Identity area
Reference code
Title
Date(s)
- [?January 1915-August 1916] (Creation)
Level of description
Item
Extent and medium
3 pages
Context area
Name of creator
Name of creator
Repository
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Content and structure area
Scope and content
Stencil copy petition to King George V from the Protestant British-Israel League regarding Sir Henry Howard's role as the first formal British envoy to the Vatican in over 300 years. Petition warns of a conspiracy to overthrow the Protestant succession and restore a 'Roman Catholic Dynasty' in England. Also warns that the placing the Home Rule Bill on the Statute Book will make Ireland 'a base for Jesuit wirepullers and plotters in the cause of subverting Your Majesty's Throne and Authority'. Lists examples of 'manifestations of Divine displeasure' when past concessions to Rome have been made by the British government, such as the sinking of the RMS Empress of Ireland (29 May 1914) following the passing of the Home Rule Bill, and that the 'Royal assent to the Bill was followed by the sinking of the three Cruisers “Hogue, Cressy and Aboukir.”’ The petitioners are listed as Agusta Cook, President; Heywood Smith MA, MD, Vice President, and CW Burge, Honorary Treasurer.
The petition is undated, but references in the text to the '[Air] Raid' on [Great] Yarmouth and King’s Lynn, [Norfolk, UK] (19 January 1915), and Sir Henry Howard's mission to the Vatican, dates it to between 19 January 1915 and August 1916 (when Howard retired).