On his return, he detailed to certain royalists a plan by
which the protector might be assassinated on his way to Hampton Court, the
guards at Whitehall overpowered, the town surprised, and the royal exile
proclaimed. Men were found to listen to his suggestions; and when a
sufficient number were entangled in the toil, forty were apprehended[a] and
examined. Of these, many consented to give evidence; three were selected[b]
for trial before the high court of justice. Fox, one of the three, pleaded
guilty, and thus, by giving countenance to the evidence of Henshaw,
deserved and obtained[c] his pardon. Vowell, a schoolmaster, and Gerard, a
young gentleman two-and-twenty years of age, received[d] judgment of death.
The first suffered on the gallows, glorying that he died a martyr in
the cause of royalty. Gerard, before he was beheaded, protested in the
strongest terms that, though he had heard, he had never approved of the
design.[2] In the depositions, it was pretended that Charles had given his
consent to the assassination of the protector.
[Footnote 1: Clarendon informs Nicholas (June 12), that in reality no one
secret had been betrayed or discovered.--Clar. Papers, iii. 247. But this
is doubtful; for Willis, one of the committee called "the sealed knot," who
was imprisoned, but discharged in September (Perfect Account, No.
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