The forefathers of Guy Fawkes almost certainly sprang from Nidderdale, in the West Riding of Yorkshire. See Foster’s “Yorkshire Families,” under Hawkesworth, of Hawkesworth, and Fawkes, of Farnley.
Guy’s grandfather was William Fawkes, of York, who married a York lady, Ellen Harrington.[A]
[A] Ellen Harrington’s father was Lord Mayor of York, in the reign of Henry VIII., in the year 1536.
William Fawkes became Registrar of the Exchequer Court of the Archbishop of York, and died between the years 1558-1565.
William Fawkes had two sons and two daughters — Thomas Fawkes, a merchant-stapler, and Edward Fawkes, a Notary or Proctor of the Ecclesiastical Court, and afterwards an Advocate of the Consistory Court of the Archbishop of York. (Certainly it is a strange and bitter irony that an ancestry like this should have brought forth such a moral monster as poor Guy Fawkes afterwards became. But our guiding motto must be: “Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in malice.”)
Edward Fawkes married a lady whose Christian name was Edith, but her surname is unknown. She was the
mother of four children — two sons and two daughters. Only one of her sons grew to man’s estate, and this was the hapless Guy.
(Only four children are known of with certainty; but Guy possibly may have had another brother, who was a student at the Inns of Court, in November, 1605.)
Now, the exact house where Edith Fawkes gave birth to her ill-fated boy is at present not known with certitude. There are four traditions respecting the place. Two traditions say the house was on the south side of High Petergate, York; one tradition that it was on the north side, adjoining the alley called Minster Gates; the fourth tradition that it was at Bishopthorpe. Personally, I am in favour of the Minster Gates’ tradition. But the Bishopthorpe tradition is worthy of a respectful hearing.
My friend, Mr. William Camidge, F.R.H.S. (than whom no man now living in York has a greater, if indeed as great, knowledge concerning the City’s antiquarian lore) tells me in a letter, dated the 5th of November, 1901, that in old Thomas Gent’s “Rippon” (1733) there is mention made of Bishopthorpe as being Guy’s birthplace. Gent says, “The house opposite the church[A] is said to be the birthplace of Guy Faux.”