Anthony Babington

Anthony Babington (1561–1586) was a Derbyshire Catholic gentleman who had served as a page in the household of the Earl of Shrewsbury, keeper of the imprisoned Mary, Queen of Scots. Around 1580 he met Thomas Morgan, who persuaded him to carry letters to Mary.

In 1586 he led young Catholic conspirators planning to murder Elizabeth I and free Mary; their letters to Mary, smuggled in beer barrels, were intercepted by Sir Francis Walsingham's agents. Babington was arrested in August and hanged, drawn and quartered on 20 September 1586, and his plot supplied the treason charge that led to Mary's execution the following year.