Watchers - Softcover

Stephen Alford is a fellow in history at King's College, Cambridge, and the author of the acclaimed Burghley: William Cecil at the Court of Elizabeth I, The Early Elizabethan Polity: William Cecil and the British Succession Crisis, 1558-1569, and Kingship and Politics in the Reign of Edward VI. He writes for the Times Literary Supplement and other periodicals.

“The secret agents who labored to prove Mary's guilt and bring about her execution are the stars of this meticulous chronicle ... Elizabeth's spies routinely used the rack for interrogations; torture was then, as now, justified as a means of protecting 'the security of the state.'” ―New Yorker

“Alford populates this engaging study of Elizabethan espionage with a cast of colorful characters and exposes the dark underbelly of a period that is often better known for Shakespeare and the triumph against the Spanish Armada. Secret correspondence, infiltration into the ranks of exile English Catholics in Rome and the betrayal of double agents are some of the thrilling elements that comprise this little-known tale.” ―Ilana Teitelbaum, Shelf Awareness

“It provides a genuine--and compelling--reappraisal of one of the most studied periods in English history: the reign of Elizabeth I. In exploring the world (or underworld) of Elizabethan espionage, Alford takes us on a darker, more disturbing and arguably more fascinating journey through the Elizabethan era than any other historian of the period ...[An] engaging and perfectly pitched narrative. ... Alford weaves together the bewilderingly complex threads of plots and counterplots so skillfully that as a reader you are never left floundering.” ―BBC History Magazine (named a Pick of the Month)