Despite what her name may suggest, by the time she was put --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- on trial in 1586, Mary Queen of Scots had not been the queen --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- of Scotland for almost 20 years. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- In 1567, a group of powerful Scottish nobles had forced Mary --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- to give up her throne. The crown of Scotland passed to her --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- infant son James and Mary was put in prison. But not for long. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Within a year, Mary had escaped and raised an army. Her plan --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- was to crush the treacherous nobles and regain her crown. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- However, the plan failed when her army was slaughtered at the --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Battle of Langside, near Glasgow. To avoid being captured Mary --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- fled to England. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- As it turned out, this was not a great idea. Mary had hoped that --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- the English queen (who was, after all, her cousin) would protect --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- her. In fact, Queen Elizabeth had Mary arrested instead. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Officially the reason for Mary’s arrest was the brutal killing in --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- 1567 of her petulant and unpopular husband Lord Darnley, --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- which Mary was thought to have ordered. However, that was --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- not the real reason she was locked up. Elizabeth was a --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Protestant and Mary was a Catholic. Many Catholics in England --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- wanted to be ruled by a Catholic monarch. And the Catholic --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- with the best claim to the English throne was (you guessed it!) --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Mary. Why? Because she was Henry VII of England’s great- --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- granddaughter and next in line to the throne after Henry VIII’s --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- children, of whom Elizabeth was one. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Mary, therefore, was seen as a threat to Elizabeth and the --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- queen was taking no chances. That is why she had Mary placed --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- under house arrest and closely guarded for the next 19 years. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- During this time, she was allowed little contact with the outside --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- world. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- By 1586 Mary had almost given up hope of ever being free --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- again. But all that was about to change. A Catholic priest --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- named Gilbert Gifford managed to smuggle a bundle of letters --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- from Mary’s supporters into Chartley Hall, the house in --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Staffordshire where she was being held. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- The letters were hidden inside the bung on a barrel of beer. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Soon Gifford was able to get more letters to Mary, and started --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- smuggling out her replies. Her guards never suspected a thing. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Or so it seemed. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- At the same time, a plan was being hatched in London by a --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- group of Catholic noblemen who wanted to overthrow their --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Protestant queen. The group was led by Anthony Babington. His --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- idea was to assassinate Elizabeth and put Mary in her place. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- However, Babington and the other plotters faced a problem. It --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- was too dangerous to proceed with their plan unless they were --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- certain Mary would support them. The trouble was that they --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- had no way of getting a message to her. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- This is when Gifford – very conveniently – arrived on the scene --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- and introduced himself to Babington. He undertook to deliver a --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- message from Babington to Mary and bring back her reply --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- using his cunning trick with the beer barrel. Babington agreed --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- to give Gifford a letter for Mary. In it he described his plan to --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- kill the queen and offer her crown to Mary, but, trying to avoid --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- discovery, he wrote his message in code. This way, if the letter --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- were opened before it reached her, nobody would understand --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- what it said. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- What Babington did not realise was that Gifford was a double --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- agent. The priest had secretly been working all along for Queen --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Elizabeth’s spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham. When he was --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- given Babington’s letter he took it straight to his boss. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Walsingham felt certain that Babington was plotting against --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Elizabeth, but he needed to crack Babington’s code to find out --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- exactly what he was up to. To do this he employed Thomas --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Phelippes, who spoke six languages and was the greatest --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- code-cracker in Europe. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- It didn’t take Phelippes long to decipher the message. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Walsingham now had all the evidence he needed to have --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Babington arrested for treason. But he didn’t merely want the --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- head of Babington: he wanted the heads of all the plotters and --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- – if he could get it – Mary’s head as well! --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Walsingham ordered Gifford to take the letter and deliver it to --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Mary. He wanted to see what she would do. Little did Mary --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- realise her life would depend on her actions. She replied to --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Babington’s letter, pledging her support for the plot. Again her --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- message was written using Babington’s code. And again it was --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- passed by Gifford straight to Walsingham and deciphered by --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Phelippes. --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- Mary had effectively signed her own death warrant. In August --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- she spotted a group of armed soldiers riding towards her. It is --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- said that she thought they must be Babington’s men coming to --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- set her free. In fact, they had been sent by Walsingham to --- RECORDSEPARATOR --- arrest her.