page_title: Francis Tresham
section_title: Introduction
hierarchical_section_title: Francis Tresham / Introduction
caption_attribution_description: Rushton Hall, near CorbyThis is a photo of listed building number 1192160.
context_page_description: Francis Tresham, eldest son of
  Thomas Tresham and Merial Throckmorton, was a member of the group of English provincial Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a conspiracy to assassinate King James I of England.
  Tresham joined the Earl of Essex's failed rebellion against the government in 1601, for which he was imprisoned. Only his family's intervention and his father's money saved him from attainder. Despite this, he became involved in two missions to Catholic Spain to seek support for English Catholics, and finally with the Gunpowder Plotters.
  According to his confession, Tresham joined the plot in October 1605. Its leader, Robert Catesby, asked him to provide a large sum of money and the use of Rushton Hall, but Tresham apparently provided neither, instead giving a much smaller amount of money to fellow plotter Thomas Wintour. Tresham also expressed concern that if the plot was successful, two of his brothers-in-law would be killed. An anonymous letter delivered to one of them, William Parker, 4th Baron Monteagle, found its way to the English Secretary of State, Robert Cecil, an event which eventually proved decisive in the conspiracy's failure.
context_section_description: English Catholics had hoped that the persecution of their faith would end when James succeeded Elizabeth I, as he appeared to hold more moderate views toward Catholics than his predecessor.  But Robert Catesby, a religious zealot also imprisoned for his involvement in the Essex rebellion, had grown tired of James's supposed perfidy and planned to kill the king.  He hoped to achieve this by blowing up the House of Lords with gunpowder and inciting a popular revolt to install James's daughter Princess Elizabeth as titular Queen.
  Catesby had recruited 11 fellow Catholics to his cause but was running out of money.  Even with his debts, with an annual income of over £3,000 Tresham was one of the wealthiest people known to the plotters, and Catesby's mother was Anne Throckmorton, an aunt of Tresham's.  The two cousins had been raised together and shared a close relationship.
  Despite their shared upbringing and involvement in the Spanish Treason, the conspirators chose not to reveal the plot to him until 14 October 1605, shortly after his father died, and just weeks before the planned explosion. According to his confession, the meeting took place at the home of Tresham's brother-in-law, Lord Stourton, in Clerkenwell.  Tresham claimed to have questioned Catesby on the morality of the plot, asking if it was spiritually "damnable".  Catesby replied that it was not, at which point Tresham highlighted the danger that all Catholics would face should the plot succeed.  Catesby replied, "The necessity of the Catholics" was such that "it must needs be done". He wanted two things from Tresham: £2,000, and the use of Rushton Hall; Catesby received neither.  Tresham had no money to spare, his father's debts having reduced his inheritance, although he paid a small sum to Thomas Wintour, on the understanding that the latter was to travel to the Low Countries. Following the meeting, he hurried back to Rushton Hall and closed his household, taking care to hide family papers (not discovered until 1838). He then returned to London with his mother and sisters, and on 2 November acquired a licence to travel abroad with his servants and horses.
caption: Rushton Hall
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