GUY FAWKES BY PHOEBE DOWTHWAITE Guy Fawkes was actually Protestant by birth. Fawkes was born into the Protestant faith. In 1578, when Fawkes was eight, his father died and his widowed mother married a Catholic. Fawkes converted to Catholicism when he was a teenager.

GUY FAWKES TOP FACTS Guy Fawkes was not the Gunpowder Plot's ringleader. There were 13 conspirators in the plot, which was masterminded by Robert Catesby. Catesby was a charismatic Catholic figure who had a reputation for speaking out against the English crown. It was Fawkes who had the perilous duty of sneaking into the cellar beneath the House of Lords and igniting the explosives. It was Fawkes who was caught red-handed with 36 barrels of gunpowder, and for two days he was the only conspirator who the King’s men had captured.

GUY FAWKES TOP FACTS The gunpowder would have done little damage to Parliament. Some experts now claim that the gunpowder had “decayed”, and would not have properly exploded even if ignited. The cellar that Fawkes tried to blow up no longer exists. It was destroyed in a fire in 1834 that devastated the medieval Houses of Parliament.

GUY FAWKES TOP FACTS The Houses of Parliament are still searched once a year to make sure there are no conspirators hiding with explosives. Before the annual State Opening of Parliament, the Yeomen of the Guard search the Houses of Parliament to make sure there are no would-be conspirators hiding in the cellars. Guy Fawkes won the unlikely admiration of King James I. When asked why he had so much gunpowder, he replied that his intention was: “to blow you Scotch beggars back to your native mountains”. His steadfast manner earned him the praise of King James, who described Fawkes as possessing "a Roman resolution".

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