Let us finally consider the Evidence and the deductions and suggestions
therefrom which tend to prove that _subsequent_ to the dictating of the
Letter by the contrite, repentant Christopher Wright, _and subsequent_ to
the penning of the Document by the deserving, beneficent Edward Oldcorne,
each of these two Englishmen, aye! these two Yorkshiremen, _were conscious
of having performed_ the several functions that these pages have
attributed unto them.
Let us take, then, the case of Christopher Wright first.
Now, the Evidence that tends to show that Christopher Wright was conscious
of having been the revealing plotter and dictating conspirator[121] has
been already mainly set forth, but let me recapitulate the same.
It is as follows:——
(1) That either Thomas Winter must have gone in search of Christopher
Wright, or Christopher Wright must have gone in search of Thomas Winter,
in order that it might be possible for Stowe to record on p. 880 of his
“_Chronicle_” the following allegation of facts:——
“T. Winter, the next day after the delivery of the Letter, told
Christopher Wright that he understood of an obscure letter delivered to
the Lord Mounteagle, advising him not to appear at the Parliament House
the first day, and that the Lord Mounteagle had no sooner read it, but
instantly carried it to the Earle of Salisbury, which newes was presently
made known unto the rest, who after divers conferences agreed to see
further trial, but, howsoever, Percy resolved to stay the last
houre.”[122]
(2) Poulson says, in his account of the Wrights, of Plowland (or Plewland)
Hall, in his “_History of Holderness_,” vol. ii., p. 57, that Christopher
Wright “was the first who ascertained that the plot was discovered.”
(3) Christopher Wright was possibly being harboured by Thomas Ward in or
near Lord Mounteagle’s town-house in the Strand during a part of Monday
night, the 4th of November, and during the early hours of Tuesday, the
5th.
Or, if Christopher Wright were not being so harboured, then it is almost
certain he must have been taking such brief repose as he did take at the
inn known by the name of “the Mayden heade in St. Gyles.”[A] For there is
evidence to prove that this conspirator’s horse was being stabled at that
hostelry in the afternoon of Monday, the 4th of November.
[Footnote A: The Strand is not far from the Church of St.
Giles-in-the-Fields. This well-known church has now two district churches,
Christ Church, Endell Street, and Holy Trinity, Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
(Communicated by Mr. J. A. Nicholson, Solicitor, York.) In 1891 the
population of St. Giles’s Parish was 15,281.]
This we know from the testimony of William Grantham, servant to Joseph
Hewett, deposed to on the 5th of November, 1605,[B] taken before Sir John
Popham, the Lord Chief Justice of England.
[Footnote B: See Appendix.]
Moreover, the Lord Chief Justice Popham[C] reported to Lord Salisbury on
the 5th of November as follows: “Christopher Wright, as I thyncke, lay
this last night in St. Gyles.”——“_Gunpowder Plot Book_,” Part I., No. 10.
[Footnote C: Of the Leyborne-Pophams, of Littlecote, Co. Wilts.]
(4) Again; from the following passage in “_Thomas Winter’s Confession_” it
is evident that Christopher Wright, at a very early hour in the morning of
Tuesday, November 5th, must have been _in very close proximity to
Mounteagle’s residence_, in order to ascertain so accurately——either
directly, through the evidence of his own senses, or indirectly, through
the evidence of the senses of some other person (presumably of Thomas
Ward)——what _there_ took place a few hours after Fawkes’s midnight
apprehension by Sir Thomas Knevet.
Thomas Winter says:——
“About five o’clock being Tuesday came the younger Wright to my chamber
and told me that, a nobleman[A] called the Lord Mounteagle, saying, ‘Rise
and come along to Essex House, for I am going to call up my Lord of
Northumberland,’ saying withal ‘the matter is discovered.’
[Footnote A: It was Edward Somerset Earl of Worcester, Master of the
Horse, I believe, an ancestor, lineal or collateral, of the Duke of
Beaufort. Worcester was a Catholic.]
“‘Go back, Mr. Wright,’ quoth I, ‘and learn what you can at Essex Gate.’
“Shortly he returned and said, ‘Surely all is lost,[123] for Leyton is got
on horseback at Essex door, and as he parted, he asked if their Lordships
would have any more with him, and being answered “No,” he rode as fast up
Fleet Street as he can ride.’
“‘Go you then,’ quoth I, ‘to Mr. Percy, for sure it is for him they seek,
and bid him be gone: I will stay and see the uttermost.’”
(5) Furthermore; Lathbury, writing in the year 1839,[A] asserts that
Christopher Wright’s advice was that each conspirator “should betake
himself to flight in a different direction from any of his
companions.”[124]
[Footnote A: Lathbury’s little book, published by Parker, is a very
careful compilation (_me judice_). It contains an extract from the Act of
Parliament ordaining an Annual Thanksgiving for November 5th; also in the
second Edition (1840) an excellent fac-simile of Lord Mounteagle’s Letter.
In Father Gerard’s “_What was the Gunpowder Plot?_” (1896), on p. 173, is
a fac-simile of the signature of Edward Oldcorne both before and after
torture.]