The Identification of the Writer of the Anonymous Letter to Lord Monteagle in 1605

A strange letter, from a strange hand, by a strange messenger; without date to it, name at it, and (I had almost said) sense in it. A letter which, even when it was opened, was still sealed, such the affected obscurity therein.
Fuller's Church History , x. 32.

One of the great mysteries of English history is the anonymous letter to Lord Monteagle, warning him not to attend the opening of Parliament, appointed for the Fifth of November, 1605, which is popularly supposed to have led to the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot. The writer's identity was carefully concealed by the Government at the time; the intention being, as explained by Lord Salisbury, to leave the further judgment indefinite regarding it. The official statements are, therefore, as unsatisfactory as might be expected in a matter that, for State reasons, has not been straightforwardly related. The letter, however, remaining and in fair preservation, there was always the possibility of the handwriting being identified; and this, after the lapse of over three hundred years, is now accomplished.


Stated by Vavasour to have been written by Mrs. Tresham. On March 24, 1605-6, he confessed that he wrote it and signed a note to it to that effect.
To avoid detection of his falsehood, he writes a hand quite different from his ordinary writing in Nos. 2 and 3, thus producing a hand which is in itself identical with his former disguised writing as seen in the anonymous letter (No. 1).

Francis Tresham, of Rushton, in Northamptonshire, has recently (September 11, 1605) succeeded his father, Sir Thomas Tresham (a great sufferer for the Roman Catholic religion), in an inheritance of at least five thousand a year, in present money; after having, as he says, spent most of his time overburdened with debts and wants, and resolves within himself to spend his days quietly. His first cousin, Robert Catesby, being hard-up with funds exhausted in financing the scheme known as the Gunpowder Plot, seeing in Tresham the chance of obtaining a further supply (though previously distrusting him), induces him, in the interests of their religion, to join the conspiracy, of which he thus becomes the thirteenth, and last, sworn conspirator (October 14, 1605). Catesby is careful to impose the oath of secrecy before fully disclosing the plot; of which Tresham, on hearing, entirely disapproves, and endeavours to dissuade his cousin from, or even to defer it; meanwhile offering him the use of his own purse if he will do so. Finding he cannot prevail with him, he is very urgent that the Lords Monteagle and Stourton, particularly the former, may be warned, each having married Tresham's sisters; but Catesby can give no definite assurance. Tresham then intends, as he says, to get the conspirators shipped away, and to inform the Government by some unknown, or anonymous, means.