The former school of gunpowder plotter Guy Fawkes is set for its annual fireworks display – but there will be no bonfires, no guys, the headteacher has said.

Fawkes – the most infamous conspirator behind a plot to blow up Parliament and kill King James I in 1605 – was born in York in 1570 and educated at St Peter’s School.

The anniversary of the discovery of the plot, on November 5, became known as Bonfire Night, and over the years dolls made from old clothes and straw were burned at stakes to represent Fawkes’ treason.

Headteacher Jeremy Walker said: “We have fireworks at the school … but what we’re not going to do is have a bonfire and burn over the effigy of one of our former pupils.”

Mr Walker said the school had an “interesting relationship” with Fawkes as he was a well-known historical figure but also a murderer.

“On the one hand, he was very clearly a terrorist and he attempted regicide (the act of trying to kill a reigning monarch), which is very clearly not good,” he said.

“On the other hand, it is known worldwide for its image.

“You just have to draw the stovepipe and the beard and the goatee and everyone knows who Guy Fawkes is straight away.”

The independent school moved from its original site near York Minster to the Clifton area of ​​the city – on land once owned by the plotter himself.

Fawkes inherited the land but sold it to fund his travels to Europe – and in what Mr Walker called a “strange twist”, the school was later rebuilt on the land.

Alan Sharp, of White Rose York Tours, said Fawkes was probably born in Stonegate, York, as his father had a property there.

Explaining the Bonfire Night traditions, he said they started after the Catholic conspirators were arrested.

“The Lord Mayor of London has ordered a day of rejoicing because the king has been spared, with bonfires all over the capital,” he said.

“Then they made it an annual day of rejoicing and building bonfires, but that thing about burning an effigy over the fire, that didn’t start until about 50 years later, and then usually the Pope was burned as an effigy and not Guy Fawkes.

“Burning a guy in effigy really started in the Victorian era.”

Another North Yorkshire link to the plot was at nearby Ripley Castle, as co-conspirators Robert and Thomas Wintour spent the week before 4 November there buying surplus armor from the surrounding district.

Sir Thomas Ingleby, the owner of the castle, said: “They were among the most dangerous leaders of the conspiracy and both were killed in the clean-up operations afterwards.”

He said it was a “family” conspiracy that “came apart like a deck of cards” once Guy Fawkes was discovered with a suspicious amount of firewood and then the gunpowder was found.

“You can tell this was a Yorkshire plot,” he said.

“It all collapsed because the gunpowder was of poor quality, it was out of date and it was kept in damp conditions.

“Only a Yorkshireman would plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament and stick to the cheapest materials possible – it’s got Yorkshire written all over it!”

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