Editing Babington Plot (section)

==Mary's imprisonment==
[[File:Mary, Queen of Scots after Nicholas Hilliard.jpg|thumb|180px|left|Mary in captivity, {{Circa|1578}}]]
Mary, Queen of Scots, a Roman Catholic, was regarded by Roman Catholics as the legitimate heir to the throne of England. In 1568, she escaped imprisonment by Scottish rebels and sought the aid of her first cousin once removed, [[Elizabeth I|Queen Elizabeth I]], a year after her forced abdication from the throne of [[History of Scotland|Scotland]]. The issuance of the [[papal bull]] ''[[Regnans in Excelsis]]'' by [[Pope Pius V]] on 25 February 1570, granted English Catholics authority to overthrow the English queen. Queen Mary became the focal point of numerous plots and intrigues to restore England to its former religion, Catholicism, and to depose Elizabeth and even to take her life. Rather than rendering the expected aid, Elizabeth imprisoned Mary for nineteen years in the charge of a succession of jailers, principally the [[George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury|Earl of Shrewsbury]].

In 1584, Elizabeth's [[Privy Council of England|Privy Council]] signed a "[[Bond of Association]]" designed by Cecil and Walsingham which stated that anyone within the line of succession to the throne ''on whose behalf'' anyone plotted against the Queen, would be excluded from the line and executed. This was agreed upon by hundreds of Englishmen, who likewise signed the Bond. Mary also agreed to sign the Bond. The following year, Parliament passed the [[Safety of the Queen, etc. Act 1584|Act of Association]], which provided for the execution of anyone who would benefit from the death of the Queen if a plot against her was discovered. Because of the bond, Mary could be executed if a plot was initiated by others that could lead to her accession to England's throne.<ref>Alexander Courtney, ''James VI, Britannic Prince: King of Scots and Elizabeth's Heir, 1566–1603'' (Routledge, 2024), pp. 82–83.</ref>

In 1585, Elizabeth ordered Mary to be transferred in a coach and under heavy guard and placed under the strictest confinement at [[Chartley Castle|Chartley Hall]] in [[Staffordshire]], under the control of [[Amias Paulet|Sir Amias Paulet]]. She was prohibited any correspondence with the outside world. [[Puritan]] Paulet was chosen by Queen Elizabeth in part because he abhorred Queen Mary's Catholic faith.

[[File:Walsingham.jpg|thumb|right|180px|Sir Francis Walsingham]]

Reacting to the growing threat posed by Catholics, urged on by the pope and other Catholic monarchs in Europe, [[Francis Walsingham]], Queen Elizabeth's [[Secretary of State (England)|Secretary of State]] and [[spymaster]], together with [[William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley|William Cecil]], Elizabeth's chief advisor, realised that if Mary could be implicated in a plot to assassinate Elizabeth, she could be executed and the [[papist]] threat diminished. As he wrote to the [[Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester|Earl of Leicester]]: "So long as that devilish woman lives, neither Her Majesty must make account to continue in quiet possession of her crown, nor her faithful servants assure themselves of safety of their lives."<ref name=conyersread2>{{cite book |last=Read|first=Conyers|author-link=Conyers Read|title=Mr Secretary Walsingham and the Policy of Queen Elizabeth, Volume II|publisher=[[Clarendon Press]]|year=1925|pages=342|doi=10.1111/j.1468-2281.2006.00396.x}}, as quoted by {{Cite web|last=Ristau|first=Ken|title=Bringing Down A Queen|url=http://anduril.ca/bible/essays/ce_his228.html|access-date=10 February 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070112200405/http://anduril.ca/bible/essays/ce_his228.html|archive-date=12 January 2007|url-status=dead|df=dmy-all}}</ref>
Walsingham used Babington to ensnare Queen Mary by sending his double agent, [[Gilbert Gifford]] to Paris to obtain the confidence of Morgan, then locked in the Bastille. Morgan previously worked for [[George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury]], an earlier jailer of Queen Mary. Through Shrewsbury, Queen Mary became acquainted with Morgan. Queen Mary sent Morgan to Paris to deliver letters to the French court. While in Paris, Morgan became involved in a previous plot designed by William Parry, which resulted in Morgan's incarceration in the Bastille. In 1585 Gifford was arrested returning to England while coming through Rye in Sussex with letters of introduction from Morgan to Queen Mary. Walsingham released Gifford to work as a [[double agent]], in the Babington Plot. Gifford used the alias "No. 4" just as he had used other aliases such as Colerdin, Pietro and Cornelys. Walsingham had Gifford function as a courier in the entrapment plot against Queen Mary.