The Sun King and the Merry 1678 Monarch

Explores the religious backdrop to one of the largest threats to England's throne - the Popish Plot. Aggravated by the murder of the magistrate Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, the Plot reflected religious beliefs and insecurities at the By Calum time. Sir Godfrey was my ancestor (of some 11 generations). A visit to his Johnson grave in Westminster Abbey in 2014 inspired me to explore his role in this religious turmoil which hit hard in 17th Century England... The Clergyman and the King of England

Leaving for his morning stroll on the 13th of August 1678, Charles II, King of England and Defender of the Faith heard for the first time of a plot to kill him. This was far from unusual. Indeed, just months earlier, a woman in Newcastle had been subjected to a large investigation after stating, "the King deserves the curse of all good and faithful wives for his bad example”. And yet, when Mr Kirkby (his lab assistant) brought Dr Israel Tonge to him at 8 o’clock that evening, the king listened impatiently before handing the matter over to his first minister….

The Religious Pendulum: Change of Faith in England

To truly examine the tumult about to hit England in the 17th Century, it is important that we look first at the Religious scene in Europe some 150 years earlier.

In the previous century the Reformation began and Protestantism gathered momentum, fuelled by a desire to reduce the exuberance of the Church in Rome with its elaborate sculptures, paintings and stained-glass windows. In 1517, Martin Luther published his Ninety-Five Theses, criticising the sale of indulgences as a means, put simply, of guaranteeing the deceased free passage to Heaven. Others followed his lead (notably John Calvin) and in 1534 Henry VIII created the Church of England, under a personal pretext.

In response, the Church in Rome began a Counter-Reformation. Some pressing issues were addressed, but many still lay open to argument; the Pope preferring instead to strengthen the ‘good’ practices of the Church rather than deal with the corruption which had infiltrated right to the highest echelons of Catholicism.

Even at the time of the English Protestant Reformation, much of England remained Catholic. In particular, there was opposition to the decision to create a new Church - deemed, by many, to serve the interests of the king alone and not the state. It was almost inevitable, therefore, that Catholicism would attempt to return; a process which began under Mary, had she not married her cousin, the Catholic King Phillip II of Spain. He still advocated the Inquisition and had 300 Protestants burnt at the stake.

With only a limited education, the population was easily influenced by the morality of events and these actions quickly linked Catholicism with violence, foreign intervention, and persecution in the minds of the people. While Elizabeth I returned England to Protestantism, her legitimacy was insecure and a number of plots (particularly Ridolfi, 1571, and Babington, 1586) were conceived to remove her from power. Once again Phillip II of Spain stepped in to reinforce the position of the side he had always hoped would fail. The Armada ‘proved’ once again that foreign intervention was synonymous with Catholicism and, with England’s winning, that God was on the side of Protestants.

This image was only reinforced further when the daring Guy Fawkes was foiled in his attempt to topple Government, an act of such magnitude that all Catholics were branded as strongly anti- establishment.

The Treaty of Dover and French ties with England

Charles II was Protestant, and enjoyed a fairly good relationship with Parliament for much of his reign. This all changed on 15th March 1672, when Charles issued the Royal Declaration of Indulgence and in doing so presented more liberal treatment to non-Protestants under his rule. The same year, he launched a new conflict with the Dutch (the Third Anglo-Dutch War) as part of a larger conflict between France and the Dutch Republic. In effect, Charles joined the French king Louis XIV, ‘The Most Catholic Ruler’ in Europe against a largely Protestant country. Parliament was fearful that Charles would form an alliance with Louis and turn the country Catholic. They therefore demanded an end to English involvement, signalled by their suspension of funding.

What they had not realised was, two years earlier, Charles had entered negotiations secretly with Louis, his first cousin, and agreed – in return for a pension and aid in the war effort – to convert to Catholicism at an unspecified date. In fact, a second ‘cover’ treaty was negotiated (by the Duke of Buckingham) along the same lines as the first but without the divisive clauses about a pension and aid. This was signed by all five of the “CABAL”, Charles’ important ministers, who had seen nothing of the original.

The Popish Plot

The plot, in fact, was not a plot at all. Fears of a Catholic takeover – by way of Charles’ ties with France or through his brother and closest heir the Duke of York – were spread by two men, Titus Oates and Israel Tonge. They claimed the King was to be assassinated by Catholics. Oates and Tonge together wrote a document detailing the approval of the Catholic Church to kill the King, to be performed by Jesuits. Named within were about a hundred devout Catholics who supposedly would play a part in the fictitious plot. Through Mr Kirkby (the lab assistant), Tonge was brought before Lord Danby (now the King’s most important minister) where he claimed to have found the document but didn’t know the author. Alarmed, Danby asked the King to launch an investigation. He refused; hoping that, instead, limited coverage of the issue would discourage any future regicide attempts.

Somehow, the Duke of York found out about the plot and ordered publicly that there be an investigation into the issue to which the King, unable to say with certainty that none of the many supposed conspirators was plotting to kill him, reluctantly agreed. On the 6th September 1678, Edmund Berry Godfrey (my ancestor) took Oates’ oath prior to his testimony before Charles II. Oates described a meeting at the White Horse Tavern, London, in which Jesuits had discussed plans to kill the king. The issue was then brought before the Privy Council.

The Unsolved Murder of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey

Still however, the allegations gained little credence. That was until the murder of the judge, Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, himself a faithful Protestant. Disappearing on the 12th October 1678, he was found to have been out all night. Searching began and he was found eventually on 17th October 1678, with a broken neck and his own sword rammed through his chest post-mortem. The murder could not be solved and conspiracies began to form. The Protestant population was outraged and his supporters blamed the murder on the Catholics, resulting in the outlawing of Catholicism within 20 miles of London from 30th October. Unfortunately, Panic had already spread.

Conclusion

What Oates and Tonge achieved through their bizarre plot was a state of mass hysteria. Britain was a blaze of religious tension throughout the 16th and 17th Century, crackling in response to certain events, and then vanishing when nothing piqued the people’s interest. It was Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey’s murder that finally relit the dying embers of a religious feud which had stretched back to the time of Henry VIII. Dead in a ditch, with no reason to be there, his assassination left scope for fantastic conspiracies which, by accident, prevented the passing of the one act that would really challenge Protestant power – Charles’ conversion. It was only on his deathbed that he eventually kept his word to Louis XIV of France, by which time it was too late to be of impact.

This seems a simple conclusion therefore, were it not for the mystery of Sir Godfrey, and his murder – one of the three greatest in English history (alongside the mysteries of Jack the Ripper and the Princes in the Tower) – which, to this day and forever, remains unsolved.

So fascinating is the fruitless search to uncover the truth that he should be remembered as a key figure of 17th Century conspiracy; his legacy certainly touched me, as his direct descendent, to write about his life and his impact on the Popish Plot.

Bibliography:

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Marshall, Alan (1999), The Strange Death of Edmund Godfrey, Plots and Politics in Restoration London

Kenyon, John (1972), The Popish Plot

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Carr, John Dickson (1989), The Murder of Sir Edmund Godfrey

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(By Calum Johnson)