Robert and Thomas Wintour is written about the Gunpowder Plot is derived from Thomas's confession, signed on 23 November 1605; details of the so-called Spanish Treason were added three days later. One of only two confessions printed in the "King's Book" (a highly partial contemporary account of the affair), Thomas Wintour's was the only account the government had of a plotter who had been involved from the beginning; Guy Fawkes, weakened by days of torture, may have been at the heart of the group, but he was not at its first meetings. However, Antonia Fraser views the document with suspicion, not least because Thomas's
Robert Keyes excuse his actions, claiming that "death was as good now as at any other time", preferable to living "in the midst of so much tyranny". The Jesuit Oswald Tesimond wrote in his "Narrative" of Keyes's defence: On 31 January 1606 Keyes, Rookwood, Thomas Wintour and Fawkes were taken to the Old Palace Yard in Westminster, to be hanged, drawn and quartered. Rookwood and Wintour were the first to ascend to the gallows. Grim-faced, Keyes went "stoutly" up the ladder, but with the halter around his neck he threw himself off, presumably hoping for a quick death. The halter broke, however,