George Washington
prohibited the celebration of Guy Fawkes Night among his troops.
Guy
Fawkes, in 1605, was arrested for involvement in a plot to dig a tunnel under
the Palace of Westminster, fill it with gunpowder and blow up Parliament during
its ceremonial opening. Not only was it a plot to kill “the leading Protestant
nobility” but also King James I. English Catholics wanted to kill the King and
replace him with his Catholic daughter, Elizabeth. The date became an
anti-Catholic holiday to celebrate the king’s life being saved which included
burning the pope in effigy.
In
Washington’s General Orders of the day, he prohibited the “observance of that
ridiculous and childish custom of burning the Effigy of the pope”. He cited the
allegiance and alliance of the French Catholics in Canada who were helping the
Patriots in the Revolutionary battle against England and felt such festivities
was “insulting their Religion, is so monstrous, as not to be suffered or excused." (source: http://memory.loc.gov)
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