Francis Throckmorton of Sir Francis Walsingham, Elizabeth I's spymaster. A search of his house produced incriminating evidence and, after torture on the rack, Throckmorton confessed his involvement in a plot to overthrow the Queen and restore the Catholic Church in England. An invasion led by Henry I, Duke of Guise, would have been coupled with an orchestrated uprising of Catholics within the country. Although Throckmorton later retracted his confession, he was convicted of high treason and executed in 1584. Sir Francis Throckmorton is featured in the film "", where he is played by Steven Robertson. In the film, he is shown asking
Francis Walsingham expansionist and nationalist English Renaissance. Spenser included a dedicatory sonnet to Walsingham in the "Faerie Queene", likening him to Maecenas who introduced Virgil to the Emperor Augustus. After Walsingham's death, Sir John Davies composed an acrostic poem in his memory and Watson wrote an elegy, "Meliboeus", in Latin. On the other hand, Jesuit Robert Persons thought Walsingham "cruel and inhumane" in his persecution of Catholics. Catholic sources portray a ruthless, devious man driven by religious intolerance and an excessive love for intrigue. Walsingham attracts controversy still. Although he was ruthless, his opponents on the Catholic side were no less so;