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Showing posts from March 26, 2023

Like James Bond, only without the cars and toys

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We return to another of Sharon's 10th great-grandfathers, Sir William Waad, or Wade, in contemporary spelling. Wade, you will remember, had been appointed  lieutenant of the Tower of London and is credited with being the one to interrogate Guy Fawkes after the attempted bombing of Parliament.  This all took place near the end of his career in government, but he held other positions, including member of Parliament, diplomat and ... spy. Now if you look at the English historical websites, you won't see that listed as a formal job description. Instead, you will see that he worked as an agent for 1st Lord Burghley, aka Sir William Cecil, whom we have encountered before, on whose behalf he traveled to a variety of European destinations over several years. He developed relationships with a variety of folks who could supply him with information about their countries of residence, information he forwarded on to Cecil.  Now, of course you could argue that he may have acting in a busines