Titus Oates: Difference between revisions
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==Jesuits== |
==Jesuits== |
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Oates was involved with the Jesuit houses of [[College of St. Omer|St. Omer]] (in France) and the Royal English College at [[Valladolid]], [[Spain]] (like many diocesan seminaries of the day, this was a Jesuit-run institution). He later claimed that he had become a Catholic doctor of Divinity. And yet, when he returned to London, he rekindled his friendship with the fervent [[anti-Catholic]] clergyman Israel Tonge. Oates' reasoning was that he had pretended to become a Catholic to learn about the secrets of the Jesuits and that, before leaving, he had heard about a planned Jesuit meeting in [[London]] |
Oates was involved with the Jesuit houses of [[College of St. Omer|St. Omer]] (in France) and the Royal English College at [[Valladolid]], [[Spain]] (like many diocesan seminaries of the day, this was a Jesuit-run institution). He later claimed that he had become a Catholic doctor of Divinity. And yet, when he returned to London, he rekindled his friendship with the fervent [[anti-Catholic]] clergyman Israel Tonge. Oates' reasoning was that he had pretended to become a Catholic to learn about the secrets of the Jesuits and that, before leaving, he had heard about a planned Jesuit meeting in [[London]]. |
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==The "Popish" Plot== |
==The "Popish" Plot== |
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Revision as of 10:44, 13 September 2008
Titus Oates (September 15, 1649 – July 12/13, 1705) was a 17th century perjurer who fabricated the "Popish Plot", a supposed Catholic conspiracy to kill King Charles II.
Early life
Titus Oates was born in Oakham. His father, Samuel, was the rector of Marsham in Norfolk[1] before becoming an Anabaptist during the Puritan Revolution[2] and rejoining the Church of England at the Restoration.[3] Titus was educated at Merchant Taylors' School, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and St John's College, Cambridge. He was known as a less than astute student, and was ejected from both colleges.[4][5] A few months later, he became an Anglican priest and Vicar of the parish of Bobbing in Kent. During this time Oates was charged with perjury having accused a schoolmaster in Hastings of sodomy. Oates was put in jail, but escaped and fled to London.[3]
In 1677 he got himself appointed as a chaplain of the ship Adventurer in the English navy. He was soon accused of buggery (i.e., sodomy, which was a capital offence in England at the time) and spared only because of his clergyman's status.
After the navy he joined the household of the Catholic Duke of Norfolk as an Anglican chaplain. On Ash Wednesday, 1677 he was received into the Catholic church.[6] At the same time Titus agreed to co-author a series of anti-Catholic pamphlets with Israel Tonge, whom he had met through his father Samuel, who had once more reverted to the Baptist doctrine. [7]
Jesuits
Oates was involved with the Jesuit houses of St. Omer (in France) and the Royal English College at Valladolid, Spain (like many diocesan seminaries of the day, this was a Jesuit-run institution). He later claimed that he had become a Catholic doctor of Divinity. And yet, when he returned to London, he rekindled his friendship with the fervent anti-Catholic clergyman Israel Tonge. Oates' reasoning was that he had pretended to become a Catholic to learn about the secrets of the Jesuits and that, before leaving, he had heard about a planned Jesuit meeting in London.
The "Popish" Plot
In August, 1678 King Charles was warned of plots against his life, first by the chemist Christopher Kirkby, and later by Tonge, whose complex claims included the Jesuits, the English Catholics and King Louis XIV of France. The king was unimpressed but made the mistake of handing the matter over to the anti-Catholic Earl of Danby, who was more willing to listen and who was introduced by Tonge to Oates.
On September 6, 1678 Oates and Tonge approached Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, an Anglican magistrate. Oates claimed he had a proof of a Catholic plot to assassinate the King and replace him with his Catholic brother, James, the Duke of York (future James II). Then all the leading Protestants would be killed.
The King's Council interrogated Oates. On September 28 he made 43 allegations against various members of Catholic religious orders — including 541 Jesuits — and numerous Catholic nobles. He accused Sir George Wakeman, the queen's physician, and Edward Colman, the secretary to the Duchess of York (Mary of Modena), of planning to assassinate the king. Although Oates probably selected the names randomly or with the help of the Earl of Danby, Coleman was found to have corresponded with a French Jesuit, which condemned him. Wakeman was later acquitted.
Others Oates accused included Dr William Fogarty, Archbishop Peter Talbot of Dublin, Samuel Pepys, and Lord Belasyse. With the help of the Earl of Danby the list grew to 81 accusations. Oates was given a squad of soldiers and he began to round up Jesuits, including those who had helped him in the past.
The Lord Chief Justice, Sir William Scroggs, began a trial against the "Popish Plot". Edward Colman was sentenced to death on December 3, 1678 for treason and was hanged, drawn and quartered.
On October 12, Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey, the Anglican magistrate, disappeared for five days and then was found dead in Primrose Hill. He had been strangled and run through with his own sword. Oates exploited this incident to launch a public campaign against the "Papists" and spread a rumor that the murder had been the work of the Jesuits. King Charles heard about the unrest, returned to London and summoned Parliament.
King Charles still did not believe in Titus's accusations. However, Parliament and public opinion forced him to order an investigation. The king's opponents, however, who disliked his "Catholic" court and his Catholic wife Catherine of Braganza, exploited the situation. One of the most prominent such opponents was Anthony Ashley Cooper, 1st Earl of Shaftesbury.
Hysteria continued. Noblewomen carried firearms if they had to venture outdoors at night. Houses were searched for hidden guns, mostly without any significant result. Some Catholic widows tried to ensure their safety by marrying Anglican widowers. The House of Commons was searched — without result — in the expectation of a second Gunpowder Plot being perpetrated.
Oates became more daring and accused five Catholic lords (including Arundel and Bellasyse) for involvement of the plot. The King reputedly laughed at the accusations but the Earl of Shaftesbury had the lords arrested and sent to the Tower. Then Shaftesbury publicly demanded that the King's brother, James, should be excluded from the royal succession. On November 5, 1678, people burned effigies of the Pope instead of those of Guy Fawkes. At the end of the year, the parliament passed a bill, a second Test Act, excluding Catholics from membership of both Houses (a law not repealed until 1829).
On November 24, Oates claimed the Queen was working with the King's physician to poison him and enlisted the aid of "Captain" William Bedloe, who was ready to say anything for money. The King personally interrogated Oates, caught him out in a number of inaccuracies and lies, and ordered his arrest. However, a couple days later, Parliament forced Oates's release with the threat of constitutional crisis.
Anyone even suspected of being Catholic was driven out of London and forbidden to return within ten miles of the city. Silk armour was produced for fashionable ladies and gentlemen. There was also a playing card set with key figures of the scandal as face cards.
Oates, in turn, received a state apartment in Whitehall and an annual allowance of £1,200. He was not ready to stop, however, and soon presented new allegations. He claimed assassins intended to shoot the king with silver bullets so the wound would not heal. The public invented their own stories, including a tale that the sound of digging had been heard near the House of Commons and rumours of a French invasion in the Isle of Purbeck. The "purge" spread to the countryside.
Oates was heaped with praise. He asked the College of Arms to check his lineage and produce a coat of arms for him. They gave him the arms of a family that had died out. There were even rumours that Oates was to be married to one of the Earl of Shaftesbury's daughters.
However, public opinion began to turn against Oates. Having had at least 15 probably-innocent men executed, the last Oliver Plunkett, Archbishop of Armagh, executed on July 1, 1681, Judge Scroggs began to declare people innocent. The King began to devise countermeasures.
On August 31, 1681, Oates was told to leave his apartments in Whitehall, but remained undeterred and denounced the King, the Duke of York, and just about anyone he regarded as an opponent. He was arrested for sedition, sentenced to a fine of £100,000 and thrown into prison.
When James II acceded to the throne, he had a score to settle. He had Oates retried and sentenced for perjury to annual pillory, loss of clerical dress, and imprisonment for life. Oates was taken out of his cell wearing a hat with the text "Titus Oates, convicted upon full evidence of two horrid perjuries" and put into the pillory at the gate of Westminster Hall (now New Palace Yard) where passers-by pelted him with eggs. The next day he was pilloried in London and a third day was stripped, tied to a cart, and whipped from Aldgate to Newgate. The next day, the whipping resumed. The judge was Judge Jeffreys who stated that Oates was a "Shame to mankind".
Oates spent the next three years in prison. At the accession of William of Orange and Mary in 1688, he was pardoned and granted a pension of £5 a week but his reputation did not significantly recover. The pension was later suspended, but in 1698 was restored and increased to £300 a year. Titus Oates died on July 12 or July 13, 1705.
Trivia
 | This article contains a list of miscellaneous information. (June 2007) |
- In 2006, Titus Oates was selected by the BBC History Magazine as the 17th century's worst Briton. He ranked the third-equal worst Briton over the last 1000 years. (BBC)(BBC)
- The Titus Oates Society was formed at Gonville & Caius College in the 1960s with Peter Tranchell as its patron. Oates was commemorated at the society's dinners (known as exceedings) which were notorious for their debauched campery. In the mid-1990s, the society was disbanded by order of the college council and banned from Caius in perpetuity.
- In the English Bill of Right of 1689, a provision for the prohibition on 'cruel or unusual punishment' was inserted because of public outrage at the treatment of Oates. The treatment he suffered when he was defrocked, whipped and set in the pillory "were thought cruel by his fanatical fellow Protestants".[8]
- The Rev. Dr. Titus Oates is referenced in Herman Melville's Billy Budd, Sailor, in connection to John Claggart of similar character and motivation
References
- ^ Pollock, John (1903). The Popish Plot: A study in the history of the reign of Charles II. London: Duckworth and Co. p. 3. ISBN 1417965762
- ^ Pollock, John p.5
- ^ a b Alan Marshall, ‘Oates, Titus (1649–1705)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004
- ^ Pollock, John p. 5
- ^ "Are these the 10 worst Britons?". The Independent. September 14, 2007. Retrieved 2007-09-14.
- ^ Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). . Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
- ^ Alan Marshall, ‘Tonge, Israel (1621–1680)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004
- ^ Robertson, Geoffrey. Crimes Agasint Humanity: The Struggle for Global Justice. Chapter 1 The Human Rights Story, p. 4. 2nd ed. Penguin Books. 2003.