The word went round that the plot must be handled as if it were true, whether it were so or not. It soon became dangerous to express doubt. To do this was to incur the certain danger of being reckoned a papist, a concealed papist, one inclined to popery; and the prison or the gallows was the fate of the doubter. The courts sat merely to condemn men denounced by Oates and his gang. Three men were hanged at Tyburn as guilty of the murder of Godfrey. Even those who to-day contend that Godfrey was murdered admit that these men were innocent. Theories have been constructed based on the evidence of infamous informers who contradicted one another on every point, and when this fails, the writer’s imagination is employed to patch up the story. On November 26, 1678, William Stayley was drawn to Tyburn and there hanged and quartered. He had been convicted, on the evidence of two infamous informers, of a design to assassinate Charles. But this case, a judicial murder, does not properly belong to the Popish Plot. On account of the plot were executed sixteen persons, three for the murder of Godfrey, thirteen for high treason. Except perhaps in the case of one, Coleman, it is now universally admitted that not one was guilty of the crime for which he suffered. Here is a list of the victims:— =1678.= _December 3._ Edward Coleman, secretary to the Duchess of York. =1679.= _January 24._ William Ireland and John Grove. _February 21._ Robert Green and Lawrence Hill, for the murder of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey. _February 28._ Henry Berry, for the same. _May 9._ Thomas Pickering, for high treason. _June 20._ Thomas Whitebread, William Harcourt, John Fenwick, John Gavan, and Anthony Turner, known as “The Five Jesuits,” all for high treason. _July 14._ Richard Langhorn, for high treason. =1680.= _December 29._ Viscount Stafford, for high treason. =1681.= _July 1._ Dr. Oliver Plunket, the catholic primate of Ireland, for high treason. Lord Stafford was executed on Tower Hill all the others at Tyburn. The sixteenth victim was Thomas Thwing, drawn, hanged, and quartered at York. In addition to these, eight priests were executed in 1679, under the penal laws, now revived, making it death for a priest to be in England. Many died in prison, thousands suffered imprisonment, banishment, loss of goods.[197] Together with Dr. Plunket was executed Edward Fitz-Harris, but this case, like that of Stayley, does not properly belong to the Popish Plot. The story would be incomplete without telling what befell the infamous creatures by whose means this innocent blood was shed. Shaftesbury, the politician who took up the Plot and directed the operations of the perjurers, died in exile. Bedloe, one of the chief witnesses, died in his bed, asserting with his last breath the truth of his perjured evidence.