 This is part nine, volume one, of the new and complete New Gate calendar read by Roy Schreiber. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. The singular case of Captain John Massie, who was hanged for piracy. This unhappy man, whose misfortune seemed to claim singular compassion, was the son of a gentleman of fortune in the country, who gave him a genteel education, but the disposition of the young man not being sufficiently solid to admit his living quietly at home, his father procured him a commission in the army, and he served with great applause as a lieutenant under the command of the Duke of Marlborough during the wars in Flanders in the reign of Queen Anne. On his return to England he conducted himself for some time with great decency, but at length became acquainted with a woman of bad character, to whom he was so much attached that he would undoubtedly have married her if his father, who got intelligence of the affair, had not happily broke off the connection. Not long after this he went with his regiment to Ireland, where he lived for some time in a course of continued debauchery, but at length he got appointed to the rank of lieutenant and engineer in the Royal African Company, and sailed in one of their ships to direct the building afort. The ship being ill supplied with provisions, and those of the worst kind, the sufferings of the crew were inexpressibly great. Every officer on board died except Massie, and many of the soldiers likewise fell a sacrifice to the scandalous neglect. Those who lived to get on shore drank so greedily of the fresh water that they were thrown into fluxes which destroyed them in the most rapid manner. Till at length only Captain Massie, and a very few of his people were left alive, and these, being totally unable to build afort, and seeing no prospect of relief, began to abandon themselves to despair. But at this time a vessel happening to come near the shore, they made signals of distress on which a boat was sent off to their relief. They were no sooner on board than they found the vessel was a pirate, and, distressed as they had been, too hastily engaged in their lawless plan rather than run the hazard of perishing on shore. Sailing from hence they took several prizes, and though the persons made prisoners were not ill-used with cruelty, Mr. Massie had so true a sense of the illegality of the proceedings in which he was connected, that his mind was perpetually tormented with the idea of the fatal consequences that might ensue. At length the ship reached Jamaica when Mr. Massie seized the first opportunity of deserting, and, repairing to the Governor, he gave such information that the crew of the pirate vessel was taken into custody, convicted and hanged. Massie might have been provided for by the Governor who treated him with singular respect on account of his services to the public, but he declined his generous offer through an anxiety to visit his native country. On a sailing for England the Governor gave his recommendatory letters to the Lords of the Admiralty. But astonishing as it may seem, instead of being caressed, he was taken into custody and committed till a sessions of admiralty was held for his trial, when he pleaded guilty and received sentence of death. As his case was remarkable the public entertained, no doubt, but he would have been pardoned. But a warrant was sent for his execution, and he made the most solemn preparations for his approaching fate. Two clergymen attended him at the place of execution, where he freely acknowledged his sins in general, was remarkably fervent in his devotions and seemed perfectly resigned to the fatal destiny. He suffered at execution dock on the 26th of July, 1723. Mysterious are the ways of Providence. To the views of the short-sighted mortals it will appear that this man ought not to have suffered, but heaven thought otherwise, and shall not the judge of all the earth do right. It seems astonishing that Mr. Masty should plead guilty at his trial when his joining the pirates was evidently an act of necessity, not of choice, and when his subsequent conduct at Jamaica proves that he took the earliest opportunity to abandon his late companions and bring them to justice, a conduct by which he seems to have merited the thanks of his country rather than the vengeance of the Laws. It is almost impossible to quit this subject, on which volumes might be written, without once more remarking on the savage inhumanity of that accursed trade to Africa, the slave trade, the trade that is born in avarice and nursed in blood. The English nation ought to give up its bloated claim to humanity till the trade be abolished, and we should blush at the idea of punishing a pirate while we openly permit a traffic that counteracts all the laws of benevolence, shame on the people, shame on the legislators that can longer permit the continuance of a practice so much more than hellish, a practice which the fiends would blush to think of, but the day of retribution may be nearer than we imagine. The present state of Great Britain, this being written on the 2nd of June 1778, bears not the most favourable aspect, and those who are dead to all feeling for suffering of others may perhaps be alive to their own. Vengeance is mine, and I will repay, saith the Lord. Particulars respecting Philip Roche, who is hanged for piracy. This atrocious malefactor was a native of Ireland, and being brought up to a seafaring life served for a considerable time on board some culling vessels, and then sailed to Barbados on board a West Indieman, and here he endeavored to procure the place of a clerk to a factor. But failing in this he went again to sea, and was advanced to the situation of a first mate. He now became acquainted with a fisherman named Neil, who hinted to him that large sums of money might be acquired for insuring ships, and then causing them to be sunk to defraud the insurers. Roche was wicked enough to listen to this horrid tale, and becoming acquainted with a gentleman who had a ship bound for Cape Breton, he got a station on board next in command to the captain, who, having a high opinion of him, trusted the ship to his management directing the seamen to obey his commands. If Roche had entertained any idea of sinking the ship, he seemed now to have abandoned it. But he had brought on board with him five Irishmen who were concerned in the shocking tragedy that ensued. When they had been only a few days at sea, the plan was executed as follows. One night, when the captain and most of the crew were asleep, Roche gave orders to two of the seamen to furl the sails, which, being immediately done, the poor fellows no sooner descended to the deck than Roche and his hellish associates murdered them and threw them overboard. At this instant a man and a boy, at a yard-arm, observed what past, and dreading a similar fate, hurried toward the top-massed head when one of the Irishmen named Cullen followed them, and, seizing the boy, threw him into the sea, the man, thinking to effect at least a present escape, descended to the main deck where Roche instantly seized and murdered him, and then threw him overboard. The noise occasioned by these transactions alarmed the sailors below. They hurried up with all possible expedition. But they were severally seized and murdered as fast as they came on deck, and being first knocked on the head were thrown into the sea. At length the master and mate came on the quarter-deck when Roche and his villainous companions seized them, and tying them back to back committed them to the merciless waves. These excruble murders, being perpetrated, the murderers ransacked the chests of the deceased, and then sat down to regale themselves with liquor. And while the profligate crew were carousing, they determined to commence pirates, and that Roche should be the captain as the reward of his superior villainy. They had intended to sail up the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but as they were within a few days' sail of the British Channel when the bloody tragedy was acted, and finding themselves short of provisions, they put in at Portsmouth, and giving the vessel a fictitious name, they painted her afresh, and then sailed for Rotterdam. At this city they disposed of their cargo, and took in a fresh one. Here they were unknown, and an English gentleman named Anisly shipped considerable property on board, and took his passage with them for the port of London. But the villains threw this unfortunate gentleman overboard after they had been only one day at sea. When the ship arrived in the Thames River, Mr. Anisly's friends made inquiry after him, in consequence of his having sent letters to England, describing the ship in which he proposed to embark, but Roche denied having any knowledge of the gentleman, and even disclaimed his own name. Notwithstanding his confident assertions, it was rightly presumed who he was, and a letter which he sent to his wife being stopped, he was taken into custody. Being carried before the Secretary of State for examination, he avarred that he was not Philip Roche, and said that he knew no person of that name. Hereupon the intercepted letter was shown him, on which he instantly confessed his crimes, and was immediately committed to take his trial at the next admiralty sessions. It was intimated to Roche that he might expect a pardon if he would impeach any three persons who were more culpable than himself, so that they might be prosecuted to conviction. But not being able to do this, he was brought to his trial, found guilty, and judgment of death was awarded against him. After conviction he professed to be of the Roman Catholic faith, but was certainly no bigot to that religion since he attended the devotions according to the Protestant form. He was hanged at Execution Dock on the 5th of August, 1723, but was so ill at the time that he could not make any public declaration of abhorrence of the crime for which he suffered. The cases of William Deuce and James Butler, who were hanged for robbery. Deuce was a native of Wolverhampton, and by trade a buckle-maker, which he followed some time in London, but being imprisoned in Newgate for debt, he there made connections which greatly tended to the corruption of his manners. He was no sooner at large than he commenced foot-pad and, in company with another man, robbed a gentleman in Chelsea Fields of Four Guineas. After this he connected himself with John Dyer and James Butler, in concert with whom he committed a variety of robberies. Their plan was to go out together, but one only to attack the party intended to be robbed, but to give a signal for his accomplices to come up if any resistance should be made. After committing a variety of robberies in the neighborhood of London, they joined in a scheme with four other villains to rob Lady Chudley between Hyde Park Corner and Kensington, but her ladyship's footman shot one of the gang named Rice through the head, which prevented the intended depredation. Their robberies had now been so numerous that the neighborhood of London became unsafe for them. Wherefore, they went on the Portsmouth Road, where they committed a variety of robberies, and even proceeded to the perpetration of murder with a view to prevent detection. Meeting Mr. Bunch a farmer near a wood on the roadside, they robbed him of his money, and then dragging him into the wood, they stripped him, and deuce-firing at him with a pistol the ball lodged in his mouth. They now imagined the man was dead, and were about to depart when Mr. Bunch turning, Butler loaded another pistol in order to dispatch him, on which he begged that they would yet spare his life. But finding that they entertained no sentiments of compassion, he exerted all his strength, and springing on his legs ran off and alarming the inhabitants of an adjacent village. Immediate pursuit was made after the villains, all of whom were apprehended except deuce, who escaped and got to London. Darker wade and meads, three of the gang, were hanged at Winchester, but Butler was sent to take his trial at the old Bailey for robberies committed in the county of Middlesex. James Butler was the son of reputable parents of the parish of St. Anne Soho, and apprenticed to a silversmith, but being of an ungovernable disposition, his parents were obliged to send him to sea. After making several voyages as an apprentice to the captain, he ran away from the ship at Boston in New England, and went to New York, where he entered on board another ship from which he likewise ran away, and embarked on a third vessel bound to Martinico. But he also quitted this on a dispute with the captain, and then sailed to Jamaica, where he was impressed into the Royal Navy, and served under the celebrated Admiral Vernon. On his return to England he married a girl of whopping, and having soon spent the little money he brought home with him, he engaged with the gang we have mentioned, with whom he was likewise concerned in several robberies. Robberies appeared to have been very desperate villains. On the road to Gravesend they stopped four gentlemen, who refusing to be robbed, Meads, one of those hanged at Winchester, shot a servant who attended them, in the breast so that he died in a few days. Disappointed of their booty in this attempt, their passions were so irritated that, meeting a gentleman on horseback, they fired, and wounded him in the head and the breast, and the next day he expired. They committed other robberies attended with circumstances of cruelty, but it will be now proper to mention those for which they suffered. Butler, having been acquitted at the old baili of the crime for which he had been transmitted from Winchester, he and Deuce and Dyer immediately renewed their depredations on the road. Meeting with Mr. Holmes near Buckingham House they robbed him of his money, hat, and handkerchief, which laid the foundation of one of the indictments against them. On the following evening they stopped a hackney coachman near Hampstead and robbed him of nine shillings, after the coachman had told them that the words, stand and deliver, were sufficient to hang a man. Jonathan Wilde being informed of these robberies caused the offenders to be apprehended at a house kept by Deuce's sister. Dyer being admitted in evidence, Deuce and Butler were brought to their trial, when the latter pleaded guilty to both the indictments and the former, after spending some time in denying the robberies, and arraigning the conduct of Jonathan Wilde, was found guilty and both of them received sentence of death. After conviction their behavior was more resigned and devout than could have been expected from men whose repeated crimes might be supposed to have hardened their hearts, but death appeared to them in all its horrors. Butler was a Roman Catholic and Deuce a Protestant. The latter was urged by the Ordinary to discover the names of some of his old accomplices, but this he refused to do because they had left their practices and lived honest lives. A few moments before they were launched into eternity Butler declared that the circumstances of cruelty with which their crimes had been attended gave him more pain than the thoughts of death, and Deuce acknowledged the enormity of his offenses and begged the forgiveness of all he had injured. They were hanged at Tyburn on the 14th of August, 1723. The life and transactions of Humphrey and Gere, who is hanged for robbery. This offender was a native of Ireland and born near Dublin, but his parents, removing to Cork, put him apprentice to a cooper in that city. He had not been long in this situation before his master desired to get rid of him on account of his untoward disposition. Being discharged from his service, he lived the life of a vagabond for two years, and his father, apprehending that he would come to a fatal end, brought him to England in the eighteenth year of his age. Still, however, he continued his dissipated course of life, till having gotten considerably in debt he enlisted for his soldier to avoid being lodged in prison. As this happened in the year 1715, he was sent to Scotland to oppose the rebels, but robbing a farmer in that country, he was punished by receiving five hundred lashes in consequence of the sentence of a court-martial. The rebellion being ended, Anjir came to London and obtained his discharge. Here he became acquainted with William Deuce, mentioned in the preceding article, and married a sister of Deuce at an ale-house in the verge of the fleet. After this he enlisted for a soldier, and the regiment being ordered to Vigo he took his wife with him, and when the greater part of the Spaniards had abandoned the place, Anjir obtained a considerable sum by plunder. On his return to England he became acquainted with butler's associates, and concerned with them in several of their lawless depredations, but refused to have any share in acts of barbarity. Anjir now kept a house of ill-fame, which was resorted to by other thieves, and one night after they had been out on one of their exploits one Medes, whose name we have before recorded, told the following horrid tale, quote, We had been out, and the best fun of all was an engagement with a smocked-faced shoemaker whom we met on the Kentish road. We asked him how far he was going, and he said he was just married and going home to see his relations. After a little more discourse we persuaded him to turn a little out of the road to look for a bird's nest, but as soon as we got him a little out of the road we bound and gagged him after which we robbed him, and were going away. But I, being in a merry humour, wanted to have a little diversion, turned about with my pistol and shot him through the head, end quote. Bad as Anjir was, in other respects, he was shocked at the story, and told his companions that there was no courage in cruelty, and from that time refused to drink with any of them. After this, Anjir kept a house of ill-fame near Charing Cross, letting lodgings to thieves and receiving stolen goods. While in this way of life he went to see an execution at Tyburn, and did not return till four o'clock the next morning. And in his absence an incident arose which was attended with some troublesome consequences. A Dutch woman, meeting with a gentleman in the street, conducted him to Anjir's house, where he drank so freely that he fell asleep, when the woman robbed him of his watch and money and made her escape. The gentleman awakening, when Anjir returned, charged him with the robbery, and in consequence of which he was committed to prison, but soon afterwards discharged the grand jury not finding the bill against him. Not long after he got free from this trouble, his wife was indicted for robbing a gentleman of his watch and a guinea, but had the good fortune to be acquitted in defect of evidence. The following accident happened about the same time. A woman named Turner had drank so much at Anjir's house that he conducted her up to bed. But while he was in the room with her, his wife entered like a fury, demanding how Turner could presume to keep company with her husband, attacked and beat the woman. William Deuce being in the house went up to interfere, but the disturbance was by this time so great that it was necessary to send for a constable. The officer no sooner arrived than Mrs. Turner charged Anjir and his wife with robbing her, on which they were taken into custody and committed. But when they were brought to trial they were acquitted, as there was no proof of any robbery to the satisfaction of the jury. Dyer, who was evidence against Deuce and Butler, as mentioned in the preceding narrative, lived at this time with Anjir as a waiter, and the master and man used occasionally to commit footpad robberies together, for which they were several times apprehended and tried at the old Bailey, but acquitted because the prosecutors could not swear to their persons. Anjir's character now grew so notorious that no person of common decency would be seen in his house, and the expenses attending his repeated prosecutions were so great that from these united causes he was compelled to decline business. After this, however, he kept a gin shop in the Shorts Gardens Drury Lane, and this house was frequented by company of the same kind as those he had formerly entertained, and among the rest Parson Lindsay. Lindsay, having prevailed on a gentleman to go to this house, made him drunk and then robbed him of several valuable articles, but procuring himself to be admitted in evidence, charged Anjir and his wife with the robbery. They had again the good fortune to escape because the character of Lindsay was by this time so infamous that the court and jury paid no regard to anything that he said. Not long after this Mrs. Anjir was transported for picking a gentleman's pocket, and her husband was convicted on two capital indictments, the one for robbing Mr. Lewin, the city marshal near Hornsey of ten guineas and some silver, and the other for robbing a waggoner near Knightsbridge. On both these trials, Dyer, who was connected in the robberies, was admitted in evidence against Anjir. After conviction Anjir was visited by numbers of persons whose pockets had been picked of valuable articles in hopes of getting some intelligence of the property they had lost, but he told them that he was never guilty of such mean actions as picking of pockets, and he said that none of his associates ever followed this practice. But one Hugh Kelly was transported for robbing a woman of a shroud which she was carrying home to cover her deceased husband. Anjir's father died of a broken heart soon after he heard of his commitment. While under sentence of death he behaved with great penitence, confessed his crimes, he said he had never been happy in the commission of them, and expressed a willingness to die as what he hoped might be a compensation for his sins. He was executed at Tyburn on the 9th of September, 1723, just before he was turned off, advised young people to be obedient to their parents as a failure in that important duty was the first step to his destruction. Account of Richard Parvin, Edward Elliott, Robert Kingshill, Henry Marshall, Edward Pink, John Pink, and John Ansel, commonly called the Waltham Blacks, who were hanged for murder. The action of these offenders became so much the object of public notice that it was deemed proper to frame a particular act of parliament in order to bring them to justice. Having blackened their faces, they went in the daytime to the parks of the nobility and gentry, once they repeatedly stole deer, and at length murdered the Bishop of Winchester's Keeper on Waltham Chase, and from the name of the place, and their blackening their faces, they obtained the name of the Waltham Blacks. The following is the substance of the act of parliament on which they were convicted. Quote, any person appearing in any forest, chase, park, etc., or in any high road, open heath, common, or down, with offensive weapons, and having his face blacked or otherwise disguised, or unlawfully and willfully hunting, wounding, killing, or stealing, any red or fallow deer, or unlawfully robbing, any warren, etc., or stealing any fish out of any river or pond, or, whether armed and disguised or not, breaking down the head or mound of any fish pond, whereby the fish may be lost or destroyed, or unlawfully and maliciously killing, maiming, or wounding any cattle, or cutting down, or otherwise destroying any trees planted in any avenue, or growing in any garden, orchard, or plantation, for ornament, shelter, or profit, or setting fire to any house, barn, or outhouse, hovel, cock, mow, or stand of corn, straw, hay, or wood, or maliciously shooting any person in any dwelling house or other place, or knowingly sending any letter without any name or signed with a fictitious name demanding money, venison, or other valuable thing, or forcibly rescuing any person, being in custody for any of the offenses before mentioned, or procuring any person by gift or promise of money or other reward to join in any such unlawful act or concealing or succoring such offenders, when by order of counsel and etc. required to surrender shall suffer death." The offence of deer-stealing was formally only a misdemeanor at common law, but the act of parliament above mentioned has been rendered perpetual by a subsequent statute. It therefore behooves people to be cautious that they do not endanger their lives while they think they are committing, what they may deem an inferior offense. We will now give such particulars as we have been able to obtain respecting the malefactors in question. Richard Parvin was heretofore the master of a public house in Portsmouth, which he kept with reputation for a considerable time, till he was imprudent enough to engage with the gang of ruffians who practiced the robbing of noblemans and gentlemen's parks through the country. The reader is already apprised that it was the custom of these fellows to go disguised. Now a servant maid of Parvin's having left his house during his absence had repaired to an ale house in the country, and Parvin calling there on his return from one of his dishonest expeditions the girl discovered him and in consequence of which he was committed to Winchester jail by the mayor of Portsmouth till his removal to London for trial. Edward Elliott was apprenticed to a tailor at Guilford and was very young when he engaged with the gang whose orders he implicitly obeyed till the following circumstance occasioned his leaving them. Having met with two countrymen who refused to enter into the society they dug holes in the ground and placed the unhappy man in them up to their chins. And had they not been relieved by persons who accidentally saw them they must have perished. Shocked by this deed Elliott left them, and for some time served a lady as a footman. But on the day the keeper was murdered he casually met them in the fields and on their promise that no harm should attend him he unhappily consented to bear them company. Having provided themselves with pistols and blackened their faces with gunpowder they proceeded to their lawless depredations and while the rest of the gang were killing of deer Elliott went in search of a fawn. But while he was looking for it the keeper and his assistants came up and took him into custody. His associates were near enough to see what happened and immediately coming to his assistants a violent affray ensued in which the keeper was shot by Henry Marshall, so that he died on the spot and Elliott made his escape. But he was soon afterwards taken into custody and lodged in the jail of Guilford. Robert Kingshill, who was a native of Farnham in Surrey, was placed by his parents with a shoemaker, but being too idle to follow the profession he was guilty of many acts of irregularity before he associated himself with the wall from blacks with whom he afterwards suffered. While he was in bed on the night proceeding the fatal murder one of the gang awakened him by knocking at his window on which he arose and went with him to join the rest of the deer-stealers. Henry Marshall was a man distinguished for his strength and agility. We have no account of the place of his birth or the manner of his education, but it is reasonable to think that the latter was of the inferior kind since he appears to have been chiefly distinguished by his skill in the vulgar science of bruising. He was once the occasion of apprehending a high woman who had robbed a coach by giving him a single blow which broke his arm. He seems to have been one of the most daring of the wall from blacks and was the man who shot the chaisekeeper as above mentioned. Edward Pink and John Pink were brothers who spent the former part of their lives as carters at Portsmouth and had maintained the character of honest men till they became weak enough to join the desperate gang of deer-stealers. It now remains to speak only of James Ansel who likewise lived in Portsmouth. We are not informed in what way he had originally supported himself. But for some years before he joined the desperate gang above mentioned he was a high women and had been connected with the wall from blacks about two years before the commission of the murder which cost them their lives. By a vigilant exertion of civil power all the above mentioned defenders were taken into custody and had been thought prudent to bring them to trial in London. They were removed thither under a strong guard enlarged at Newgate. On the 13th of November, 1723, they were brought to their trial in the court of King's Bench and being convicted on the clearest evidence were found guilty and sentenced to die, and it was immediately ordered that they should suffer on the fourth of the next month. One circumstance was very remarkable on this occasion. The judge had no sooner pronounced the sentence than Henry Marshall, the man who had shot the keeper, was immediately deprived of the use of his tongue, nor did he recover his speech till the day before his death. After passing solemn sentence the convicts behaved in a manner equally devout and resigned, were regular in their devotions and prepared themselves for eternity with every mark of unfained contrition. They received the sacrament before they left Newgate, acknowledged the justice of the sentence against them, and said they had been guilty of many crimes besides that for which they were to suffer. At the place of execution they were so dejected as to be unable to address the populace, but they again confessed their sins, recommended their souls to God, beseeching his mercy through the merits of Christ with the utmost fervency of devotion. These malifactors were hanged at Tyburn on the fourth of December, 1723. The end of Part 9, Volume 1 of the New and Complete Newgate Calendar. This is Part 10, Volume 1 of the New and Complete Newgate Calendar, read by Roy Schreiber. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Particulars respecting John Stanley, who was hanged for murder. Mr. Stanley was the son of an officer in the army, and was born in the year 1690 at Deuce Hall in Essex, a seat that belonged to Mr. Palmer, who was his uncle by the mother's side. Young Stanley, being the favorite of his father, the latter began to teach him the art of fencing when he was no more than five years of age, and other officers likewise practicing the same art with him. He became a kind of master of the sword when he was but a mere boy. For, to stimulate his courage, it was common for those who fenced with him to give him wine or other strong liquors. In consequence of this treatment the boy grew daring and insolent beyond expression, and at length behaved with so uncommon a degree of audacity that his father deemed him a singular character of bravery. While he was very young, Mr. Stanley, being ordered to join his regiment in Spain, took his son with him. And in that country he was the spectator of several engagements, but his principal delight was in trampling on the bodies of the deceased after the battles were ended. From Spain the elder Stanley was ordered to leave Ireland wither he took his son, and there procured for him an ensign's commission. But the young gentleman, habituating himself to extravagant company, spent much more money than the produce of his commission, which he soon sold and then returned to England. The father was greatly mortified at this proceeding, and advised him to make application to General Stanhope, who had been a warm friend of the family. But this advice was lost on the young fellow who abandoned himself to the most desolute course of life, borrowed money of all his acquaintance, which he soon squandered at the gaming tables, and procured further supplies from women with whom he made illicit connections. He was so vain of his acquaintance with the ladies that he boasted of their favours as an argument in proof of his own accomplishments. Though what he might obtain the weakness of one woman, he commonly squandered on others of more abandoned character. One mode which he took to supply his extravagance was to introduce himself into the company of young gentlemen who were but little acquainted with the vices of the age, whom he assisted in wasting their fortunes in every species of scandalous dissipation. At length, after a scene of riot in London, he went with one of his associates to Flanders and thence to Paris, and Stanley boasted not a little of his favours. He received among the French ladies, and of the improvements he made in the science of fencing. On his return to England, the opinion he conceived of his skill in the use of the sword made him insufferably vain and presuming. He would frequently intrude himself into company at a tavern and saying he was come to make himself welcome would sit down at the table without farther ceremony. The company would sometimes bear with his insolence for the sake of peace. But when this was the case, it was a chance if he did not pretend to have received some affront, and drawing his sword walk off while the company was in confusion. It was not always, however, that matters thus ended, for sometimes a gentleman of spirit would take the liberty of kicking our hero out of the house. It will now be proper to mention something of his connection with Mrs. Maycock, the murderer of whom cost him his life. As he was returning from a gaming house which he frequented in Covent Garden, he met a Mr. Bryant of Newgate Street and his sister, Mrs. Maycock, the wife of a Mercer of Ludgate Hill. Stanley rudely ran against the man and embraced the woman, on which quarrel arose. But this subsiding Stanley insisted on seeing the party's home. This he did and spent the evening with him. And from this circumstance a fatal connection arose as will appear in the sequel. Stanley, having made an acquaintance with the family, soon afterwards met Mrs. Maycock at the house of a relation in Red Lion Street, Holborn. In a short time Mr. Maycock, removing into Sotheck, the visits of our captain were admitted on a footing of intimacy. The husband dying soon after this connection Stanley became more at liberty to pay his addresses to the widow, and it appears that some considerable intimacy subsisted between them from the following letter, which is not more a proof of the absurd vanity of the man that could write it than of the woman that could keep him company after receiving it. The egregious coxcomb and supercilious flatterer is visible in every line. Quote, I am to-morrow to be at the opera, O, that I could add with her I love. The opera where beauty's less beauty is than thou, sit panting, admired, and taste the sweet barbarian sounds. On Friday I shall be at the masquerade at Somerset House, where modest pleasure hides itself before it will be touched. But though it is uncertain in the shape, it is real in the sense, for masks scorn to steal and not repay. Therefore, as they can hold a face, they oft make the body the better known. At this end of town many faded beauties bid the oleos and the brush kiss their cheeks and lips till their charms only glimmer with a borrowed grace, so that a city beauty rich in her native spring of simplicity and loveliness will doubly shine with us, shine like the innocent morning blush of light that glitters untainted on the gardens. This exquisite piece of nonsense flattered the vanity of the lady, so that he was admitted to repeat his visits at his own convenience. At this time a young fellow, who had served his apprenticeship with the late Mr. Maycock and who was possessed of a decent fortune to begin the world, paid his addresses to the young widow, but she preferred the ventious life with Stanley to a more virtuous connection. Soon after this she quitted her house in Southwick, and the lovers spent their time at balls, plays, and assemblies till her money was dissipated, when he did not scruple to insinuate that she had been too liberal of her favours to other persons. In the meantime she bore him three children, one of whom was living at the time of the father's execution. Stanley, continuing his disolute course of life, his parents became very uneasy and fear of the fatal consequences that might ensue, and his father, who saw too late the wrong bias he had given to his education, procured him the commission of a lieutenant to go to Cape Coast Castle in the service of the Africa Company. The young fellow seemed so pleased with disappointment that his friends conceived great hopes that he would reform. Preparations being made for his voyage and the Company having advanced a considerable sum, he went to Portsmouth in order to embark. But he had been only a few days in that town when he was followed by Mrs. Maycock with their infant child. She reproached him with baseness, in first debauching and then leaving her to starve. And employing all the arts she was mistress of, to divert him from his resolution, he gave her half the money which belonged to the Company and followed her to London with the rest. Shocked with the news of this dishonorable action, the father took to his bed and died of grief. Young Stanley appeared greatly grieved at this event, and to divert his chagrin he went to Flanders where he stayed a considerable time, when he returned to England and lived in as abandon a manner as before. Soon after his return, having drank freely with two tradesmen, they all walked together towards Hampstead and meeting a Mr. Dawson with five other gentlemen, a quarrel ensued. One of the gentlemen fired a pistol, the ball from which grazed Stanley's skin, enraged thereby, the latter drew his sword, and making a pass at him the sword ran into the body of Mr. Dawson, through the lower part of his belly, and to his backbone. The wounded man was conveyed to a neighbouring house, where he lay six weeks before he was perfectly recovered. However, as Dawson happened to know Stanley, he took out a writ against him for damages to recover the expense of the cure. But the writ was never executed, as Stanley was so celebrated for his skill in the use of his sword and his daring disposition that bailiffs were afraid to arrest him. Not long after this, quarreling with Captain Chickley in a cider cellar in Covent Garden, Stanley challenged the captain to fight in a dark room. They shut themselves in, but a constable being sent for broke open the door, and probably saved Stanley's life. For Chickley had then ran his sword through his body while he himself received only two slight wounds. It appears that Stanley still paid occasional visits to Mrs. Maycock, and he had the insolence to pretend anger at her receiving the visits of other persons, though he was not able to support her. For he had the vanity to think that a woman whom he had debauched ought FOREVER to bear true allegiance to him as a wife to her husband. Mrs. Maycock, having been to visit a gentleman, was returning one night through chance relaying in company with another woman and Mr. Hammond of the Old Bailey. Stanley, in company with another man, met the parties, and he and his companion insisted on going with the women. Hammond, hereupon said, the ladies belonged to him. But Mrs. Maycock, now recognizing Stanley, said, What, Captain, is it you? He asked her where she was going. She said to Mr. Hammond's in the Old Bailey. He replied that he was glad to meet her and would go with her. As they walked down Fleet Street, Stanley desired his companions to go back and wait for him at an appointed place. And as the company was going forward, Stanley struck a man who happened to be in his way and kicked a woman on the same account. Being arrived at Hammond's house, the company desired Stanley to go home. But this he refused, and Mrs. Maycock, going into the kitchen, he pushed in after her, and some words having passed between them he stabbed her so that she died in about an hour and a half. Other company, going into the kitchen, saw Stanley flourishing his sword, while the deceased was fainting, with loss of blood, and crying out, I am stabbed! I am murdered! Stanley's sword being taken from him, he threw himself down by Mrs. Maycock, and said, My dear Hannah, would you not speak to me? The offender being taken into custody was brought to his trial at the Old Bailey, where some witnesses endeavored to prove that he was a lunatic, but the jury, considering his extravagant conduct as the effect of his vices only, and the evidence against him being positive, he was found guilty and received sentence of death. Before his conviction he had behaved in a very inconsiderate manner, nor was his conduct much altered afterwards, only that when he heard the name of Mrs. Maycock mentioned, he was seized with violent trembling and drops of cold sweat fell from his face. He was carried to the place of execution in a morning-coach, but on being put into the cart under the gallows he turned pale and was so weak that he could not stand without support. He made no speech to the people, but only said, as a hearse was provided to take away his body, he hoped no one would prevent his receiving Christian burial. It was observed that he wept bitterly after the cap was drawn over his eyes. He was executed at Tibern on the 23rd of December, 1723, at age 25 years. Case of Stephen Gardner who was hanged for burglary. This malefactor was born in more fields of poor parents who put him apprentice to a weaver. But his behavior soon became so bad that his master was obliged to correct him severely, on which he ran away and associated with black-art boys in the streets, and then was driven home through mere hunger. His friends now determined to lend him to sea, and put him on board a corn-vessel, the master of which traded to France and Holland. Being an idle and useless hand on board, he was treated so roughly by his shipmates that he grew heartily tired of a seafaring life. And on his return from the first voyage he promised the utmost obedience if his friends would permit him to remain at home. This was readily applied with in the hope of his reformation. And he was now put to a waterman. But being impatient of restraint, he soon quitted his service, and engaged with disolute fellows in the neighborhood of more fields with whom he played cards, dice, and et cetera, till he was stripped of what little money he had and then commenced pickpocket. His first attempt of this kind was at Guild Hall during the drawing of the lottery when he took a wig out of a man's pocket. But though he was detected in the offence, the humanity of the surrounding multitude permitted his escape. This circumstance encouraged him to continue his practice, and about a month afterwards he was detected in picking another pocket, and not withstanding his protestations of innocence, underwent discipline of the horse pond. He was now determined to give over a business which was necessarily attended with so much hazard, and afforded so little prospect of advantage. But soon afterwards he became acquainted with two notorious housebreakers named Garoway and Sly, who offered to take him as partner. But he rejected their proposals till one night when he had lost all his money and most of his clothes at cards. Then he went to his new acquaintance, and agreed to be concerned in their illicit practices. Garoway proposed that they should rob his own brother, which being immediately agreed to, they broke open his house and stole most of his and his wife's wearing apparel, which they sold and spent the money in extravagance. They in the next place robbed Garoway's uncle of a considerable quantity of plate, which they sold to a woman named Gill, who disposed of the plate and never accounted to them for the produce. Gardner, provoked at being thus defrauded of his share of the ill-got booty, informed Jonathan Wilde of the robbery, who got him admitted and evidence against the other men, who were convicted but respited on condition of being transported. Gardner, having now been some time acquainted with a woman who kept a public house in Fleet Lane, and who was possessed of some money, he proposed to marry her, with a view of obtaining her property. And the woman listening to his offer they were married by one of the Fleet Parsons. The money Gardner obtained with his spouse was soon spent in extravagance. And not long afterwards they were apprehended on suspicion of felony and conducted to St. Sepliker's watch-house. However, the charge against them, not being validated, it was necessary to dismiss them. But before they were set at liberty the constable said to Gardner, Beware how you come here again, or this bell-man will certainly say his verses over you, for the bell-man happened to be at that time in the watch-house. It has been a very ancient practice on the night preceding the execution of condemned criminals for the bell-man of the parish of St. Sepliker to go under Newgate and ring his bell, to repeat the following verses as a piece of friendly advice to the unhappy wretches under sentence of death. All you that in the condemned hold do lie. Prepare you for tomorrow you shall die. Watch all and pray the hour is drawing near that you before the Almighty must appear. Examine well yourselves in time and repent. For you may not the eternal flames be sent. And when St. Sepliker's bell to-morrow tolls, the Lord above have mercy on your souls. Past twelve o'clock. The following extract from Stowe's survey of London, page 195 of the Courtauld edition, printed in 1618, will prove that the bell verses ought to be repeated by a clergyman instead of a bell-man. Quote, Robert Dove, citizen and merchant-taylor of London, gave to the parish church of St. Sepliker's the sum of fifty pounds, that after the several sessions of London, when the prisoners remain in jail as condemned men to death, expecting execution on the moral following, the Clark, that is, the parson of the church, should come in the night-time and likewise early in the morning to the window of the prison where they lie, and there ring certain tolls with a hand-bell appointed for the purpose. He doth afterwards, in a most Christian manner, put them in mind of their present condition, and ensuing execution, desiring them to be prepared therefore as they ought to be. When they are in the cart, and brought before the wall of the church, there he standeth ready with the same bell, and after certain tolls, rehearseth an appointed prayer, desiring all the people there present to pray for them. The beetle also, of Merchant-Taylor's Hall, hath an honest stipend allowed to see that this was duly done. Gardner was greatly affected when the constable told him that the bellman would say his verses over him. But the impression had made on his mind soon wore off, and he quickly returned to his vicious practices. In a short time after this adventure Gardner fell into the company with one Rice-Jones, and they agreed to go together in the passing lay, which is an artifice frequently practiced in modern times, and though the sharpers are often taken into custody, and their tricks exposed in the newspapers, yet there are repeatedly found people weak enough to submit to the imposition. The following is a description of this trick from a book formerly printed. The rogues having concerted their plan, one of them takes a countryman into a public house under pretense of any business they can think of. Then the other one comes in as a stranger, and in a little time finds a pack of cards which his companion has designedly laid on some shelf in the room, on which the two sharpers begin to play. At length one of them offers a wager on the game and puts down his money. The other shows his carts to the countryman to convince him that he must certainly win, and offers to let him go halves in the wager. But soon after the countryman has laid down his money, the sharpers manage the matter so as to pass off with it. This was evidently the mode of tricking formally, but it seems to have been improved on of late years, for the sharpers generally game with the countryman till he has lost all his money, and then he has only to excrete his own folly for suffering himself to be duped by a couple of rascals. In this practice our adventurers were very successful at different places, particularly at Bristol. But in this last place Jones built Gardner in such a manner as to prove that there is no truth in the observation of honour among thieves. For Jones, having defrauded a country gentleman of a gold watch and chain, a suit of laced clothes, and about a hundred guineas, gave no share of the booty to Gardner. This induced the latter to think of revenge. But he disguised his sentiments, and they went together to Boff, where they remained some time and then proceeded on their journey. But in the morning of which they set out Gardner stole an iron pestle from the inn where they lay, and concealed it in his boot with the intention of murdering his companion when they should come into an unfrequented place. On their journey Gardner, general, kept behind Jones, and twice took out the pestle with an intention to perpetrate her. But his resolution failing him he at length dropped it in the road, unperceived by his companion. In a few days afterwards these companions in iniquity parted, and on this occasion Jones said, Harkey Gardner, where are you going? To London, said he. Why, then, replied Jones, you are going to be hanged. We find that this was not the first intimation that Gardner received of the fatal consequence that must attend his illicit practices. But it appeared to have no good effect on him. For soon after he quitted Jones he broke open a house between Aber-Gavenny and Monmouth, and finding no money he took only a gown with which he rode off. Soon after his arrival in London he robbed a house in Addle Hill but was not apprehended for it. But in a short time he broke open the house of Mrs. Roberts and carried off Linnon to the amount of twenty-five pounds. In this robbery he was assisted by John Martin, and both offenders, being soon afterwards taken into custody, were brought to trial, capital convicted, and received sentence of death. But Martin was afterwards reprieved on the condition of transportation for fourteen years. After sentence of death, Gardner became a sincere penitent as he had been a notorious offender. He resigned himself to his fate with the utmost submission, and before he quitted Newgate on the day of execution he dressed himself in a shroud in which he was executed, refusing to wear any other clothes, though the weather was intensely cold. At the fatal tree he saw some of his old companions whom he desired to take warning by his calamitous fate, to avoid bad company and embrace a life of sobriety, as the most certain rode to happiness in this world and the next. He was executed at Tyburn on the 3rd of February, 1724. Particular is respecting France's Brightwell and Benjamin Brightwell, who were tried for highway robbery and acquitted. As it is one professed design of this publication, to give trials and extraordinary cases on which the parties accused have been acquitted, in compliance with this rule we insert the following, though it will be seen that the supposed offenders so far from being thieves were an ornament to human nature. In the month of August 1724, France's Brightwell and Benjamin Brightwell were indicted for assaulting John Partigar on the highway and robbing him of three shillings. It was sworn by Mr. Partigar that he had been robbed on the road to Hampstead by two fellows. In the course of the following pages it will appear that this robbery was committed by Shepard and Blueskin. Dressed in soldiers' clothes and that being on the same road a few days afterwards he was showing some farmers the spot where he had been robbed at the very time the Brightwells came in sight. On which he declared that they were the persons who had robbed him. Whereupon they were immediately taken into custody, which was a work of no great difficulty, as the surprise on being charged with a crime of which they were wholly innocent deprive them of all idea of resistance. These brothers were soldiers in the Grenadier guards, and when they were carried before a magistrate, though Mr. Partigar swore positively to their persons, Francis alleged that he was on guard at the time of the robbery, and Benjamin said that he was at home. On the trial the sergeant produced the regimental book, from which it was evident that when the robbery was committed Francis was on guard at Kensington, and several persons of reputation proved that Benjamin was at his lodgings in Clare Market, and likewise gave him an excellent character. With regard to Francis, Mr. Hughes, a clergyman, delivered his testimony in the following words. I have known Francis Brightwell near twenty years. He has always reputed to be a person of the fairest character for sobriety, piety, and justice. He was, to an extraordinary degree, accomplished with Latin and Greek literature, and had good skill in Roman antiquities, and in a word he carried so great a share of exquisite learning under his Grenadiers cap that I believe there is not such another Grenadier in the whole universe. This testimony of Mr. Hughes was confirmed by a number of military officers, and the court and jury, considering that Mr. Partigar must have been mistaken in the parties who robbed him, the brothers were honorably acquitted. On the twenty-second of the month in which he was tried, Francis Brightwell died at his lodgings at Paddington, as supposed of jail distemper. He was attended, during his short illness, by the late eminent Sir Hans Sloane, but the malignity of his disorder defied the power of medicine. The following curious letter, respecting Francis Brightwell, is extracted from the newspaper called The British Journal of the Fifth of September, 1724. Sir, finding that all our public papers from the Fourth of August of this day have omitted to make honorable mention of some very remarkable circumstances relating to a very private person, I desire his memory may be deposited in your journal. The person I mean is Francis Brightwell the Grenadier, who has tried and acquitted at the old berry for a robbery sworn against him, and who, since his coming out of prison, died as to said of the jail distemper. When evidence was given against him in court Brightwell, by several witnesses proved that he was upon the king's guard at Kensington, and at the time of that robbery, if a robbery, was committed. Hereupon the court went into an inquiry concerning the reputation and character of the prisoner. Some officers who had known him long in the service gave testimony of his sobriety and diligence in the duty of a soldier. As to his honesty, a lady present in court declared that she had entrusted him with a thousand pounds at a time, and a gentleman that had committed his house and goods to the value of six thousand pounds to his keeping. In both trusts Brightwell had acquitted himself to the satisfaction of the parties concerned. These ample testimonies concurring to the honour of a man in so low a condition of life gave, as you may imagine, no small surprise to all that were present, when a clergyman added to the astonishment by declaring that he had long known the prisoner to be not only a person of sobriety, but likewise a very excellent learning, and particularly in Latin and Greek, for that Brightwell had often consulted him upon difficult passages in Virgil and Horus. Thus much for what appeared at the trial of this grenadier, I shall only remark upon his learning, that I am amazed that scholarship is not very common among military men considering their profession amidst of more leisure to ours than any other. Perhaps these gentlemen are afraid of knowledge from a celebrated maxim delivered by John Dryden. The learned are all cowards by profession. And yet Alexander and Caesar were scholars, and they did not seem to want courage, but to pursue what further particulars I have learned of this deceased grenadier. He was contented in his station, studious of leisure, and ambitious only of knowledge. He had offers of being promoted to the rank of corporal or sergeant, which he declined they might have as few avocations as possible from his studies. Neither did he ever covet money. And, I am apt to believe, had he been at the sacking of a town he would not have thought of carrying off any other plunder but a valuable book or two. Take the following instance of his disregard of gain. He had an excellent manner of cleaning and refurbishing arms for which he had a settled price. An officer, whose arms he had earned, was so pleased with his work that he sent bright well, over and above the usual price, a guinea for a present. The philosopher took his price and returned the guinea by the servant. Some time after, when the gentlemen saw him, said he, why would you not accept the guinea I sent you? I am paid for my work, replied the sentinel, and desire no more. Except of a crown then, if your modesty makes you think a guinea too much, said the officer. Excuse me, sir, answered the veteran, and do not think it vanity or affectation when I refuse your kindness. But indeed, sir, I don't want it. But I am thirsty and have no money about me. So that if your honour will be pleased to give me thruppence to drink your health, I shall thankfully accept it. This last particular of our grenadier runs so very parallel with the story in Sir William Temple's observations of the United Provinces that I think it proper to transcribe it on this occasion, Volume 1, page 50, quote, among the many and various hospitals that are in every man's curiosity and talk that travels Holland. I was affected with none more than that of the aged seaman at Enchucidon, which is contrived, finished, and ordered, as if it were done with a kind of intention of some well-natured man that those who had passed their whole lives in the hardships and commodities of the sea should find a retreat stored with all the ease and conveniency that age is capable of feeling and enjoying. And here I met with the only rich man that I ever saw in my life. For one of those old seaman, entertaining me with the plain stories of his fifty years' voyages and adventures while I was viewing this hospital and church adjoining, gave him at parting a piece of their coin about the value of a crown. He took it smiling and offered me again, but when I refused it he asked me what he should do with the money. I left him to overcome his modesty as he could, but a servant coming after me saw him give it to a little girl that opened the church door as she passed by him, which made me reflect on the fantastic calculation of riches and poverty that is current to the world, by which a man that wants a million is a prince, and he that wants but a groat is a beggar, and that this was a poor man that wanted nothing at all. The case of these brothers affords an admirable lesson to prosecutors to be cautious how they swear to the identity of persons. It is better that the guilty should escape than that the innocent should be punished. It likewise affords us an instance of the mysterious providence of God. Two innocent men are charged with a crime, and the consequence of imprisonment and possibly of grief ends in the death of one of them. We may assume that he was too good for this wicked world, and that the Almighty chose this method of calling him to a better. This is the end of Part 10, Volume 1 of the New and Complete Newgate Calendar. This is the eleventh and final part of Volume 1 of the New and Complete Newgate Calendar, read by Roy Schreiber. This hypervox recording is in the public domain. The life and transactions of Joseph Blake, otherwise blue skin, who is hanged for burglary. This offender, who is a native of London, was sent to school by his parents for the space of six years, but he made little progress in learning, having a very early propensity to acts of dishonesty. While at school he made an acquaintance with William Bluett, who afterwards entered into Jonathan Wiles' gang and became one of the most notorious villains of the age. No sooner had Blake left school than he commenced pickpocket, and had been in all the prisons for felons before he was fifteen years of age. From this practice he turned street robber and joined Oki, Levy, and many other villains who acted under the directions of Jonathan Wiles. For some of the robberies they committed, they were taken into custody, and Blake was admitted and evidence against his companions who were convicted. In consequence of these convictions Blake claimed his liberty, and part of the reward allowed by government. But he was informed by the court that he had no right to either, because he was not a voluntary evidence since, so far from having surrendered, he made an obstinate resistance and was much wounded before he was taken, and therefore he must find security for his good behavior or be transported. Not being able to give the requisite security he was lodged in the Wood Street Comptor, where he remained a considerable time during which Jonathan Wiles allowed him three shillings and sixpence a week. At length he prevailed on two gardeners to be his bail. But the court at the Old Bailey, hesitating to take their security, they went before Sir John Fryer, who took their recognizance for Blake's good behavior for seven years. A gentleman, who happened to be present at Sir John's, asked how long it might be before Blake would appear again at the Old Bailey, to which another gentleman answered three sessions. And he happened to be perfectly right in his conjecture. Blake had no sooner obtained his liberty than he was concerned in several robberies with Jack Shepard, and particularly that for which the two brothers Brightwell were tried. The footpad robberies and burglaries they committed were very numerous. But the fact for which Blake suffered was the robbery of Mr. Kneebone, as will appear by the following account. At the Old Bailey's sessions in October 1724 Joseph Blake, otherwise blue-skinned, was indicted for breaking and entering the dwelling-house of William Kneebone, and stealing a hundred and eight yards of woollen cloth, valued at thirty-six pounds and other goods. The prosecutor, having sworn that the bars of his cellar window were cut, and that the cellar door, which had been bolted and padlocked, was broken open, he acquainted Jonathan Wilde with what had happened, who went to Blake's lodgings with two other persons. But Blake, refusing to open the door, it was broke open by Quilt Arnold, one of Wilde's men. On this Blake drew a pen-knife, and swore he would kill the first man that entered, an answer to which Arnold said, Then I am the first man, and Mr. Wilde is not far behind. If you don't deliver your pen-knife immediately, I will chop off your arm. Thereupon the prisoner dropped the knife, and Wilde entering, he was taken into custody. As the parties were conveying Blake to Newgate, they came by the house of the prosecutor on which Wilde said to the prisoner, Where's the can? and the latter replied, Say no more of that, Mr. Wilde, for I know I am a dead man. But what I fear is that I shall afterwards be carried to the surgeon's hall and anatomised. To which Wilde replied, No, I'll take care to prevent that, for I'll give you a coffin. William Field, who was evidence on the trial, swore that the jury was committed by Blake Shepherd and himself, and the jury brought in a verdict of guilty. As soon as the verdict was given, Blake addressed the court in the following terms. Quote, On Wednesday morning last Jonathan Wilde said to Simon Jacobs, I believe you will not bring forty pounds this time. I wish Joe, meaning me, was in your case, but I'll do my favor to bring you off as a single felon. And then, turning to me, he said, I believe you must die, I'll send you a good book or two, and provide you a coffin, and you shall not be anatomised." Wilde was to have been in evidence against this malefactor, but going to visit him in the bail-dock, previous to his trial, Blake drew a clasped pen-knife, with which he cut Jonathan's throat, which prevented his giving evidence. But as the knife was blunt, the wound, though dangerous, did not prove mortal. And we shall see that Jonathan was preserved for a different fate. Well, under sentence of death Blake did not show a concern proportion to his calamitous situation. What asked if he was advised to commit the violence on Wilde, he said no, but that a sudden thought entered his mind, or he would have provided a knife with which to have cut off his head at once. On the nearer approach of death he appeared still less concerned, and it was thought that his mind was chiefly bent on meditating means of escaping. But seeing no prospect of getting away he took to drinking, which he continued even to the day of his death, for he was observed to be intoxicated even while he was under the gallows. He was executed at Tyburn on the 11th of November, 1723. Narrative of the life, trial, and execution of John Shepherd, who is hanged for burglary. The case of this malefactor having been more the subject of public conversation than that of almost anyone who ever underwent the sentence of law, and his adventures being in themselves very remarkable, we shall be the more particular in our account of him. John Shepherd was born in Spittlefields in the year 1702. His father, who was a carpenter, bore the character of an honest man. Yet he had another son named Thomas, who, as well as Jack, turned out a thief. The father dying while the boys were very young. They were left to the care of the mother, who placed Jack at a school in Billingsgate Street, where he remained two years and was then put apprentice to a cane-maker in Houndsditch. His master dying when he had been only a short time with him, he was placed with another person of the same trade. But here he was so ill treated that he remained only a short time, when he was taken into the protection of Mr. Kneebone, a woollen draper in the Strand, who had some knowledge of his father. At length Mr. Kneebone put him apprentice to a carpenter in Witch Street. He behaved with decency in this place for about four years. When frequenting the black lion ale-house in Drury Lane, he became acquainted with some abandoned women, among whom the principal was Elizabeth Lyon, otherwise called Edgeworth Bess, from the town of Edgeworth where she was born. While he continued to work as a carpenter, he often committed robberies in the houses where he was employed, stealing tankards, spoons, and other articles which he carried to Edgeworth Bess. But not being suspected of having committed these robberies, he at length resolved to commence Housebreaker. Exclusive of Edgeworth Bess, he was acquainted with a woman named Maggot, who persuaded him to rob the house of Mr. Baines, a peace broker in Whitehorse Yard, and Jack having brought away a piece of fustian from fence, which he deposited in his trunk, went afterwards at midnight, and taking the bars out of the cellar window, entered, and stole goods and money to the amount of twenty-two pounds which he carried to Maggot. As Shepherd did not go home that night, nor the following day, his master suspected that he had made bad connections, and searching his trunk found the piece of fustian that had been stolen. But Shepherd, hearing of this, broke open his master's house in the night, and carried off the fustian, lest it should be brought in evidence against him. Shepherd's master, sending intelligence to Mr. Baines of what had happened, the latter looked over his goods, and missing such a piece of fustian as had been described to him, suspected that Shepherd must have been the robber, and determined to have him taken into custody. But Jack, hearing of the affair, went to him and threatened a prosecution for scandal, alleging that he had received the piece of fustian from his mother, who bought it for him in Spiddlefields. The mother, with a view to screen her son, declared that what he had asserted was true, though she could not point out the place where she had made the purchase. Though this story was not credited, Mr. Baines did not take any farther steps in the affair. Shepherd's master seemed willing to think well of him, and he continued sometime longer in the family. But after associating himself with the worst of company, and frequently staying out the whole night, his master and he quarreled, and the headstrong youth totally absconded in the last year of his apprenticeship, and became connected with a set of villains of Jonathan Wiles' gang. Jack now worked as a journeyman carpenter, with a view to the easier commission of robbery, and being employed to assist in repairing the house of a gentleman in Mayfair, he took an opportunity of carrying off a sum of money, a quantity of plate, some gold rings, and four suits of clothes. Not long after this Edgeworth Bess was apprehended and lodged in the roundhouse of the parish of St. Giles, where Shepherd went to visit her, and the beetle refusing to admit him. He knocked him down, broke open the door, and carried her off in triumph, an exploit which acquired him a high degree of credit with the women of abandoned character. In the month of August 1723, Thomas Shepherd, the brother of Jack, was indicted in the Old Bailey for two petty offenses, and being convicted was burnt in the hand. Soon after his discharge he prevailed on Jack to lend him forty shillings, and to take him as a partner in his robberies. The first fact they committed in concert was the robbing of a public house in Southwick, whence they carried off some money and wearing apparel. But Jack permitted his brother to reap the whole advantage of this booty. Not long after this, the brothers, in conjunction with Edgeworth Bess, broke open the shop of Mrs. Cook, a linen draper in Clare Market, and carried off goods to the value of fifty-five pounds, and in less than a fortnight afterwards stole some articles from the house of Mr. Phillips in Drury Lane. Tom Shepherd going to sell some of the goods stolen at Mrs. Cook's was apprehended and committed to Newgate, when, in hope of being admitted in evidence, he impeached his brother and Edgeworth Bess, but they were sought for in vain. At length James Sykes, otherwise called Helen Fury, one of Shepherd's companions, meeting with him in St. Giles, enticed him into a public house in hope of receiving a reward for apprehending him, and, while they were drinking, Sykes sent for a constable who took Jack into custody and carried him before a magistrate, who, later, after a short examination, sent him to St. Giles' roundhouse. But he broke through the roof of that place and made his escape in the night. Within a short time after this, a Shepherd and an associate named Benson were crossing Lester Fields, the latter endeavored to pick a gentleman's pocket of his watch, but failing in the attempt the gentleman called out a pickpocket on which Shepherd was taken, and lodged in St. Anne's roundhouse, where he was visited by Edgeworth Bess, who was detained on suspicion of being one of his accomplices. On the following day they were carried before a magistrate, and some persons appearing who charged them with felonies, they were committed to New Prison. As they passed for husband and wife, they were permitted to lodge together in a room known by the name of Newgate Ward. Shepherd being visited by several of his acquaintances, some of whom furnished him with implements to make his escape, and early in the morning, a few days after his commitment, he filed off his fetters, and having made a hole in the wall, he took an iron bar and a wooden one out of the window. But as the height from which he was to descend was twenty-five feet, he tied a blanket and a sheet together, and making one of them fast to a bar in the window, Edgeworth Bess first descended and Jack followed her. Having reached the yard, they still had a wall of twenty-two feet high to scale, but climbing up by the locks and bolts of the Great Gate, they got quite out of the prison and affected a perfect escape. Shepherd's fame was greatly celebrated among the lower orders by this exploit, and the Theses of St. Giles courted his company. Among the rest was one Charles Grace, a cooper, begged that he would take him as an associate in his robberies, alleging as a reason for this request that his girl he kept was so extravagant that he could not support her on the profits of his own thefts. Shepherd did not hesitate to make this new connection, but at the same time said that he did not admit of a partnership with a view to any advantage to himself, but that Grace might reap the profits of their depredations. Shepherd and Grace, making an acquaintance with Anthony Lamb, an apprentice to a mathematical instrument-maker near St. Clemens Church, it was agreed to rob a gentleman who lodged with Lamb's master, and at two o'clock in the morning Lamb led in the other villains who stole money and effects to a large amount. They left the door open and Lamb went to bed to prevent suspicion, but notwithstanding this his master did suspect him, and having taken him into custody he confessed the whole affair before a magistrate, and being committed to Newgate he was tried, convicted, and received sentence to be transported. On the same day Thomas Shepherd, the brother of Jack, was indicted for breaking open the dwelling-house of Mary Cook and stealing her goods, and being convicted was sentenced to transportation. Jack Shepherd, not being in custody, he and Blue Skin committed a number of daring robberies and sometimes disposed of the stolen goods to William Field. Jack used to say that Field wanted courage to commit robbery, though he was as great a villain as ever existed. Shepherd seems to have thought that courage consisted in villainy, and if this were the case Field had an undoubted claim to the character of a man of courage. For, in October, 1721, he was tried on four indictments for felony and burglary, and he was an accomplice in a variety of robberies. He was likewise in evidence against one of his associates on another occasion. Shepherd and Blue Skin hired a stable near the horse-fairy Westminster in which they deposited their stolen goods till they could dispose of them to the best advantage, and in this place they put the woolen cloth which was stolen from Mr. Kneebone. For Shepherd was concerned in this robbery, and at the sessions held at the Old Bailey in August 1724 he was indicted for several offenses, and among the rest for breaking and entering the house of William Kneebone and stealing 108 yards of woolen cloth and other articles, and being capitally convicted received sentence of death. We must now go back to observe that Shepherd and Blue Skin, having applied to Field to look at these goods and procure a customer for them, he promised to do so, nor was he worse than his word, for in the night he broke open their warehouse and stole the ill-gotten property, and then gave information against them to Jonathan Wilde in consequence of which they were apprehended. On Monday the 30th of August 1724 a warrant was sent to Newgate for the execution of Shepherd with other convicts under sentence of death. It is proper to observe that in the old jail of Newgate there was, within the lodge, a hatch with large iron spikes which hatch opened into a dark passage, whence there were a few steps in damned hold. The prisoners being permitted to come down to the hatch to speak with their friends, Shepherd, having been supplied with instruments, took an opportunity of cutting one of the spikes in such a manner that it might be easily broken off. On the evening of the above-mentioned 30th of August two women of Shepherd's acquaintance going to visit him, he broke off the spike, and thrusting his head and shoulders through the space the women pulled him down, and he affected his escape notwithstanding some of the keepers who were at that time drinking at the other end of the lodge. On the day after his escape he went to a public house in Spitalfields, whence he sent for an old acquaintance one page, a butcher in Clare Market, and advised with him how to render his escape effectual for his future preservation. After deliberating on the matter they agreed to go to Warrandon in Northamptonshire, where Page had some relations, and they had no sooner resolved than they made the journey, but Page's relations treating him with indifference they returned to London after being absent only about a week. On the night after their return, as they were walking up Fleet Street together, they saw a watchmaker shop open and only a boy attending. Having passed the shop they turned back and Shepherd, driving his hand through the window, stole three watches with which they made their escape. Some of Shepherd's old acquaintance informing him that strict search was making after him, he and Page retired defintely, in hope of laying there concealed till the diligence of the jailkeepers should relax. But the keepers of Newgate, having intelligence of their retreat, took Shepherd into custody and conveyed him to his old lodgings. Such steps were now taken as it was thought would be effectual to prevent his future escape. He was put into a strong room called the Castle, handcuffed, loaded with a heavy pair of irons, and chained to a staple fixed in the floor. The curiosity of the public, having been greatly excited by his former escape, he was visited by great numbers of people of all ranks, and scarce anyone left him without making him a present in money, though he would have more gladly received a file, a hammer, or a chisel. But the utmost care was taken that none of his visitors should furnish him with such implements. Notwithstanding this disadvantageous situation, Shepherd was continually employing his thoughts on the means of another escape. On the 14th of October the sessions began at the Old Bailey, and the keepers being much engaged in attending the court, he thought they would have little time to visit him, and therefore the present juncture would be the most favorable to carry out his plan into execution. About two o'clock in the afternoon of the following day one of the keepers carried him his dinner, and having carefully examined his irons and finding them fast, he left him for the day. Some days before this Jack had found a small nail in the room with which he could, at pleasure, unlock the padlock that went from the chained to the staple in the floor, and in his own account of the transaction he says that he was frequently about the room and had several times slept on the barracks when the keepers imagined he had not been out of the chair. The keeper had not left him more than an hour when he began his operations. He first took off his handcuffs, and then opened the padlock that fastened the chain to the staple. He next, by mere strength, twisted asunder a small link of the chain between his legs, and then drawing up his fetters as high as he could he made them fast with his garters. He then attempted to get up the chimney, but had not advanced far before he was stopped by an iron bar that went across it, on which he descended, and with a piece of broken chain picked out the mortar and moving a small stone or two above six feet from the floor he got out the iron bar which was three feet long and an inch square and proved very serviceable to him in his future proceedings. He in a short time made such a breach as to enable him to get into the red room over the castle, and here he found a large nail which he made use of in his father's operations. It was seven years since the door of this red room had been opened, but Shepard wrenched off the lock in less than seven minutes and got into the passage leading to the chapel. In this place he found a door which was bolted on the opposite side, but making a hole through the wall he pushed the bolt back and opened the door. Arriving at the door of the chapel he broke off one of the iron spikes which, keeping for his farther use, he got into the entry between the chapel and the lower leads. The door of this entry was remarkably strong and fastened with a large lock, and night now coming on Shepard was obliged to work in the dark. Notwithstanding this disadvantage he, in a half hour, forced open the box of the lock and opened the door, but this led to another room still more difficult, for it was barred and bolted as well as locked. However he wrenched the fillet from the main post of the door and the box and staples came off with it. It was now eight o'clock and Shepard found no farther obstruction to his proceedings, for he had only one other door to open which being bolted on the inside was open without difficulty, and he got over the wall to the upper leads. His next consideration was how he should descend with the greatest safety. Accordingly he found that the most convenient place for him to alight on would be the Turner's house adjoining to Newgate. But as it would have been very dangerous to have jumped to such a depth he went back for the blanket with which he used to cover himself when he slept in the castle, and endeavored to fasten his stockings to the blanket to ease his descent. But not being able to do so he was compelled to use the blanket alone, wherefore he made it fast to the wall of Newgate with the spike he took out of the chapel and sliding down dropped on the Turner's leads just as the clock was striking nine. It happened that the door of the garret next to the Turner's leads was open on which he stole softly down two stairs and heard some company talking in a room. His irons clinking, a woman cried, what noise is that? And a man answered, perhaps a dog or a cat. Shepherd, who was exceedingly fatigued, returned to the garret and lay down for more than two hours, after which he crept down once more as far as the room where the company were when he heard a gentleman taking his leave of the family and saw the maid light him down the stairs. As soon as the maid returned he resolved to venture at all hazards. But in stealing down the stairs he stumbled against a chamber door, but instantly recovering himself he got into the street. By this time it was after twelve o'clock, and passing by the watch-house of St. Sepliker he bid the watchman good morrow and going up Hallborn he turned down Grayson Lane and about two in the morning got into the fields near Tottenham Court Road where he took shelter in a place that had been a cow-house and slept soundly about three hours. His fetters still being on, his legs were greatly bruised and swelled, and he dreaded the approach of daylight lest he should be discovered. He had now about forty shillings in his possession, but was afraid to send to any person for assistance. At seven in the morning it began to rain hard and continued to do so all day so that no person appeared in the fields, and during this melancholy day he would, to use his own expression, have given his right hand for a hammer, a chisel, and a punch. Night coming on and being pressed by hunger he ventured to a little chandler's shop in Tottenham Court Road where he got a supply of bread, cheese, small beer, and some other necessaries hiding his irons with a long great coat. He asked the woman of the house for a hammer, but she had no such utensil on which he retired to the cow-house where he slept that night and remained all the next day. At night he went again to the chandler's shop, supplied himself with provisions, and returned to his hiding-place. At six the next morning, which was Sunday, he began to beat the basils of his fetters with a stone in order to bring them to an oval form to slip his heels through. In the afternoon the master of the cow-house, coming thither and seeing his iron said, for God's sakes, what are you? Sheppard said he was an unfortunate young fellow who, having had a bastard child sworn to him, and not being able to give security to the parish for its support, he had been sent to Bridewell from whence he had made his escape. The man said, if that was all, it did not much signify, but he did not care how soon he was gone, for he did not like his looks. Soon after he was gone Sheppard saw a journeyman shoemaker to whom he told the same story of the bastard child and offered him twenty shillings if he would procure a smith's hammer and a punch. The poor man, tempted by the reward, procured them accordingly, and assisted him in getting rid of his irons, which work was completed by five o'clock in the evening. When night came on, our adventurer tied a hanger-chief round his head, tore his woollen cap in several places, and likewise tore his coat in shillings. So as to have the appearance of a beggar. And in this condition he went to a cellar near Charing Cross where he supped on roasted veal and listened to the conversation of the company all of whom were talking about the escape of Sheppard. On the Monday he sheltered himself at a public house of little trade in Rupert Street, and conversing with the landlady about Sheppard he told her that it was impossible for him to get out of the kingdom, and the keepers would certainly have him again in a few days on which the woman wished that a curse might fall on those who should betray him. Remaining in this place till evening he went into the hay market where a crowd of people was surrounding two ballad singers and listening to a song made on his adventures and escape. The next day he hired a garret in Newport Market, and soon afterwards, dressing himself like a porter, he went to Black Friars to the house of Mr. Appleby, printer of dying speeches, and delivered a letter in which he ridiculed the printer, the ordinary of Newgate, and enclosed the letter for one of the keepers of Newgate. Some nights after this he broke open the shop of Mr. Rollins, a pawnbroker in Drew Relaine. Where he stole a sword, a suit of wearing apparel, some snuff boxes, rings, watches, and other effects to a considerable amount. Determining to make the appearance of a gentleman among his old acquaintance in Drew Relaine and Claire Market, he dressed himself in a suit of black and a tie wig, wore a ruffled shirt, a silver-hilted sword, a diamond ring, and a gold watch. Though he knew that diligent search was being made after him at that very time. On the thirty-first of October he dined with two women in a public house in Newgate Street, and about four in the afternoon they all passed under Newgate in a hackney coach having first drawn up the blinds. Going in the evening to a public house in Maple Alley, Claire Market, Shepherd sent for his mother and treated her with brandy. When the poor woman dropped on her knees and begged he would immediately quit the kingdom, which he promised to do, but had no intention of keeping his word. Being now grown valiant through an excess of liquor, he wandered from ale houses to gin shops in the neighborhood till near twelve o'clock at night, when he was apprehended in the consequence of the information of an ale house boy who knew him. When he was taken into custody he was quite senseless from the quantity and variety of liquors he had drank and was conveyed to Newgate in a coach without being capable of making the least resistance, though he had two pistols then in his possession. His fame was now so much increased by his exploits that he was visited by a great number of people, some of them of the highest quality. He endeavored to divert them with a recital of the particulars of his many robberies in which he had been concerned. And when any nobleman came to see him, he never failed to beg that they would intercede with the king for a pardon, to which he thought that his singular dexterity gave him some pretensions. Having been already convicted, he was carried to the bar of the court of King's bench on the tenth of November, and the record of his conviction being read, and an affidavit being made that he was the same John Shepard mentioned in the record, sentence of death was passed on him by Mr. Justice Powis, and a rule of court was made for his execution on the Monday following. He regularly attended the prayers in the chapel, but though he behaved with decency there, he effected mirth before he went thither, and endeavored to prevent any degree of seriousness among the prisoners on his return. Even when the day of execution arrived, Shepard did not appear to have given over all expectations of eluding justice. For having been furnished with a pen-knife, he put it in his pocket with a view, when the melancholy procession came opposite Little Turn's style, to have cut the cord that bound his arms and throwing himself out of the cart among the crowd to have run through the narrow passage where the sheriff's officers could not follow on horseback. And he had no doubt but that he should make his escape by the assistance of the mob. It is not impossible but that this scheme might have succeeded. But before Shepard left the press-yard, one Watson, an officer, searching his pockets, found the knife, and was cut with it so as to occasion a great effusion of blood. Shepard had yet a farther view to his preservation, even after execution, for he desired his acquaintance to put him into a warm bed as soon as he should be cut down, and tried to open a vein which he had been told would restore him to life. He behaved with great decency at the place of execution, and confessed the having committed two robberies for which he had been tried and acquitted. He was executed at Tyburn on the 16th of November, 1724, in the 23rd year of age. He died with difficulty, and was much pitied by the surrounding multitude. When he was cut down his body was delivered to his friends, who carried him to a public house in Longacre, whence he was removed in the evening and buried in the churchyard of St. Martin's in the fields. It is astonishing to think how much Shepard and his adventures engaged the attention of the public. For a considerable time there was scarcely a subject conversation but himself. There were several different histories of his life, and a variety of prints were worked off representing his escapes from the condemned hold, and from the castle in Newgate. And there were likewise several other prints of his person, the best of which was a mesotinto done from an original painting of Sir James Thornhill, which gave rise to the following ingenious lines. Thornhill tis dined to gild the fame, though obscure and raised the humble name, to make the form elude the grave, and Shepard from oblivion save. Though life in vain the wretch implores and exile on the father's shores, thy pencil brings a kind reprieve, and bids the dying robber leave. This piece to latest time shall stand, and show the wonders of thy hand. Thus former masters graced their name and gave egregious robbers fame. Appails Alexander drew. Caesar is to Aurelius do. Cromwell in Lily's work doth shine, and And Shepard Thornhill lives in thine. This is the end of the eleventh and final part of the new and complete Newgate calendar. Selections read and chosen by Roy Schreiber.