Great Fire and, later, rumours of another similar plot. On 1 November, both Houses ordered an investigation in which a Frenchman, Choqueux, was discovered to be storing gunpowder in

1692-592: The Baptists ; he became a Baptist during the English Civil War , rejoining the established church at the Restoration , and was rector of All Saints' Church at Hastings (1666–74). Oates was educated at Merchant Taylors' School and other schools. At Cambridge University, he entered Gonville and Caius College in 1667 but transferred to St John's College in 1669; he left later the same year without

1786-455: The English Civil War (1642–1649), which led to the abolition of the monarchy and a decade of Puritan rule tolerating most forms of Protestantism, but not Catholicism. The restoration of the monarchy in 1660 under King Charles II brought a reaction against all religious dissenters outside the established Church of England. Catholics still suffered under popular hostility and legal discrimination. Anti-Catholic hysteria flared up lightly during

1880-539: The Inquisition continued, and had 300 Protestants burned at the stake, causing many Englishmen to associate Catholicism with the involvement of foreign powers and religious persecution. Mary was succeeded by her Protestant half-sister, Elizabeth I (1558–1603), who again broke away from Rome and suppressed Catholicism. Elizabeth and later Protestant monarchs caused to be hanged and mutilated hundreds of Catholic priests and laymen. This, and her dubious legitimacy – she

1974-543: The Lincolnshire District, and finally, in 1678 he was declared Provincial. In this capacity he refused to admit Titus Oates as a member of the Society, on the grounds of his ignorance, blasphemy and sexual attraction to young boys, and expelled him forthwith from the seminary of St Omer ; shortly afterwards Titus, motivated by personal spite against Whitbread, and against the Jesuits generally, fabricated

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2068-483: The Privy Council later that month, and the Council interrogated Oates for several hours; Tonge, who was generally believed to be mad, was simply laughed at, but Oates made a much better impression on the council. On 28 September Oates made 43 allegations against various members of Catholic religious orders – including 541 Jesuits – and numerous Catholic nobles. He accused Sir George Wakeman and Edward Colman ,

2162-560: The 1670s. In December 1677 an anonymous pamphlet (possibly by Andrew Marvell ) spread alarm in London by accusing the Pope of plotting to overthrow the lawful government of England. The fictitious Popish Plot unfolded in a very peculiar fashion. Oates and Israel Tonge , a fanatically anti-Catholic clergyman (who was widely believed to be insane), had written a large manuscript that accused the Catholic Church authorities of approving

2256-519: The Armada's failure convinced many Englishmen that God was on the Protestant side. Anti-Catholic sentiment reached new heights in 1605 after the failed Gunpowder Plot . Catholic conspirators attempted to topple the Protestant reign of King James I by exploding a bomb during the King's opening of parliament. The plot was thwarted when Guy Fawkes , who was in charge of the explosives, was discovered

2350-475: The Church of England was transformed into a strictly Protestant body, with many remnants of Catholicism suppressed. Edward was succeeded by his half-sister Mary I of England (1553–1558), daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine. She was a Catholic and returned the Church in England to union with the Holy See . Mary tainted her policy with two unpopular actions: she married her cousin, King Philip II of Spain , where

2444-470: The French ambassador, in which he made it clear that he did not believe that there was a word of truth in the plot, and that Oates was "a wicked man"; but that by now he had come round to the view that there must be an investigation, particularly with Parliament about to reassemble. On 6 September Oates was summoned before the magistrate Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey to swear an oath prior to his testimony before

2538-526: The King for the first time "began to think that there might be somewhat in the Plot". However, public opinion began to turn against Oates. As Kenyon points out, the steady protestations of innocence by all of those who were executed eventually took hold in the public mind. Outside London, the priests who died were almost all venerable and popular members of the community, and there was widespread public horror at their executions. Even Lord Shaftesbury came to regret

2632-520: The King made it clear that he approved of Scroggs' conduct. On 31 August 1681, Oates was told to leave his apartments in Whitehall, but remained undeterred and even denounced the King and the Duke of York. He was arrested for sedition , sentenced to a fine of £100,000 and thrown into prison. When James II acceded to the throne in 1685 he had Oates tried on two charges of perjury. The Bench which tried him

2726-636: The King's brother, James, be excluded from the royal succession , prompting the Exclusion crisis . On 5 November 1678, people burned effigies of the Pope instead of those of Guy Fawkes . At the end of the year, the parliament passed a bill, a second Test Act , excluding Catholics from membership of both Houses (a law not repealed until 1829). On 1 November 1678, the House of Commons resolved to proceed by impeachment against "the five popish lords". On 23 November all Arundell's papers were seized and examined by

2820-624: The King. Oates claimed he had been at a Jesuit meeting held at the White Horse Tavern in the Strand, London , on April 24, 1678. According to Oates, the purpose of that meeting was to discuss the assassination of Charles II . The meeting discussed a variety of methods which included: stabbing by Irish ruffians, shooting by two Jesuit soldiers, or poisoning by the Queen's physician, Sir George Wakeman . Oates and Tonge were brought before

2914-607: The London underworld. The King personally interrogated Oates, caught him out in a number of inaccuracies and lies, and ordered his arrest. However, a few days later, with the threat of constitutional crisis, Parliament forced the release of Oates. Hysteria continued: Roger North wrote that it was as though "the very Cabinet of Hell has been opened". Noblewomen carried firearms if they had to venture outdoors at night. Houses were searched for hidden guns, mostly without any significant result. Some Catholic widows tried to ensure their safety by marrying Anglican widowers. The House of Commons

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3008-523: The Lords' committee; on 3 December the five peers were arraigned for high treason ; and on 5 December the Commons announced the impeachment of Arundell. A month later Parliament was dissolved, and the proceedings were interrupted. In March 1679, it was resolved by both houses that the dissolution had not invalidated the motions for the impeachment. On 10 April 1679 Arundell and three of his companions (Belasyse

3102-464: The Plot, advised the King to order an investigation. Charles II denied the request, maintaining that the entire affair was absurd. He told Danby to keep the events secret so as not to put the idea of regicide into people's minds. However, word of the manuscript spread to the Duke of York, who publicly called for an investigation into the matter. Even Charles admitted that given the sheer number of allegations, he could not say positively that none of them

3196-602: The Protestant Netherlands. Furthermore, Charles' brother and heir presumptive, James, Duke of York , had embraced Catholicism, although his brother forbade him to make any public avowal. In 1672, Charles issued the Royal Declaration of Indulgence , in which he suspended all penal laws against Catholics and other religious dissenters. This fueled Protestant fears of increasing Catholic influence in England, and led to conflict with parliament during

3290-647: The Wakeman trial, and a backlash against Oates and his Whig supporters took place. On 31 August 1681, Oates was told to leave his apartments in Whitehall, but he remained undeterred and even denounced the King and his Catholic brother, the Duke of York . He was arrested for sedition , sentenced to a fine of £100,000 and imprisoned. When the Duke of York acceded to the throne in 1685 as James II, he had Oates retried, convicted and sentenced for perjury, stripped of clerical dress, imprisoned for life, and to be "whipped through

3384-477: The accusations as absurd, pointing out that Belasyse was so afflicted with gout that he could hardly stand, while Arundell and Stafford, who had not been on speaking terms for 25 years, were most unlikely to be intriguing together; but Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury had the lords arrested and sent to the Tower on 25 October 1678. Seizing upon the anti-Catholic tide, Shaftesbury publicly demanded that

3478-487: The aim was to kill him by ill-treatment, as Jeffreys and his fellow judges openly regretted that they could not impose the death penalty in a case of perjury. Oates spent the next three years in prison. In 1689, upon the accession of the Protestant William of Orange and Mary , he was pardoned and granted a pension of £260 a year, but his reputation did not recover. The pension was later suspended, but in 1698

3572-402: The assassination of Charles II. The Jesuits in England were to carry out the task. The manuscript also named nearly 100 Jesuits and their supporters who were supposedly involved in this assassination plot; nothing in the document was ever proven to be true. Oates slipped a copy of the manuscript into the wainscot of a gallery in the house of the physician Sir Richard Barker, with whom Tonge

3666-487: The assassination plot, and that he had ever been in the White Horse Tavern. Given the state of public opinion, it was unthinkable to the Government that Whitbread, whom Oates and the other informers had identified as one of the originators of the Plot, should be allowed to escape punishment. Accordingly he was remanded and kept in prison until 13 June 1679, when he was again indicted for treason , and with four others

3760-523: The chemist Christopher Kirkby, and later by Tonge. Charles was unimpressed, but handed the matter over to one of his ministers, Thomas Osborne, Earl of Danby ; Danby was more willing to listen and was introduced to Oates by Tonge. The King's Privy Council questioned Oates. On 28 September, Oates made 43 allegations against various members of Catholic religious orders —including 541 Jesuits—and numerous Catholic nobles. He accused Sir George Wakeman , Queen Catherine of Braganza 's doctor, and Edward Colman ,

3854-460: The countryside, they took with them stories of a kind which were to be familiar enough in 1678 and 1679." Anti-Catholicism was fueled by doubts about the religious allegiance of the King, who had been supported by the Catholic powers during his exile, and had married a Portuguese Catholic princess, Catherine of Braganza . Charles formed an alliance with the leading Catholic power France against

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3948-556: The executions and is said to have quietly ordered the release of particular priests, whose families he knew. Accusations of plotting in Yorkshire (the "Barnbow Plot"), where prominent local Catholics like Sir Thomas Gascoigne, 2nd Baronet were accused of signing "the Bloody Oath of Secrecy", were unsuccessful because their Protestant neighbours (who sat on the juries) refused to convict them. A grand jury at Westminster rejected

4042-410: The following day the petitions were granted. On 1 June 1685, their liberty was formally assured on the ground that the witnesses against them had perjured themselves, and on 4 June the bill of attainder against Stafford was reversed. On 24 November 1678, Oates claimed the Queen was working with the King's physician to poison him and enlisted the aid of "Captain" William Bedloe , a notorious member of

4136-404: The help of Danby, the list grew to 81 accusations. Oates was given a squad of soldiers and he began to round up Jesuits, including those who had helped him in the past. On 6 September 1678, Oates and Tonge approached an Anglican magistrate, Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey , and swore an affidavit before him detailing their accusations. On 12 October, Godfrey disappeared, and five days later his dead body

4230-472: The help of the actor Matthew Medbourne he joined the household of the Catholic Henry Howard, 7th Duke of Norfolk as an Anglican chaplain to those members of Howard's household who were Protestants. Although Oates was admired for his preaching, he soon lost this position. On Ash Wednesday in 1677 Oates was received into the Catholic Church . Oddly, at the same time he agreed to co-author

4324-646: The hysteria. They were no longer permitted to have more than a certain number of members or missions within England. John Kenyon points out that European religious orders throughout the Continent were affected since many of them depended on the alms of the English Catholic community for their existence. Many Catholic priests were arrested and tried because the Privy Council wanted to make sure to catch all of those who might possess information about

4418-529: The lack of substantial evidence and inconsistencies in Oates's testimony began to unravel the plot. Eventually, Oates himself was arrested and convicted for perjury , exposing the fabricated nature of the conspiracy. The fictitious Popish Plot must be understood against the background of the English Reformation and the subsequent development of a strong anti-Catholic nationalist sentiment among

4512-472: The manuscript but did not know the author. As Kenyon points out, the government took seriously even the remotest hint of a threat to the King's life or well-being – in the previous spring a Newcastle housewife had been investigated by the Secretary of State simply for saying that "the King gets the curse of many good and faithful wives such as myself for his bad example". Danby, who seems to have believed in

4606-460: The mostly Protestant population of England. The English Reformation began in 1533, when King Henry VIII (1509–1547) sought an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon to marry Anne Boleyn . As the Pope would not grant this, Henry broke away from Rome and took control of the Church in England . Later, he had the monasteries dissolved, causing opposition in the still largely Catholic nation. Under Henry's son Edward VI (1547–1553),

4700-408: The murder of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey , a magistrate and strong supporter of Protestantism, to whom Oates had made his first depositions. His disappearance on 12 October 1678, the finding of his mutilated body on 17 October, and the subsequent failure to solve his murder sent the Protestant population into an uproar. He had been strangled and run through with his own sword. Many of his supporters blamed

4794-578: The murder on Catholics. As Kenyon commented, "Next day, the 18th, James wrote to William of Orange that Godfrey's death was already 'laid against the Catholics', and even he, never the most realistic of men, feared that 'all these things happening together will cause a great flame in the Parliament'." The Lords asked King Charles to banish all Catholics from a radius of 20 miles (32 km) around London, which Charles granted on 30 October 1678, but it

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4888-475: The night before. The magnitude of the plot, meant to kill the leading government figures in one stroke, convinced many Englishmen that Catholics were murderous conspirators who would stop at nothing to have their way, laying the groundwork for future allegations. Anti-Catholic sentiment was a constant factor in how England perceived the events of the following decades: the Thirty Years War (1618–1648)

4982-480: The number of innocent men he had been forced to condemn; possibly thinking of the Act of Indemnity and Oblivion , under which he had pardoned many of his former opponents in 1660, he remarked that his people had never previously had cause to complain of his mercy. At the trial of Sir George Wakeman, and several priests who were tried with him, Scroggs virtually ordered the jury to acquit all of them, and despite public uproar,

5076-521: The parish of Bobbing in Kent, 1673–74, and then curate to his father at All Saints', Hastings. During this time Oates accused a schoolmaster in Hastings of sodomy with one of his pupils, hoping to get the schoolmaster's post. However, the charge was shown to be false and Oates himself was soon facing charges of perjury , but he escaped jail and fled to London. In 1675 he was appointed as a chaplain of

5170-609: The plight of the Jesuits during this time period. He comments, "The name of the Jesuit is hated above all else, even by priests both secular and regular, and by the Catholic laity as well, because it is said that the Jesuits have caused this raging storm, which is likely to overthrow the whole Catholic religion". Other Catholic religious orders such as the Carmelites , Franciscans , and the Benedictines were also affected by

5264-420: The plot. Charles was dismissive but Kirkby stated that he knew the names of assassins who planned to shoot the King and, if that failed, the Queen's physician, Sir George Wakeman , would poison him. When the King demanded proof, the chemist offered to bring Tonge who knew of these matters personally. The King did agree to see both Kirkby and Tonge that evening, when he gave them a short audience. At this stage, he

5358-455: The plot; apparently it did not occur to them that Oates' ability to recognise the letters made it more likely, rather than less, that he had forged them. Others Oates accused included Dr. William Fogarty, Archbishop Peter Talbot of Dublin , Samuel Pepys and John Belasyse, 1st Baron Belasyse . The list grew to 81 accusations. Oates was given a squad of soldiers and he began to round up Jesuits. The allegations gained little credence until

5452-508: The plotting charge against Sir John Fitzgerald, 2nd Baronet in 1681. Judges gradually began to take a more impartial line, ruling that it was not treason for a Catholic to advocate the conversion of England to the old faith, nor to give financial support to religious houses (the latter was a criminal offence, just not treason). The supposed plot gained some credence in Ireland , where the two Catholic Archbishops, Plunkett and Talbot , were

5546-541: The principal victims, but not in Scotland . Having had at least twenty-two innocent men executed (the last being Oliver Plunkett , the Catholic Archbishop of Armagh on 1 July 1681), Chief Justice William Scroggs began to declare people innocent and the King began to devise countermeasures. The King, who was notably tolerant of religious differences and generally inclined to clemency, was embittered at

5640-547: The reign of Charles II, which saw disasters such as the Great Plague of London (1665) and the Great Fire of London (1666). Vague rumours blamed the fire on arson by Catholics and especially Jesuits . Kenyon remarks, "At Coventry , the townspeople were possessed by the idea that the papists were about to rise and cut their throats ... A nationwide panic seemed likely, and as homeless refugees poured out from London into

5734-495: The secretary to Mary of Modena Duchess of York , of planning the assassination. Colman was found to have corresponded with the French Jesuit Fr Ferrier, confessor to Louis XIV , outlining his grandiose schemes for obtaining a dissolution of the present Parliament, in the hope of its replacement by a new and pro-French Parliament; in the wake of this revelation he was condemned to death for treason . Wakeman

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5828-493: The secretary to Mary of Modena , Duchess of York , of planning to assassinate Charles. Although Oates may have selected the names randomly, or with the help of the Earl of Danby, Colman was found to have corresponded with a French Jesuit, Father Ferrier, who was confessor to Louis XIV , which was enough to condemn him. Wakeman was later acquitted. Despite Oates's unsavoury reputation, his confident performance and superb memory made

5922-508: The sermon he had preached at Liège the previous year suggests that he expected to suffer the death of a martyr, sooner or later. He was sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn . The King, who knew that he and his fellow victims were innocent, ordered that they be allowed to die before being mutilated. The well-known story that they were offered a pardon on the scaffold if they would confess seems to have no substance. The crowd showed that on this occasion its sympathies were with

6016-538: The ship HMS  Adventure in the Royal Navy . Oates visited English Tangier with his ship, but was accused of buggery , which was a capital offence , and spared only because of his clerical status. He was dismissed from the Navy in 1676. In August 1676, Oates was arrested in London and returned to Hastings to face trial for his outstanding perjury charges, but he escaped a second time and returned to London. With

6110-512: The so-called " Popish Plot ". Whitbread preached a celebrated sermon at Liège in July 1678, on the text "Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?", in which he warned his listeners that the present time of tranquillity would not last, and that they must be willing to suffer false accusations, imprisonment, torture and martyrdom . Having completed a tour of his Flanders province, he went to England but at once fell ill with plague . Whitbread

6204-401: The streets of London five days a year for the remainder of his life". Oates was taken from his cell wearing a hat with the text "Titus Oates, convicted upon full evidence of two horrid perjuries" and put into the pillory at the gate of Westminster Hall (now New Palace Yard ), where passers-by pelted him with eggs. The next day he was pilloried in London and the third day was stripped, tied to

6298-445: The supposed plot. The hysteria had serious consequences for ordinary British Catholics as well as priests. On 30 October 1678, a proclamation was made that required all Catholics who were not tradesmen or property owners to leave London and Westminster. They were not to enter a twelve-mile (c.19 km) radius of the city without special permission. Throughout this period Catholics were subject to fines, harassment and imprisonment. It

6392-587: Was a fictitious conspiracy invented by Titus Oates that between 1678 and 1681 gripped the kingdoms of England and Scotland in anti-Catholic hysteria. Oates alleged that there was an extensive Catholic conspiracy to assassinate Charles II , accusations that led to the show trials and executions of at least 22 men and precipitated the Exclusion Bill Crisis . During this tumultuous period, Oates weaved an intricate web of accusations, fueling public fears and paranoia. However, as time went on,

6486-590: Was a native of Essex , but little is known of his family or early life. He was educated at St. Omer 's, and entered the novitiate of the Society of Jesus on 7 September 1635. Coming upon the English mission in 1647, he worked in England for more than thirty years, mostly in the eastern counties. On 8 December 1652, he was professed of the four vows. Twice he was superior of the Suffolk District, once of

6580-417: Was already sceptical, but he was apparently not ready to rule out the possibility that there might be a plot of some sort (otherwise, Kenyon argues, he would not have given these two very obscure men a private audience). Charles told Kirkby to present Tonge to Thomas Osborne, Lord Danby , Lord High Treasurer , then the most influential of the King's ministers. Tonge then lied to Danby, saying that he had found

6674-609: Was arrested in London on Michaelmas Day (i.e., 29 September) 1678, but was so ill that he could not be moved to Newgate until three months later. The house in which he and his secretary Edward Mico (who died in Newgate shortly afterwards) had been lodging was part of the Spanish Embassy in Wild Street, but for whatever reason, there was no claim of diplomatic immunity , as there was in the case of some other priests. He

6768-602: Was first indicted at the Old Bailey , on 17 December 1678, but the evidence against him and his companions broke down. Oates testified that he had overheard Whitbread and other senior Jesuits plotting to kill the King in late April 1678 in the White Horse Tavern in the Strand . This was probably garbled second-hand information about an actual Jesuit meeting which was then going on at Whitehall Palace : but no one corroborated Oates' story, and Whitbread could in good conscience deny

6862-417: Was fixed for 13 May, but a quarrel between the two houses as to points of procedure, and the legality of admitting the bishops as judges in a capital trial, followed by a dissolution, delayed its commencement until 30 November 1680. On that day it was decided to proceed first against Lord Stafford, who was condemned to death on 7 December and beheaded on 29 December. His trial, compared to the other Plot trials,

6956-572: Was found guilty on the perjured evidence of Oates, William Bedloe and Stephen Dugdale . The importance of the trial is shown by the fact that it was heard by a bench of seven judges, headed by the Lord Chief Justice , Sir William Scroggs , who was a firm believer in the Plot and deeply hostile to Catholic priests. In the circumstances Whitbread could not have hoped to escape, and, although he strongly maintained his innocence, Kenyon suggests that he had resigned himself to death. Certainly

7050-429: Was found in a ditch at Primrose Hill ; he had been strangled and run through with his own sword. Oates subsequently exploited this incident to launch a public campaign against the " Papists " and alleged that the murder of Godfrey had been the work of the Jesuits. On 24 November 1678, Oates claimed the Queen was working with the King's physician to poison the King. Oates enlisted the aid of "Captain" William Bedloe , who

7144-559: Was hanged for his murder. Bedloe, Turbervile and Dugdale had all died of natural causes while the Plot was still officially regarded as true. The Society of Jesus suffered the most between 1678 and 1681. During this period, nine Jesuits were executed and twelve died in prison. Three other deaths were attributable to the hysteria. They also lost Combe in Herefordshire , which was the Jesuit headquarters for south Wales. A quote from French Jesuit Claude de la Colombière highlights

7238-454: Was later acquitted. Despite Oates' unsavoury reputation, the councillors were impressed by his confidence, his grasp of detail and his remarkable memory. A turning point came when he was shown five letters, supposedly written by well-known priests and giving details of the plot, which he was suspected of forging: Oates "at a single glance" named each of the alleged authors. At this the council were "amazed" and began to give much greater credence to

7332-527: Was living. The following day Tonge claimed to find the manuscript and showed it to an acquaintance, Christopher Kirkby, who was shocked and decided to inform the King. Kirkby was a chemist and a former assistant in Charles' scientific experiments, and Charles prided himself on being approachable to the general public. On 13 August 1678, whilst Charles was out walking in St. James's Park , the chemist informed him of

7426-554: Was not until the early 19th century that most of the anti-Catholic legislation was removed by the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1829 ; anti-Catholic sentiment remained even longer among politicians and the general populace, although the Gordon Riots of 1780 made it clear to sensible observers that Catholics were far more likely to be the victims of violence than its perpetrators. Thomas Whitbread He

7520-517: Was observed scrupulously, and only Oates claimed to have any hard evidence against the remaining Lords. Lord Petre died in the Tower in 1683. His companions remained there until 12 February 1684 when an appeal to the Court of King's Bench to release them on bail was successful. On 21 May 1685 Arundell, Powis, and Belasyse came to the House of Lords to present petitions for the annulling of the charges and on

7614-458: Was presided over by the formidable George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys , who conducted the trial in such a manner that Oates had no hope of acquittal, and the jury brought in the expected guilty verdict. The death penalty was not available for perjury and Oates was sentenced to be stripped of clerical dress, whipped through London twice, and imprisoned for life and pilloried every year (the penalties were so severe that it has been argued that Jeffreys

7708-523: Was quickly exposed, and his frequently blasphemous conversation, and his attacks on the British monarchy, shocked both his teachers and the other students. Thomas Whitbread , the new Provincial, took a much firmer line with Oates than had Strange and, in June 1678, expelled him from St Omer. When he returned to London, he rekindled his friendship with Israel Tonge. Oates claimed that he had pretended to become

7802-583: Was ready to say anything for money. The King personally interrogated Oates and caught him out in a number of inaccuracies and lies. In particular, Oates unwisely claimed to have had an interview with the Regent of Spain, Don John , in Madrid : the King, who had met Don John at Brussels during his Continental exile, pointed out that Oates's hopelessly inaccurate description of his appearance made it clear that he had never seen him. The King ordered his arrest. However,

7896-546: Was reasonably fair, but as in all cases of alleged treason at that date the absence of defence counsel was a fatal handicap (this was finally remedied in 1695), and while Oates' credit had been seriously damaged, the evidence of the principal prosecution witnesses, Turberville and Dugdale, struck even fair-minded observers like John Evelyn as being credible enough. Stafford, denied the services of counsel, failed to exploit several inconsistencies in Tuberville's testimony, which

7990-708: Was restored and increased to £300 a year. Oates died on 12 or 13 July 1705, by then an obscure and largely forgotten figure. Francis Barlow made a comic strip about the Popish Plot and Oates in c. 1682 named A True Narrative of the Horrid Hellish Popish Plot , which is generally considered the earliest example of a signed balloon comic strip. Oates was played by Nicholas Smith in the 1969 BBC TV serial The First Churchills . In Charles II: The Power and The Passion (2003), Eddie Marsan played Oates. Popish Plot The Popish Plot

8084-456: Was searched – without result – in the expectation of a second Gunpowder Plot . Anyone even suspected of being Catholic was driven out of London and forbidden to be within ten miles (16 km) of the city. William Staley , a young Catholic banker, made a drunken threat against the King; within 10 days he was tried, convicted of plotting treason and executed. In calmer times, Staley's offence would probably have resulted in him being bound over ,

8178-613: Was seen as an attempt by the Catholic Habsburgs to exterminate German Protestantism. Under the early Stuart Kings, fears of Catholic conspiracies were rampant and the policies of Charles I – especially his church policies, which had a decidedly high church bent – were seen as pro-Catholic and likely induced by a Catholic conspiracy headed by Charles' Catholic queen, Henrietta Maria of France . This, together with accounts of Catholic atrocities in Ireland in 1641, helped trigger

8272-412: Was supplemented by other informers; some like Thomas Dangerfield , were notorious criminals, but others like Stephen Dugdale , Robert Jenison and Edward Turberville were men of good social standing who from motives of greed or revenge denounced innocent victims, and by their apparently plausible evidence made the Plot seem more credible. Dugdale in particular made such a good initial impression that even

8366-690: Was the daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn – led to Catholic powers not recognising her as queen and favouring her next relative, the Catholic Mary, Queen of Scots . Elizabeth's reign saw Catholic rebellions like the Rising of the North (1569) as well as intrigues like the Ridolfi Plot (1571) and the Babington Plot (1586), both intending to kill Elizabeth and replace her with Mary under

8460-491: Was to be married to a daughter of Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury . After nearly three years and the execution of at least 15 innocent men, opinion began to turn against Oates. The last high-profile victim of the climate of suspicion was Oliver Plunkett , Roman Catholic Archbishop of Armagh , who was hanged, drawn and quartered on 1 July 1681. William Scroggs , the Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales , began to declare more people innocent, as he had done in

8554-469: Was too ill to attend) were brought to the House of Lords to put in pleas against the articles of impeachment. Arundell complained of the uncertainty of the charges, and implored the peers to have them "reduced to competent certainty" but on 24 April this plea was voted irregular, and on 26 April the prisoners were again brought to the House of Lords and ordered to amend their pleas. Arundell replied by briefly declaring himself not guilty. The impeachment trial

8648-515: Was too late because London was already in a panic, which was long remembered as "Godfrey's autumn". Oates seized on Godfrey's murder as proof that the plot was true. The murder of Godfrey and the discovery of Edward Coleman's letters provided a solid basis of facts for the lies of Oates and the other informers who followed him. Oates was called to testify before the House of Lords and the House of Commons on 23 October 1678. He testified that he had seen

8742-485: Was true, and reluctantly agreed. During the investigation, Oates' name arose. From the first, the King was convinced that Oates was a liar, and Oates did not help his case by claiming to have met the regent of Spain , Don John of Austria . Questioned by the King, who had met Don John in Brussels in 1656, it became obvious that Oates had no idea what he looked like. The King had a long and frank talk with Paul Barillon ,

8836-409: Was trying to kill Oates by ill-treatment). Oates spent the next three years in prison. At the accession of William of Orange and Mary in 1689, he was pardoned and granted a pension of £260 a year, but his reputation did not recover. The pension was suspended, but in 1698 was restored and increased to £300 a year. Oates died on 12 or 13 July 1705, quite forgotten by the public which had once called him

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