Guy Fawkes
(1570-1606)

Died aged c. 36

Guy Fawkes (/fɔːks/; 13 April 1570 – 31 January 1606), also known as Guido Fawkes while fighting for the Spanish, was a member of a group of provincial English Catholics involved in the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605. He was born and educated in York; his father died when Fawkes was eight years old, after which his mother married a recusant Catholic. Fawkes converted to Catholicism and left for mainland Europe, where he fought for Catholic Spain in the Eighty Years' War against Protestant Dutch reformers in the Low Countries. He travelled to Spain to seek support for a Catholic rebellion in England without success. He later met Thomas Wintour, with whom he returned to England. Wintour introduced him to Robert Catesby, who planned to assassinate King James I and restore a Catholic monarch to the throne. The plotters leased an undercroft beneath the House of Lords; Fawkes was placed in charge of the gunpowder that they stockpiled there. The authorities were prompted by an anonymous letter to search Westminster Palace during the early hours of 5 November, and they found Fawkes guarding the explosives. He was questioned and tortured over the next few days and confessed to wanting to blow up the House of Lords. Fawkes was sentenced to be hanged, drawn and quartered. However, at his execution on 31 January, he died when his neck was broken as he was hanged, with some sources claiming that he deliberately jumped to make this happen; he thus avoided the agony of his sentence. He became synonymous with the Gunpowder Plot, the failure of which has been commemorated in the UK as Guy Fawkes Night since 5 November 1605, when his effigy is traditionally burned on a bonfire, commonly accompanied by fireworks.

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Commemorated on 3 plaques

St. Michael-Le-Belfrey the only pre-Reformation church in York to have been built all at one time (1525-1536) by John Forman, Master Mason to the Minster. Guy Fawkes was baptized here on 16th April 1570

St. Michael-Le-Belfrey, York, United Kingdom where they was baptised (1570)

Guy Fawkes Hereabouts lived the parents of Guy Fawkes of Gunpowder Plot fame, who was baptized in St. Michael-le-Belfrey Church in 1570.

Stonegate, York, United Kingdom where they lived

Guy Fawkes Gunpowder Plot Conspirator Born here 1570 Hung, drawn & quartered in City of London 31st January 1606

25 High Petergate, York, United Kingdom where they was born (1570)