The Persons-Campion Jesuit mission of 1580-1581 -- Tainted in blood -- A wolf by the ears -- The MP from Morpeth: gentleman pensioner and assassin -- Persecution of Catholic gentry -- Aboard the ambassador's boat -- Mary Stewart and the theatre of the world -- The Spanish Armada and English Catholics -- The Essex, Phelippes and Bacon intelligence initiative -- In Spanish lands: the Bisley-Moody Plot -- The Parliament of 1593: Sterrell and Marlowe -- Who can protect the queen? A rivalry over assassins -- The General Factor and Arbella Stewart -- Co-opting the Privy Council -- Trustworthy men at the Fountainhead in the Council -- The network at work: tricks of strong imagination -- Charles Paget, meet Monsieur Boulant -- Treaty negotiations and Burgundian jewels -- Essex's dismal tumult -- The war between the priests -- Scenes of a dying queen -- Transitions and treasons, 1603 -- From intelligence to entertainment -- Measure for measure: a sermon to a king -- Cecil's interrogations: Phelippes's lies and Sterrell's equivocations -- A stir in Wales; the Whitsun commotion, 1605 -- The Gunpowder Treason -- Conclusion: the state of the English Counter-Reformation after Gunpowder
Summary
"In the wake of the 1588 destruction of the Spanish Armada, English Catholics launched an ingenious counterespionage effort to undermine the Tudor government's anti-Catholic machinations. Queen Elizabeth long maintained spies and provocateurs among English Catholic exiles. Walsingham, her principal secretary, used treachery to foster plots against the queen to justify harsh measures against Catholics"-- Provided by publisher
