71.Special Episode: Guy Fawkes Attempts to Blow Up King James and Parliament, London, England November 5, 1605

This is one of the illustrations made by George Cruikshank for the 1840 edition of William Harrison Ainsworth’s Guy Fawkes, or The Gunpowder Treason, an historical novel that made Edgar Allan Poe very upset indeed. Here, Guy is in Ordsall Cave, philosophically pondering how best to commit domestic terrorism. (Did Guy and his cohorts plan the Gunpowder Plot in Ordsall? No. Ainsworth made that up.

Special Episode! It’s the third birthday of True Crime Medieval, but, more importantly really, it’s the 417th anniversary of the Gunpowder Plot not actually coming off; if it had, not only King James and all of Parliament would have been destroyed, but also several blocks around, including Westminster Abbey.  We discuss the Plot, why it didn’t work, what’s been going on with November 5th celebrations since then, and, because Michelle finds this stuff, Edgar Allan Poe and his hatred for William Harrison Ainsworth’s historical novel about the whole affair. 

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