Sir Francis Throckmorton was a conspirator against Queen Elizabeth I of England in the Throckmorton Plot.
Background
He was the son of Sir John Throckmorton, the seventh out of eight sons of Sir George Throckmorton of Coughton Court. Katherine Vaux, daughter of Nicholas Vaux, 1st Baron Vaux of Harrowden, was the paternal aunt of the Protestant queen consort of King Henry VIII, Catherine Parr.
Education
Francis Throckmorton was educated in Oxford and entered the Inner Temple in London as a pupil in 1576.
Career
In 1580, he traveled to the European continent and met leading Catholic malcontents from England abroad (in Spain and France). lieutenant was in Paris that Throckmorton met Charles Paget and Thomas Morgan, agents of Mary, Queen of Scots. Following his return to England in 1583, he served as an intermediary for communications between supporters of the Catholic cause on the continent, the imprisoned Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Spanish ambassador Bernardino de Mendoza.
His activities raised the suspicions of Sir Francis Walsingham, Elizabeth I"s spymaster.
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.