The Press Junior THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 1937. Guy Fawkes

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22241, 4 November 1937, Page 4 (Supplement)

The Press Junior THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 1937. Guy Fawkes

To-morrow will be an early rising day for many young boys in Christchurch and other places; it will be Guy Fawkes’ day and the young guys will make themselves thoroughly ugly—so that the name fits—and will go about singing traditional and other songs and begging pennies of the passers-by. The significance of the day has in this country completely changed; so much so that anyone who takes the trouble to ask the guys why they are begging for money and why they call themselves guys will probably be told some strange tale of hardship and want and nothing very intelligible about the notorious Guy Fawkes himself. The boys who dress themselves in old clothes, black their faces and go out collecting money do not all know the outline of the story they perpetuate. They do not know that at the beginning of the reign of James I the Roman Catholic population of England had high hopes of the new king and that as the years went by they found to their bitterness that those hopes were in vain: the persecution against those not following the Protestant religion ’was as severe as ever before. Therefore a plot was hatched by a group of especially discontented gentlemen and Guy or Guido Fawkes was one of the group. This Guy Fawkes was probably not the man who first thought of the scheme of blowing up the Lords and the Commons when they were gathered together at the opening of Parliament. All writers do not agree about the < inventor of the plot; but possibly ! it was one by name Robert Catesby, a gentleman of ancient family who had at one time • turned Protestant but who was now reconverted to the Catholic ; faith. Eight or nine men took a : house next to the building where Parliament met, and in 1604, stocking the house with supplies ; of food so that they could better ; keep their operations secret, they began the long task of digging through the wall. As all the men engaged in the plot were gentle- i men unused to manual labour ! they found their task most diffi- ; cult. When they had spent many i months on it a better way was i made clear for them; this was to ! fill a coal cellar below the House ' of Lords with their casks of gun- ; powder and so blow up the King i and the Lords and the Commons i from tiiis place, directly beneath i them. All* was ready in May of i 1605. But Parliament was not to open till November 5: so the conspirators had the summer months So spend in planning the other i details of the revolution which ; would follow the explosion. At i last the night of November 4 : ramp and Guy Fawkes, who had : been chosen to fire the gunSowder, was hidden in the cellar, y some means news of the plot * came to the ears of some members of Parliament and soldiers were sent to search the cellar. : The result was that the conspira- ! Sors were all caught and put to .

death. And after some months November 5 was proclaimed a public holiday on which there should be rejoicing for the escape of the King and his members of Parliament. Each year it, became the custom for small boys to dress a scare-crow figure as a guy, to deck themselves with false noses and beards and to march the Guy Fawkes effigy through the streets and then burn it in a bonfire. As they went through the streets they sang the well-known song “Remember, remember the fifth of November” and held out their hands for money. Nowadays the effigy has been left out, the songs may be variations of “Remember, remember” or they may simply be chants which have nothing whatever to do with Guy Fawkes’ day, and the young boys make themselves look as ugly and as unrecognisable as possible and seem to have one thought in their heads—to collect as much money as possible. ■ „