Guy Fawkes at The Corner Café

Guy Fawkes Night, also known as Bonfire Night and Fireworks Night, is a celebration in the UK on 5th November each year.

It all began back in 1605 when Guy Fawkes was arrested on the 5th November while guarding barrels of explosive powder in an undercroft beneath the House of Lords in the Houses of Parliament in London. The target of the members of the Gunpowder Plot, as it became known, was the protestant king, James I, who they wished to replace with a catholic king. Their plan was to blow up the gunpowder and everything above it, while the king was attending parliament.

Overjoyed that the king had survived the attempt on his life, people lit bonfires around London. This impromptu celebration led to a law a few months later called the Observance of 5th November Act which actually enforced an annual public day of thanksgiving for the plot's failure.

Over the following years, effigies of popular figures of hate were burned on the bonfires on Gunpowder Treason Day as it was then called.

Guy Fawkes (13th April 1570 to 31st January 1606) and his fellow conspirators paid a high price for their plans.

Fawkes himself fell or more likely jumped from the scaffold on the day of his execution, breaking his neck and thereby avoiding the gruesome fate of being hanged, drawn and quartered – the usual punishment for traitors at that time.

A couple of centuries later, and children began begging for money with effigies of Guy Fawkes and 5th November became known as Guy Fawkes Day. The Observance of 5th November Act was finally repealed in 1859.

By the 20th century, Guy Fawkes Day had become the enjoyable social commemoration, that it is today, with large organised displays centred on a bonfire and extravagant firework displays. Some families or groups of friends do still have smaller displays at home.

No bonfire party is complete without food, sticky toffee apples, bonfire night toffee, hot dogs, jacket spuds and whatever else you fancy. Hot chilli cooked on the fire, and marshmallows on a stick - not sure about that one. The spuds had to be cooked in the embers until the skins were black !!

Sticky Toffee Apples

Bonfire Toffee

Hot dogs

Jacket spuds

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