The so-called Popish Plot overshadowed religious and political life from 1678 until the end of Charles II’s reign. The former naval chaplain, Titus Oates falsely claimed to have discovered a conspiracy to assassinate Charles and put his Catholic brother James on the throne. Oates was granted a pension, lodgings at Whitehall and the power to arrest, leading to the execution of at least 22 innocent people. Oates’s lies finally caught up with him in 1684, and he was sentenced to life imprisonment and placed in the pillory five times a year.

Cat. 175