Chapter X: Part 10

He persevered in these professions of his innocency to the very last, still hoping for a reprieve, and not only feeding himself with such expectations while in prison, but also gazed earnestly when at the tree, in hopes that pardon would be brought him, until the cart drew away and extinguished life and the desire of life together.

Edward Elliot, a boy of about seventeen years of age, whose father was a tailor at a village between Petworth and Guildford, was the next who received sentence of death with Parvin. The account he gave of his coming into this society has something very odd in it, and which gives a fuller idea of the strange whims which possessed these people. The boy said that about a year before his being apprehended, thirty or forty men met him in the county of Surrey and hurried him away. He who appeared to be the chief of them told him that he enlisted him in the service of the King of the Blacks, in pursuance of which he was to disguise his face, obey orders of whatsoever kind they were, such as breaking down fish ponds, burning woods, shooting deer, taking also an oath to be true to them, or they by their art magic would turn him into a beast, and as such make him carry their burdens, and live like a horse upon grass and water.

He said, also, that in the space of time he continued with them, he saw several experiments of their witchcraft, for that once when two men had offended them by refusing to comply in taking their oath and obeying their orders, they caused them immediately to be blindfolded and stopping them in holes of the earth up to their chin, ran at them as if they had been dogs, bellowing and barking as it were in their ears; and when they had plagued them awhile in this ridiculous manner they took them out, and bid them remember how they offended any of the Black Nation again, for if they did, they should not escape so well as they had at present. He had seen them also, he said, oblige carters to drive a good way out of the road, and carry whatsoever venison or other thing they had plundered to the places where they would have them; that the men were generally so frightened with their usage and so terrified with the oaths they were obliged to swear, that they seldom complained, or even spoke of their bondage.

As to the fact for which they died, Elliot gave this account: that in the morning when that fact was committed for which he died, Marshall, Kingshell and four others came to him and persuaded him to go to Farnham Holt, and that he need not fear disobliging any gentlemen in the country, some of whom were very kind to this Elliot. They persuaded him that certain persons of fortune were concerned with them and would bear him harmless if he would go. He owned that at last he consented to go with them, but trembled all the way, insomuch that he could hardly reach the Holt. While they were engaged in the business for which they came, viz., killing the deer, the keepers came upon them. Elliot was wandered a considerable way from his companions after a fawn which he intended to send as a present to a young woman at Guildford; him therefore they quickly seized and bound, and leaving him in that condition, went in search of the rest of his associates. It was not long before they came up with them. The keepers were six, the Blacks were seven in number, so they fell to it warmly with quarter-staffs. The keepers unwilling to have lives taken, advised them to retire, but upon their refusing, and Marshall's firing a gun, by which one of the keepers belonging to the Lady How was slain, they discharged a blunderbuss and shattered the thigh of one Barber, amongst the Blacks. Upon this three of his associates ran away, and the two others, Marshall and Kingshell were likewise taken, and so the fray for the present ended.

Elliot lay bound all the while within hearing, and in the greatest agonies imaginable, at the consideration that whatever blood was spilt he should be as much answerable for it as these who shed it; in which he was not mistaken, for the keepers returning after the fight was over, carried him away bound and he never had his fetters off after, till the morning of his execution. He behaved himself very soberly, quietly and with much seeming penitence and contrition. He owned the justice of the Law in punishing him, and said he more especially deserved to suffer, since at the time of the committing this fact, he was servant to a widow lady, where he wanted nothing to make him happy or easy.

Robert Kingshell was twenty-six years old, and lived in the same house with his parents, being apprentice to his brother a shoemaker. His parents were very watchful over his behaviour and sought by every method to prevent his taking to ill courses, or being guilty of any debauchery whatever. The night before this unhappy accident fell out, as he and the rest of the family were sleeping in their beds, Barber made a signal at his chamber window, it being then about eleven o'clock. Upon this Kingshell arose and got softly out of the window; Barber took him upon his horse, and away they went to the Holt, twelve miles distant, calling in their way upon Henry Marshall, Elliot and the rest of their accomplices. He said it was eight o'clock in the morning before the keepers attacked them, he owned they bid them retire, and that he himself told them they would, provided the bound man (Elliot) was released and delivered into their hands, but that proposition being refused, the fight at once grew warm. Barber's thigh was broken, and Marshall killed the keeper with a shot; being thereupon very hard pressed, three of their companions ran away, leaving him and Marshall to fight it out. Elliot being already taken, and Barber disabled, it was not long before they were in the same unhappy condition with their companions. From the time of their being apprehended, Kingshell laid aside all hopes of life, and applied himself with great fervency and devotion to enable him in what alone remained for him to do, viz., dying decently.

Henry Marshall, about thirty-six years of age, the unfortunate person by whose hand the murder was committed, seemed to be the least sensible of any of the evils he had done, although such was the pleasure of Almighty God that till the day before his execution, he neither had his senses, nor the use of his speech. When he recovered it, and a clergyman represented to him the horrid crime of which he had been guilty, he was so far from showing any deep sense of that crime of shedding innocent blood, that he made light of it, said he might stand upon his own defence, and was not bound to run away and leave his companions in danger. This was the language he talked for the space of twenty-four hours before his death, in which he enjoyed the use of speech; and so far was he from thanking those who charitably offered him their admonitions, that he said he had not forgot himself, but had already taken care of what he thought necessary for his soul. However, he did not attempt in the least to prevaricate, but fairly acknowledged that he committed the fact for which he died, though nothing could oblige him to speak of it in any manner as if he was sorry for or repented of it, farther than for having occasioned his own misfortunes; so strong is the prejudice which vulgar minds acquire by often repeating to themselves and in company certain positions, however ridiculous and false. And sure, nothing could be more so than for a man to fancy he had a right to imbrue his hands in the blood of another, who was in the execution of his office, and endeavouring to hinder the commission of an illegal act.

These of whom I have last spoken were all concerned together in the before-mentioned fact, which was attended with murder; but we are now to speak of the rest who were concerned in the felony only, for which they with the above-mentioned Parvin suffered. Of these were two brothers, whose names were John and Edward Pink, carters in Portsmouth, and always accounted honest and industrious fellows before this accident happened. They did not, however, deny their being guilty, but on the contrary ingenuously confessed the truth of what was sworn, and mentioned some other circumstances that had been produced at the trial which attended their committing it. They said they met Parvin's housekeeper upon that road, that they forced her to cut the throat of a deer which they had just taken upon Bear Forest, gave her a dagger which they forced her to wear, and to ride cross-legged with pistols before her.

In this dress they brought her to Parvin's house upon the forest, where they dined upon a haunch of venison, feasted merrily and after dinner sent out two of their companions to kill more deer, not in the King's Forest, but in Waltham Chase, belonging to the Bishop of Winchester. One of these two persons they called their king, and the other they called Lyon. Neither of these brothers objected anything, either to the truth of the evidence given against them, or the justice of that sentence which had passed upon them, only one insinuating that the evidence would not have been so strong against him and Ansell, if it had not been for running away with the witness's wife, which so provoked him that they were sure they should not escape when he was admitted a witness.

These like the rest were hard to be persuaded that the things they had committed were any crimes in the eyes of God. They said deer were wild beasts, and they did not see why the poor had not as good a right to them as the rich. However, as the Law condemned them to suffer, they were bound to submit, and in consequence of that notion, behaved themselves very orderly, decently and quietly, while under sentence.

James Ansell, _alias_ Stephen Philips, the seventh and last of these unhappy persons, was a man addicted to a worse and more profligate life than any of the rest had ever been; for he had held no settled employment, but had been a loose disorderly person, concerned in all sorts of wickedness for many years, both at Portsmouth, Guildford, and other country towns, as well as at London. Deer were not the only things that he had dealt in; stealing and robbing on the highway had been formerly his employment, and in becoming a Black, he did not as the others ascend in wickedness, but came down on the contrary, a step lower. Yet this criminal as his offences were greater, so his sense of them was much stronger than in any of the rest, excepting Kingshell, for he gave over all manner of hopes of life and all concerns about it as soon as he was taken.

Yet even he had no notion of making discoveries, unless they might be beneficial to himself, and though he owned the knowledge of twenty persons who were notorious offenders in the same kind, he absolutely refused to name them, since such naming would not procure himself a pardon; talking to him of the duty of doing justice was beating the air. He said, he thought there was no justice in taking away other people's lives, unless it was to save his own, yet no sooner was he taxed about his own going on the highway than he confessed it, said he knew very well bills would have been preferred against him at Guildford assizes, in case he had got off at the King's Bench, but that he did not greatly value them. Though formerly he had been guilty of some facts in that way, yet they could not all now be proved, and he should have found it no difficult matter to have demonstrated his innocence of those then charged upon him, of which he was not really guilty, but owed his being thought so to the profligate course of life he had for some time led, and his aversion to all honest employments.

Bold as the whole gang of these fellows appeared, yet with what sickness, what with the apprehension of death, they were so terrified that not one of them but Ansell, _alias_ Philips, was able to stand up, or speak at the place of execution, many who saw them affirming that some of them were dead even before they were turned off.

As an appendix to the melancholy history of these seven miserable and unhappy persons, I will add a letter written at that time by a gentleman of the county of Essex, to his friend in London, containing a more particular account of the transactions of these people, than I have seen anywhere else. Wherefore, without any further preface, I shall leave it to speak for itself.

A letter to Mr. C. D. in London.

Dear Sir,

Amongst the odd accidents which you know have happened to me in the
course of a very unsettled life, I don't know any which hath been
more extraordinary or surprising than one I met with in going down
to my own house when I left you last in town. You cannot but have
heard of the Waltham Blacks, as they are called, a set of whimsical
merry fellows, that are so mad to run the greatest hazards for the
sake of a haunch of venison, and passing a jolly evening together.

For my part, though the stories told of these people had reached my
ears, yet I confess I took most of them for fables, and I thought
that if there was truth in any of them it was much exaggerated. But
experience (the mistress of fools) has taught me the contrary, by
the adventure I am going to relate to you, which though it ended
well enough at last, I confess at first put me a good deal out of
humour. To begin, then; my horse got a stone in his foot, and
therewith went so lame just as I entered the forest, that I really
thought his shoulder slipped. Finding it however impossible to get
him along, I was even glad to take up at a little blind alehouse
which I perceived had a yard and a stable behind it.

The man of the house received me very civilly, but when he
perceived my horse was so lame as scarce to be able to stir a step,
I observed he grew uneasy. I asked him whether I could lodge there
that night, he told me no, he had no room, I desired him, then, to
put something to my horse's foot, and let me sit up all night; for I
was resolved not to spoil a horse which cost me twenty guineas by
riding him in such a condition in which he was at present. The man
made me no answer, and I proposed the same questions to the wife.
She dealt more roughly and freely with me, and told me that truly I
neither could, nor should stay there, and was for hurrying her
husband to get my horse out. However, on putting a crown into her
hand and promising another for my lodging, she began to consider a
little; and at last told me that there was indeed a little bed above
stairs, on which she should order a clean pair of sheets to be put,
for she was persuaded I was more of a gentleman than to take any
notice of what I saw passed there.

This made me more uneasy than I was before. I concluded now I was
got amongst a den of highwaymen, and expected nothing less than to
be robbed and my throat cut. However, finding there was no remedy, I
even set myself down and endeavoured to be as easy as I could. By
this time it was very dark, and I heard three or four horsemen
alight and lead their horses into the yard. As the men returned and
were coming into the room where I was, I overheard my landlord say,
_Indeed, brother, you need not be uneasy, I am positive the
gentleman's a man of honour_, to which I heard another voice reply,
_What could our death do to any stranger? Faith, I don't apprehend
half the danger you do. I dare say the gentleman would be glad of
our company, and we should be pleased with his. Come, hang fear,
I'll lead the way._ So said, so done, in they came, five of them,
all disguised so effectually that I declare, unless it were in the
same disguise, I should not be able to distinguish any one of them.

Down they sat, and he who I suppose was constituted their captain
_pro hac vice_, accosted me with great civility, and asked me if I
would honour them with my company to supper. I acknowledge I did not
yet guess the profession of my new acquaintances, but supposing my
landlord would be cautious of suffering either a robbery or a murder
in his own house, I know not how, but by degrees my mind grew
perfectly easy. About ten o'clock I heard a very great noise of
horses, and soon after men's feet tramping in a room over my head.
Then my landlord came down and informed us supper was just ready to
go upon the table.

Upon this we were all desired to walk up, and he whom I before
called the captain, presented me, with a humorous kind of ceremony,
to a man more dignified than the rest who sat at the end of the
table, telling me at the same time, he hoped I would not refuse to
pay my respects to Prince Oroonoko, King of the Blacks. It then
immediately struck into my head who those worthy persons were, into
whose company I was thus accidentally fallen. I called myself a
thousand blockheads for not finding out before, but the hurry of
things, or to speak the truth, the fear I was in, prevented my
judging even from the most evident signs.

As soon as our awkward ceremony was over, supper was brought in; it
consisted of eighteen dishes of venison in every shape, roasted,
boiled with broth, hashed collops, pasties, umble pies, and a large
haunch in the middle, larded. I easily saw that of three ordinary
rooms of which the first floor of the house consisted, ours (by
taking down the partitions) was very large, and the company in all
twenty-one persons. At each of our elbows there was set a bottle of
claret, and the man and woman of the house sat down at the lower
end. Two or three of the fellows had good natural voices, and so the
evening was spent as merrily as the rakes pass theirs in the King's
Arms, or the City apprentices with their master's maids at Sadler's
Wells. About two the company seemed inclined to break up, having
first assured me that they should take my company as a favour any
Thursday evening, if I came that way.

I confess I did not sleep all night with reflecting on what had
passed, and could not resolve with myself whether these humorous
gentlemen in masquerade were to be ranked under the denomination of
knight-errants, or plain robbers. This I must tell you, by the by,
that with respect both to honesty and hardship, their life resembles
much that of the hussars, since drinking is all their delight, and
plundering their employment.

Before I conclude my epistle, it is fit I should inform you that
they did me the honour (with a design perhaps to have received me
into their order) of acquainting me with those rules by which their
society was governed.

In the first place their Black Prince assured me that their
government was perfectly monarchial, and that when upon expeditions
he had an absolute command; _but in the time of peace_, continued
he, _and at the table, government being no longer necessary, I
condescend to eat and drink familiarly with my subjects as friends.
We admit no man_, continued he, _into our society until he has been
twice drunk with us, that we may be perfectly acquainted with his
temper, in compliance with the old proverb--women, children and
drunken folks speak truth. But if the person who sues to be
admitted, declares solemnly he was never drunk in his life, and it
plainly appears to the society in such case, this rule is dispensed
with, and the person before admission is only bound to converse with
us a month. As soon as we have determined to admit him, he is then
to equip himself with a good mare or gelding, a brace of pistols,
and a gun of the size of this, to lie on the saddle bow. Then he is
sworn upon the horns over the chimney, and having a new name
conferred by the society, is thereby entered upon the roll, and from
that day forward, considered as a lawful member._

He went on with abundance more of their wise institutions, which I
think are not of consequence enough to tell you, and shall only
remark one thing more, which is the phrase they make use of in
speaking of one another, viz., _He is a very honest fellow and one
of us._ For you must know it is the first article in their creed
that there's no sin in deer-stealing.

In the morning, having given my landlady the other crown piece, I
found her temper so much altered for the better, that in my
conscience I believe she was not in the humour to have refused me
anything, no, not even the last favour; and so walking down the yard
and finding my horse in pretty tolerable order, I speeded directly
home, much in amaze at the new people I had discovered. You see I
have taken a great deal of pains in my letter; pray, in return, let
me have as long a one from you, and let me see if all your London
rambles can produce such another adventure.

I am, yours, etc.

Before I leave these people, I think it proper to acquaint my readers that their folly was not to be extinguished by a single execution. There were a great many young fellows of the same stamp, who were fools enough to forfeit their lives upon the same occasion. However, the humour did not run very long, though some of them were impudent enough to murder a keeper or two afterwards. Yet in the space of a twelvemonth, the whole nation of Blacks was extinguished, and these country rakes were contented to play the fool upon easier terms. The last blood that was shed on either side was that of a keeper's son at Old Windsor, whom some of these wise people fired at as he looked out of the window, by which means they drew on their own ruin and that of several numerous families by which the country was put in such terror that we have heard nothing of them since, though this Act of Parliament[44] as I shall tell you, has been by construction extended to some other criminals, who were not strictly speaking of the same kind as the Waltham Blacks.

FOOTNOTES:

[44] The Black Act (9 Geo. I, cap. 2) was repealed so late as 1827.

The Life of JULIAN, a Black Boy and Incendiary

From speaking of artificial blacks, I come now to relate the unhappy death of one who was naturally of that colour. This poor creature's Julian. At the time of his execution he seemed to be about sixteen years of age, he had been stolen while young from his parents at Madras. He still retained his pagan ignorance both in respect to religion and our language.

He was brought over by one Captain Dawes, who presented him to Mrs. Elizabeth Turner, where he was used with the greatest tenderness and kindness, she often calling him to dance and sing after his manner before company; and he himself acknowledged that he had never been so happy in his life as he was there. Yet, on a sudden, he stole about twenty or thirty guineas, and then placing a candle under the sheets left it burning to fire the house, and consume the inhabitants in it. Of this, upon proof and his own confession made before Sir Francis Forbes and Mr. Turner, he was convicted.

While he remained under sentence, he was often heard to mumble in reproach and revengeful terms to himself. However, before his death he learned the Lord's Prayer, and when it was demanded whether he would be a Christian, he assented with great joy, which arose, it seems, from his having heard the common foolish opinion that when christened Blacks are to be set free. However, christened he was, and received at his baptism the name of John.

The place in which he was confined being very damp, the boy having nothing to lie on but a coat, caught so great a cold in his limbs that he almost lost the use of them before his death, and continued in a state of great pain and weakness; insomuch that when he was told he must prepare for his execution, he determined with himself to forestall it, and for that purpose desired one of the prisoners to lend him a penknife, but the man, it seems, had more grace than to grant his request, and he ended his life at Tyburn, according to his sentence.

The Life of ABRAHAM DEVAL, a Lottery Ticket Forger

Abraham Deval, who had been a clerk to the Lottery Office, at last took it into his head to coin tickets for himself, and had such good luck therein that he at one time counterfeited a certificate for £52 12s. 0d., for seven blank lottery tickets, in the year 1723. Two or three other facts of the same nature he perpetrated with the like success, but happening to counterfeit two blank tickets of the lottery in the year in which he died, they were discovered, and he thereupon apprehended and tried at the Old Bailey. On the first indictment, for want of evidence he was acquitted, upon which he behaved himself with great insolence, lolled out his tongue at the Court, and told them he did not value the second indictment. But herein he happened to be mistaken, for the jury found him guilty of that indictment and thereupon he received sentence of death accordingly.

Notwithstanding that impudence with which he had treated the Court at his trial, he complained very loudly of their not showing him favour; nay, he even pretended that he had not justice done him. This he grounded upon the score that the ticket he was indicted for was No. 39, in the 651st course of payment. Now it seems that in searching of his brother-in-law Parson's room, the original ticket was found, though very much torn, from whence Deval would have had it taken to be no more than a duplicate, and much blamed his counsel for not insisting long enough upon this point, which if he had done, Deval entertained a strong opinion that he could not have been convicted.

The apprehension of this and the uneasiness he was under with his irons made him pass his last moments with great unquietness and discontent. He said it was against the law to put men in irons, that fettering English subjects (except they attempted to break prisons) was altogether illegal. But after having raved at this rate for a small space, when he found it did him no good, and that there were no hopes of a reprieve, he even began to settle himself to the performance of those duties which became a man in his sad condition and when he did apply himself thereto, nobody could appear to have a juster sense than he of that miserable and sad condition into which the folly and wickedness of his life had brought him.

It is certain the man did not want parts, though sometimes he applied them to the worst of purposes, and was cursed with an insolent and overbearing temper which hindered him from being loved or respected anywhere, and which never did him any service but in the last moments of his life, where if it had not been for the severity of his behaviour, Julian, the black boy, would have been very troublesome, both to him and to the other person who was under sentence at the same time.

At the place of execution Deval owned the fact, but wished the spectators to consider whether for all that he was legally convicted, and so suffered in the thirtieth year of his age.

The Life of JOSEPH BLAKE, _alias_ BLUESKIN, a Footpad and Highwayman

As there is impudence and wickedness enough in the lives of most malefactors to make persons of a sober education and behaviour wonder at the depravity of human nature, so there are sometimes superlative rogues who, in the infamous boldness of their behaviour, as far exceed the ordinary class of rogues as they do honest people; and whenever such a monster as this appears in the world, there are enough fools to gape at him, and to make such a noise and outcry about his conduct as is sure to invite others of the gang to imitate the obstinacy of his deportment, through that false love of fame, which seems inherent to human nature. Amongst the number of these, Joseph Blake, better known by his nickname of Blueskin, always deserves to be remembered as one who thought wickedness the greatest achievement, and studiously took the paths of infamy in order to become famous.

By birth he was a native of this City of London. His parents being persons in tolerable circumstances kept him six years at school, where he did not learn half as much good from his master as he did evil from his schoolfellow, William Blewitt, from whose lessons he copied so well that all his education signified nothing. When he came from school he absolutely refused to go to any employment, but on the contrary set up for a robber when he was scarce seventeen, but from that time to the day of his death was unsuccessful in all his undertakings, hardly ever committing the most trivial fact but he experienced for it, either the humanity of the mob, or of the keepers of Bridewell, out of which or some other prison, he could hardly keep his feet for a month together.

He fell into the gang of Lock, Wilkinson, Carrick[45] Lincoln and Daniel Carroll, which last having so often been mentioned, perhaps my readers may be desirous to know what became of him. I shall therefore inform them that after Carrick and Molony were executed for robbing Mr. Young, as has been before related, he fled home to his own native country of Ireland, where for a while making a great figure till he had exhausted what little wealth he had brought over with him from England, he was obliged to go again upon the old method to supply him. But street-robbing being a very new thing at Dublin, it so alarmed that city that they never ceased pursuing him, and one or two more who joined with him, till catching them one night at their employment, they pursued Carrol so closely that he was obliged to come to a close engagement with a thief-taker, so he was killed upon the spot.

But to return to Blake, _alias_ Blueskin. Being one night out with his gang, they robbed one Mr. Clark of eight shillings and a silver hilted sword, just as candles were going to be lighted, and a woman looking accidentally out of a window, perceived it, and cried out, _Thieves._ Wilkinson fired a pistol at her which, very luckily, upon her drawing in her head, grazed upon the stone of the window, and did no other mischief. Blake was also in the company of the same gang when they attacked Captain Langley, at the corner of Hyde Park Road, as he was going to the Camp[46]; but the Captain behaved himself so well that notwithstanding they shot several times through and through his coat, yet they were not able to rob him.

Not long after this Wilkinson being apprehended impeached a large number of persons, and with them Joseph Blake and William Lock. Blake hereupon made a fuller discovery than the other before Justice Blackerby; in which information there was contained no less than seventy robberies, upon which he also was admitted a witness. And having named Wilkinson, Lincoln, Carrick, Carrol, and himself to have been the five persons who murdered Peter Martin the Chelsea pensioner, by the Park wall, Wilkinson was apprehended, tried and convicted, notwithstanding the information he had before given (which was thereby totally set aside); so that Blake himself became now an evidence against the rest of his companions, and discovered about a dozen robberies which they had committed.

Amongst these there was one very remarkable one. Two gentlemen in hunting caps were together in a chariot on the Hampstead Road, and they took from them two gold watches, rings, seals and other things to a considerable value. Junks, _alias_ Levee, laid his pistol down by the gentleman all the while he searched him, yet he wanted either the courage or the presence of mind to seize and prevent their losing things of so great value. Not long after this, Oakey, Junks and this Blake, stopped a single man with a link before him in Fig Lane; and he not surrendering so easily as they expected, Junks and Oakey beat him over the head with their pistols, and then left him wounded in a terrible condition, taking from him one guinea and one penny. A very short time after this, Junks, Oakey and Flood were apprehended and executed for robbing Colonel Cope and Mr. Young of that very watch for which Carrick and Molony had been before executed, Joseph Blake being the evidence against them.

After this hanging work of his companions, he thought himself not only entitled to liberty but reward. Herein, however, he was mightily mistaken, for not having surrendered willingly and quietly, but being taken after long resistance and when he was much wounded, there did not seem to be the least foundation for this confident demand, he still remaining a prisoner in the Wood Street Compter, obstinately refusing to be transported for seven years, but insisting that as he had given evidence he ought to have his liberty. However, the magistrates were of another opinion, until at last by procuring two men to be bound for his good behaviour, he was carried before a wealthy alderman of the City and there discharged. At which time, somebody there present asking how long time might be given him before they should see him again at the Old Bailey, a gentleman made answer in about three sessions, in which time it seems he guessed very right, for the third session from thence, Blake was indeed brought to the Bar.

For no sooner were his feet at liberty but his hands were employed in robbing, and having picked up Jack Shepherd for a companion, they went out together to search for prey in the fields. Near the half-way house to Hampstead they met with one Pargiter, a man pretty much in liquor, whom immediately Blake knocked down into the ditch, where he must have inevitably perished if John Shepherd had not kept his head above the mud with great difficulty. For this fact, the next sessions after it happened the two brothers Brightwell in the Guards were tried, and if a number of men had not sworn them to have been upon duty at the time the robbery was committed, they had certainly been convicted, the evidence of the prosecutor being direct and full. Through the grief of this the elder Brightwell died a week after he was released from his confinement, and so did not live to see his innocence fully cleared by the confession of Blake.

A very short space after this, Blake and his companion Shepherd committed the burglary together in the house of Mr. Kneebone, where Shepherd getting into the house, let in Blake at the back door and stripped the house of a considerable value. For this, both Shepherd and he were apprehended, and the sessions before Blake was convicted his companion received sentence of death; but at the time Blake was taken up, he had made his escape out of the condemned hold.

He behaved with great impudence at his trial, and when he found nothing would save him, he took the advantage of Jonathan Wild coming to speak with him, to cut the said Wild's throat, making a large gash from the ear beyond the windpipe.[47] Of this wound Wild languished a long time, and happy had it been for him if Blake's wound had proved fatal, for then Jonathan had escaped death by a more dishonourable wound in the throat than that of a penknife; but the number of his crimes and the spleen of his enemies procured him a worse fate. Whatever Wild might deserve of others, he seems to have merited better usage from this Blake, for while he continued a prisoner in the Compter, Jonathan was at the expense of curing his wound, allowing him three shillings and sixpence a week, and after his last misfortune promised him a good coffin, actually furnishing him with money to support him in Newgate, and several good books, if he would have made any use of them; but because he freely declared to Blueskin that there was no hopes of getting him transported, the bloody villain determined to take away his life, and was so far from showing any signs of remorse when he was brought up again to Newgate, that he declared if he had thought of it before, he would have provided such a knife as should have cut his head off.

At the time that he received sentence there was a woman also condemned, and they being placed as usual in what is called the Bail Dock at the Old Bailey, Blake offered such rudeness to the woman that she cried out and alarmed the whole Bench. All the time he lay under condemnation he appeared utterly thoughtless and insensible of his approaching fate. Though from the cutting of Wild's throat, and some other barbarities of the same nature, he acquired amongst the mob the character of a brave fellow, yet he was in himself but a mean-spirited timorous wretch, and never exerted himself but either through fury and despair. His cowardice appealed manifestly in his behaviour at his death; he wept much at the chapel in the morning he was to die, and though he drank deeply to drive away fear, yet at the place of execution he wept again, trembled and showed all the signs of a timorous confusion, as well he might, who had lived wickedly and trifled with his repentance to the grave.

There was nothing in his person extraordinary. A dapper, well-set fellow of great strength, and great cruelty, equally detested by the sober part of the world for his audacious wickedness of his behaviour, and despised by his companions for the villainies he committed even against them. He was executed in the twenty-eighth year of his age, on the 11th of November, 1724.

FOOTNOTES:

[45] See page 85.

[46] An encampment was formed in Hyde Park, about 1714. Writing
to Martha Blount, Pope says "The tents are carried there this
morning, new regiments with new clothes and furniture, far
exceeding the late cloth and linen designed by his Grace (the
Duke of Marlborough) for the soldiery."

[47] See also the Life of Jonathan Wild, subsequently related.

The Life of the Famous JOHN SHEPHERD, Footpad, Housebreaker and Prison-breaker

Amongst the prodigies of ingenious wickedness and artful mischief which have surprised the world in our time, perhaps none has made so great a noise as John Shepherd, the malefactor of whom we are now to speak. His father's name was Thomas Shepherd, who was by trade a carpenter, and lived in Spitalfields, a man of an extraordinary good character, and who took all the care his narrow circumstances would allow, that his family might be brought up in the fear of God, and in just notions of their duty towards their neighbour. Yet he was so unhappy in his children that both his son John and another took to evil courses, and both in their turns have been convicted at the bar at the Old Bailey.

After the father's death, his widow did all she could to get this unfortunate son of hers admitted into Christ's Hospital, but failing of that, she got him bred up at a school in Bishopsgate Street, where he learned to read. He might in all probability have got a good education if he had not been too soon removed, being put out to a trade, viz., that of a cane-chair-maker, who used him very well, and with whom probably he might have lived honestly. But his mother dying a short time afterwards, he was put to another, a much younger man, who used him so harshly that in a little time he ran away from him, and was put to another master, one Mr. Wood in Wych Street. From his kindness and that of Mr. Kneebone (whom he robbed) he was taught to write and had many other favours done by that gentleman whom he so ungratefully treated. But good usage or bad, it was grown all alike to him now; he had given himself up to all the sensual pleasures of low life. Drinking all day, and getting to some impudent and notorious strumpet at night, was the whole course of his life for a considerable space, without the least reflection on what a miserable fate it might bring upon him here, much less the judgment that might be passed upon him hereafter.

Amongst the chief of his mistresses there was one Elizabeth Lion, commonly called Edgeworth Bess, the impudence of whose behaviour was shocking even to the greatest part of Shepherd's companions, but it charmed him so much that he suffered her for a while to direct him in every thing, and she was the first who engaged him in taking base methods to obtain money wherewith to purchase baser pleasures. This Lion was a large masculine woman, and Shepherd a very little slight-limbed lad, so that whenever he had been drinking and came to her quarrelsome, Bess often beat him into better temper, though Shepherd upon other occasions manifested his wanting neither courage nor strength. Repeated quarrels, however, between Shepherd and his mistress, as it does often with people of better rank, created such coldness that they spoke not together sometimes for a month. But our robber could not be so long without some fair one to take up his time, and drive his thoughts from the consideration of his crimes and the punishment which might one day befall them.

The creature he picked out to supply the place of Betty Lion was one Mrs. Maggott, a woman somewhat less boisterous in her temper, but full as wicked. She had a very great contempt for Shepherd, and only made use of him to go and steal money, or what might yield money, for her to spend in company that she liked better. One night when Shepherd came to her and told her he had pawned the last thing he had for half a crown, _Prithee_, says she, _don't tell me such melancholy stories but think how you may get more money. I have been in Whitehorse Yard this afternoon. There's a piece-broker there worth a great deal of money; he keeps his cash in a drawer under the counter, and there's abundance of good things in his shop that would be fit for me to wear. A word, you know, to the wise is enough, let me see now how soon you'll put me in possession of them._ This had the effect she desired; Shepherd left her about one o'clock in the morning, went to the house she talked of, took up the cellar window bars, and from thence entered the shop, which he plundered of money and goods, to the amount of £22. He brought it to his doxy the same day before she was stirring, who thereupon appeared very satisfied with his diligence, and helped him in a short time to squander what he had so dearly earned.

However, he still retained some affection for his old favourite, Bess Lion, who being taken up for some of her tricks, was committed to St. Giles's Round-house. Shepherd going to see her there, broke the doors open, beat the keeper, and like a true knight-errant, set his distressed paramour at liberty. This heroic act got him so much reputation amongst the fair ladies in Drury Lane that there was nobody of his profession so much esteemed by them as John Shepherd, with his brother Thomas, who had taken to the same trade. Observing and being in himself in tolerable estimation with that debauched part of the sex, he importuned some of them to speak to his brother John to lend him a little money, and for the future to allow him to go out robbing with him. To both these propositions Jack (being a kind brother as he himself said) consented at the first word, and from thence forward the two brothers were always of one party: Jack having, as he impudently phrased it, lent him forty shillings to put himself in a proper plight, and soon after their being together having broke open an alehouse, where they got a tolerable booty, in a high fit of generosity, John presented it all to his brother, as, soon after, he did clothes to a very considerable extent, so that the young man might not appear among the damsels of Drury unbecoming Mr. Shepherd's brother.

About three weeks after their coming together, they broke open a linen-draper's shop, near Clare Market, where the brothers made good use of their time; for they were not in the house above a quarter of an hour before they made a shift to strip it of £50. But the younger brother acting imprudently in disposing of some of the goods, he was detected and apprehended, upon which the first thing he did was to make a full discovery to impeach his brother and as many of his confederates as he could. Jack was very quickly apprehended upon his brother's information, and was committed by Justice Parry to the Round-house, for further examination. But instead of waiting for that, Jack began to examine as well as he could the strength of the place of his confinement, which being much too weak for a fellow of his capacity, he marched off before night, and committed a robbery into the bargain, but vowed to be revenged on Tom who had so basely behaved himself (as Jack phrased it) towards so good a brother. However, that information going off, Jack went on in his old way as usual.

One day in May he and F. Benson being in Leicester Fields, Benson attempted to get a gentleman's watch, but missing his pull, the gentleman perceived it and raised a mob. Shepherd passing briskly to save his companion, was apprehended in his stead, and being carried before Justice Walters, was committed to New Prison, where the first sight he saw was his old companion, Bess Lion, who had found her way thither upon a like errand. Jack, who now saw himself beset with danger, began to exert all his little cunning, which was indeed his masterpiece. For this purpose he applied first to Benson's friends, who were in good circumstances, hoping by their mediation to make the matter up, but in this he miscarried. Then he attempted a slight information, but the Justice to whom he sent it, perceiving how trivial a thing it was, and guessing well at the drift thereof, refused it. Whereupon Shepherd, when driven to his last shift, communicated his resolution to Bess Lion. They laid their heads together the fore part of the night, and then went to work to break out, which they effected by force, and got safe off to one of Bess Lion's old lodgings, where she kept him secret for some time, frightening him with stories of great searches being made after him, in order to detain him from conversing with any other woman.

But Jack being not naturally timorous, and having a strong inclination to be out again in his old way with his companions, it was not long before he gave her the slip, and lodged himself with another of his female acquaintances, in a little by-court near the Strand. Here one Charles Grace desired to become an associate with him. Jack was very ready to take any young fellow in as a partner of his villainies, and Grace told him that his reason for doing such things was to keep a beautiful woman without the knowledge of his relations. Shepherd and he therefore getting into the acquaintance of one Anthony Lamb, an apprentice of Mr. Carter, near St. Clement's Church, they inveigled the young man to consent to let them in to rob his master's house. He accordingly performed it, and they took from Mr. Barton, who lodged there, to a very considerable value. But Grace and Shepherd quarrelling about the division, Shepherd wounded Grace in a violent manner, and on this quarrel betraying one another, they were all taken, Shepherd only escaping. But the misfortune of poor Lamb who had been drawn in, being so very young, so far prevailed upon several gentlemen who knew him, that they not only prevailed to have his sentence mitigated to transportation, but also furnished him with all necessaries, and procured an order that on his arrival there he should not be sold as the other felons were, but that he should be left at liberty to provide for himself as well as he could.

It seems that Shepherd's gang (which consisted of himself, his brother Tom, Joseph Blake, _alias_ Blueskin, Charles Grace, James Sikes, to whose name his companions tacked their two favourite syllables, Hell and Fury) not knowing how to dispose of the goods they had taken, made use of one William Field for that purpose, who Shepherd in his ludicrous style, used to characterise thus: that he was a fellow wicked enough to do anything, but his want of courage permitted him to do nothing but carry on the trade he did, which was that of selling stolen goods when put into his hands.

But Blake and Shepherd finding Field somewhat dilatory, not thinking it always safe to trust him, they resolved to hire a warehouse and lodge their goods there, which accordingly they did, near the Horseferry in Westminster. There they placed what they had taken out of Mr. Kneebones' house, and the goods made a great show there, whence the people in the neighbourhood really took them for honest persons, who had so great a wholesale business on their hands as occasioned their taking a place where they by convenient for the water.

Field, however, importuned them (having got scent they had such a warehouse) that he might go and see the goods, pretending that he had it just now in his power to sell them at a very great price. They accordingly carried him thither and showed him the things. Two or three days afterwards, though he had not courage enough to rob anybody else, Field ventured to break open the warehouse, and took every rag that had been lodged there; and not long after, Shepherd was apprehended for the fact and tried at the next sessions of the Old Bailey.

His appearance there was very mean, and all the defence he offered to make was that Jonathan Wild had helped to dispose of part of the goods and he thought it was very hard that he should not share in the punishment. The Court took little notice of so insignificant a plea and sentence being passed upon him, he hardly made a sensible petition for the favour of the Court in the report, but behaved throughout as a person either stupid or foolish, so far was he from appearing in any degree likely to make the noise he afterwards did.