Section 56 of Lives of the Most Remarkable Criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder, the highway, housebreaking, street robberies, cloning, or other offenses. Volume 1. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Lives of the Most Remarkable Criminals who have been condemned and executed, Volume 1, edited by Arthur L. Hayward. The history of the Waltham Blacks and their transactions to the death of Richard Parvin, Edward Elliott, Robert Kingshell, Henry Marshall, John Pink and Edward Pink, and James Ansel, Elias Phillips at Tibern, whose lives are also included. Such is the unaccountable folly which reigns in too great a part of the human species that by their own ill deeds they make such laws necessary for the security of men's persons and properties, as by their severity, unless necessity compel them, would appear cruel and inhuman and doubtless those laws which we esteem barbarous in other nations and even some which appear so though anciently practiced in our own had their rise from the same cause. I am led to this observation from the folly which certain persons were guilty of in making small insurrections for the sake only of getting a few deer and going on because they found the leniency of the laws could not punish them at present until they grew to that height as to write in armed troops, In order of the more to terrify those whom they assaulted and wherever they were denied what they thought proper to demand whether venison, wine, money or other necessaries for their debauched feasts would by letter threaten plunder and destroying with fire and sword whomever they thought proper. These villainies being carried on with a high hand for some time in the years 1722 and 1723, their insumments grew at last so intolerable as to oblige the legislature to make a new law against all who thus went armed and disguised and associated themselves together by the name of blacks or entered into any other confederacies to support and assist one another in doing injuries and violences to the persons and the victims. By this law it was enacted that after the first day of June 1723 whatever persons armed with offensive weapons and having her faces blacked or otherwise disguised should appear in any forest, park or grounds enclosed with any wall or fence where in deer were kept or any warren where hares or conies are kept or in any highway, heath, or any other forest, park or grounds enclosed with any wall or fence where in deer were kept or any warren where hares or conies are kept or in any highway, heath, or down or unlawfully hunt, kill or steal any red or fallow deer or rob any warren or steal fish of any pond or kill or wound cattle or set fire to any house or outhouses, stack, etc. or cut down or any other way destroy trees planted for shelter or profit or shall maliciously shoot at any person or send a letter demanding money or other valuable things shall rescue any person in custody of any officer for any such offenses or by gifts or promise procure anyone to join with them shall be deemed guilty of felony without benefit of clergy and shall suffer pains of death as felons so convicted. Nor was even this thought sufficient to remedy those evils which the idle follies of some rash persons had brought about but a retrospect was also by the same act had two offenses heretofore committed and all persons who had committed any crimes punishable by this act after the second of February 1722 were commanded to render themselves before the 24th of July 1723 to some justice of His Majesty's court of King's bench or to some justice of the peace for the county where they lived and there make a full and exact confession of the crimes of such a nature which they had committed the times when and the places where and persons with whom together with an account of such persons places of abode as had with them been guilty as aforesaid in order to their being there upon apprehended and brought to judgment according to law on pain of being deemed felons without benefit of clergy and suffering accordingly but were entitled to a free pardon and forgiveness in case that before the 24th of July they surrendered and made such discovery. Justices of peace by the said act were required on any information being made before them by one or more credible persons against any person charged with any of the offenses aforesaid to transmit it under their hands and seals to one of His Majesty's principal secretaries of state who by the same act is required to lay such information and return before His Majesty in council where upon an order is to issue for the person so charged to surrender within 40 days and in case he refused or neglect to surrender within that time then from the day in which the 40 days elapsed he is to be deemed as a felon convict and execution may be awarded as attained a felony by a verdict. Every person who after the time appointed for the surrender of the person shall conceal aid or secure him knowing the circumstances in which he then stands shall suffer death as a felon without benefit of clergy and that people might the more readily hazard their persons for the apprehending such offenders it is likewise enacted that if any person shall be wounded so as to lose an eye or the use of any limb in endeavoring to take persons charged with the commission of crimes within this law then on a certificate from the justices of the peace of his being so wounded the sheriff of the county if commanded within 30 days after the sight of such certificate to pay the said wounded persons 50 pounds under pain of forfeiting 10 pounds on failure thereof and in case any person shall be killed in seizing such persons as aforesaid then the said 50 pounds is to be paid to the executors of the person to be killed. It cannot seem strange that in consequence of so extraordinary and active legislature many of these presumptions and silly people should be apprehended in a considerable number of them having upon their apprehension been committed to Winchester jail seven of them by habeas corpus removed for the greater solemnity of their trial to new gate and for their offense brought up and arraigned at the king's bench bar west minister there being convicted on full evidence all of them of felony and three of murder I shall inform you one by one of what has come to my hand in relation to their crimes and the manner and circumstances with which they were committed Richard Parvin was master of a public house in Portsmouth a man of dull and dogmatic disposition who continually denied his having been in any manner concerned with these people though the evidence against him at his trial was as full and as direct as possibly could have been expected and he himself evidently proved to have been on the spot where the violence is committed by the other prisoners were transacted in answer to this he said that he was not with them though indeed he was upon the forest for which he gave this reason he had he said a very handsome young wench who lived with him and for that reason being admired by many of his customers she took it in her head one day to run away he hearing that she had fled across the forest pursued her and in that pursuit calling at the house of Mr. Parford who keeps an ale house in the forest this man being an evidence against the other blacks took him it seems into the number though as he said he could fully have cleared himself if he had had any money to have sent for some witnesses out of Berkshire but the mayor of Portsmouth seizing as soon as he was apprehended all his goods put his family into great distress and whether he could have found them or not hindered his being able to produce any witnesses at his trial he persevered in these professions of his innocencey 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 Elliott a boy of about 17 years of age whose father was a tailor at a village between Petworth and Guildford was the next who received sentence of death with parmin 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 30 or 40 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 and pursuance of which he was to disguise his face obey orders of whatsoever kind they were such as breaking down fishponds 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 the witchcraft for that once when two men had offended them by refusing to comply and 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 a while 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 obliged 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 that 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 King shell and for 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 and so much that he could hardly reach the Holt while they were emerged in the business for which they came viz killing the deer the keepers came upon them Elliot was windered 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 upon 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 wives taken advised them to retire but upon the refusing and Marshall's firing a gun by which one of the keepers belonging to the Lady Howell 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 other two 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 penance 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 committing this fact he was served 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 apprenticed to his brother a shoemaker his parents were very watchful over his behavior 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 Barbara 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 Barbara took him upon his horse and away they went to the halt twelve miles distant calling in their way upon Henry Marshall, Elliott 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 a man, Elliott, was released and delivered into their hands but that proposition being refused the fight at once grew warm Barbara's thigh was broken and Marshall killed the keeper with a shot being there upon very hard pressed three of their companions ran away leaving him and Marshall to fight it out Elliott being already taken and Barbara 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 this 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 the 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 may light of it said he might stand upon his own defense and was not bound to run away and leave his companions in danger this is 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 too fancy he had a right to imbrew his hands in the blood of another who was in the execution of his office and endeavoring 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 these were two brothers whose names were John and Edward Pink Carter's in part small and always accounted honest and industrious fellows before this accident happened they did not however deny their being guilty but on the contrary ingeniously 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 bare 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 lion 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 Ansel 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 a lock and dim 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 Ansel alias Stephen Phillips 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 in 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 offenses were greater so his sense of them was much stronger than in any of the rest accepting King shell 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 20 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 and 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 sizes 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 now all 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 in 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 Ancel alias Phillips 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 where for without any further preface I shall leave it to speak for itself a letter to Mr. CD 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 have 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 Wolfen 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 humor 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 shoulders slipped finding it however impossible to get him along I was even glad to take up a little blind ale house 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 on my horse's foot and let me sit up all night for I was resolved not to spoil a horse which cost me 20 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 I'm 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 past there this made me more uneasy than I was before I concluded now I was amongst a den of highwaymen and expected nothing less than to be robbed in my throat cut however finding there was no remedy I even set myself down and endeavored 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 that gentleman's a man of honor 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 sad 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 hoc beasts accosted me with great civility and asked me if I would honor 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 said at the end of the table telling me at the same time he hoped I would not refuse to pay my respects to Prince Oronoco 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 18 dishes of venison in every shape roasted boiled with broth hashed collops pasties umbil 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 21 persons at each of our elbows there was set a bottle of clare and the man and woman of the house sat on the floor and two or three of the fellows had good natural voices and so the evening was spent as merely as the rakes past theirs in the king's arms or the city apprentices with their masters maids at Saddler's Wells about to the company seemed inclined to break up having first assured me that they should take my company as a favor any Thursday evening if I came that way I confess I did sleep all night with the reflecting what had passed and could not resolve with myself whether these humorous gentlemen in masquerade were to be ranked under the denomination of night errands 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 honor with the 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 condescended to eat and drink familiarly with my subjects as friends we admit no man continued he into our society tell he has been twice drunk with us that we may be perfectly acquainted with his temper and 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 gelling 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 and thereby entered upon the role and from that day forward considered as a lawful member he went on with abundance more of these 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 is he is a very honest fellow and one of us for you must know it is the first article in their creed and 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 humor to have refused me anything no not even the last favor and so walking down the yard and finding my horse in pretty tolerable order I speeded directly home much in a maze 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 that same stamp who were fools enough to forfeit their lives upon the same occasion however the humor 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 twelve month 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's put in such terror that we have heard nothing of them since though this act of parliament 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 the black act nine geographical I caption two was repealed so late as eighteen twenty seven and of section fifty six section fifty seven of lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining for other offenses volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by John Brandon lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed volume one edited by Arthur L. Hayward section fifty seven the life of Julian a black boy and incendiary from speaking of artificial blacks they come now to relate the unhappy death of one who was naturally of that color this poor creatures 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 retains 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 their 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 and 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 one 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 in so much 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 pen knife but the man it seems had more grace than to grant his request and he ended his life at Tyburn according to his sentence end of section 57 recording by John Brandon section 58 of the lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining or other offenses volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org reading by Dale growthman section 58 the life of Abraham Duvall a lottery ticket forager Abraham Duvall 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 pounds 12 shillings no pants for seven blank lottery tickets in the year 1723 to 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 lolling out his tongue at the court and told them he did not value the second indictment but therein he happened to be mistaken for the jury found him guilty of that indictment and thereupon he received a sentence of death accordingly not withstanding the impudence with which he had treated the court at his trial he complained very loudly of their not showing him favor 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 number 39 in the 651st course of payment now it seems that in the search of his brother-in-law parson's room the original ticket was found though very much torn from whence Duval 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 Duval 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 the greatest unquietness and discontent he said it was against the law to put a man in irons that feathering English subjects accept the attempt to break prison 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 was no hope of a reprieve he even began to settle himself to the performance of those duties which become a man in his sad condition and when he did apply himself hitherto 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 behavior 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 Duval owned the fact but wished the spectators to consider whether for all that he was legally convicted and so suffered at the 30th year of his age the end of section 58 the life of Abram Duval a lottery ticket forger section 59 of lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining or other offenses volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed volume one edited by Arthur L. Hayward section 59 the life of Joseph Blake alias blue skin a foot pad and highwayman as there is impudence and wickedness enough in the lives of most malefactors to make persons of a sober education and behavior wonder at the depravity of human nature so there are sometimes superlative rogues who in the infamous boldness of their behavior 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 Yang 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 blue skin always deserves to be remembered as one who thought 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 intolerable 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 school fellow William blew it 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 Locke Wilkinson Carrick 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 Maloney 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's 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 Carol 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 blue skin 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 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 Locke 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 Carroll 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 Levy 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 Oki 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 Oki 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 Oki and flood were apprehended and executed for robbing Colonel Cope and Mr. Young of that very watch for which Carrick and Maloney 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 here in 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 behavior 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 Shepard for a companion they went out together to search for prey in the fields near the halfway house to Hampstead they met with one pargator a man pretty much in liquor whom immediately Blake knocked down into the ditch where he must have inevitably perished if John Shepard 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 Shepard committed the burglary together in the house of Mr. Kneebone where Shepard getting into the house let in Blake at the back door and stripped the house of a considerable value for this both Shepard 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 Wilde coming to speak with him to cut the said Wilde's throat making a large gash from the ear beyond the windpipe of this wound Wilde 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 dishonorable wound in the throat than that of a pen knife but the number of his crimes and the spleen of his enemies procured him a worse fate whatever Wilde 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 six pence 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 Blue Skid 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 bale 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 Wilde'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 28th year of his age on the 11th of November 1724 end of section 59 recording by Linda Johnson section 60 of lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining or other volume 1 this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed volume 1 edited by Arthur L. Hayward section 60 the life of the famous John Shepherd house breaker 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 male factor of whom we are now to speak his father's name was Thomas Shepherd who was by trade a carpenter and lived in spittle fields a man of an extraordinary good character 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 neighbor 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 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 bishops gate 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 that is that of a cane chair maker who used him very well and with whom probably he might have lived closely 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 on Mr. Wood in Wick Street from his kindness and that of Mr. Kneebone whom he robbed he was taught to write and had many other favors done by that gentleman whom he so ungrateful 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 trumpet 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 here after amongst the chief of his mistresses there was one Elizabeth Lyon commonly called Edgeworth Bess the impudence of whose behavior was shocking even to the greatest part of Shepard's companions but it charmed him so much that he suffered her for a while to direct him in everything and she was the first to engage him in taking base methods to obtain money wherewith to purchase base or pleasures this Lyon was a large masculine woman and Shepard 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 Shepard upon other occasions manifested his wanting neither courage nor strength repeated quarrels however between Shepard 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 Lyon was one Mrs. Baggett a woman somewhat less boisterous in her temper but full as wicked she had a very great contempt for Shepard 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 Shepard 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 well and calling stories but think how you may get more money I have been in Whitehorse yard this afternoon there's a peace 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 Shepard left her about one o'clock in the morning went to the house she talked of took up the seller window bars and from thence entered the shop which he plundered of money and goods to the amount of twenty-two pounds 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 easily earned however he still retained some affection for his old favorite Bess Lyon who being taken up for some of her tricks was committed to Syngiles roundhouse Shepard 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 Shepard 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 ale house where they got a tolerable fee 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. Shepard'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 fifty pounds 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 roundhouse 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 Shepard 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 Lyon who had found her way thither upon a Leic errant 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 where upon Shepard when driven to his last shift communicated his resolution to Bess Lyon they laid their heads together the poor 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 Lyon'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 Shepard and he therefore getting into the acquaintance of one Anthony Lamb an apprentice of Mr. Carter near St. Clement's church they invagaled 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 Shepard quarreling about the division Shepard wounded Grace in a violent manner and on this quarrel betraying one another they were all taken Shepard 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 Shepard's gang which consisted of himself, his brother Tom, Joseph Blake, alias Blue Skin, Charles Grace, James Sykes to whose name his companions tacked their two favorite 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 Shepard in his ludicrous style used to characterize thus that he was a fellow wicked enough to do anything the count 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 Shepard 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 horse-fairy in Westminster there they placed what they had taken out of Mr. Kneebone's house and the goods made a great show there whence the people in the neighborhood really took them for honest persons who had so great a wholesale business on their hands as occasioned there taking a place where they by convenient for the water Field however importuned them having got sent 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 wither 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 Shepard was apprehended for the fact and tried at the next sessions of the old Bailey his appearance there was very mean and all the defense he offered to make was that Jonathan Wilde 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 favor 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 when put into the condemned hold he prevailed upon one fouls who was also under sentence to lift him up to the iron spikes placed over the door which looks into the lodge a woman of large make attending without and two others standing behind her in riding hoods Jack no sooner got his head and shoulders through between the iron spikes then by a sudden spring his body followed with ease and the women taking him down gently he was without suspicion of the keepers although some of them were drinking at the upper end of the lodge conveyed safely out of the lodge door and getting a hackney coach went clear off before there was the least notice of his escape which when it was known very much surprised the keepers who never dreamt of an attempt of that kind before as soon as John breathed the fresh air he went again briskly to his old employment and the first thing he did was to find out one page a butcher of his acquaintance in Clare Market who dressed him up in one of his frocks and then went with him upon the business of raising money no sooner had they set out but shepherd remembering one Mr. Martin a watchmaker near the castle tavern in Fleet Street he prevailed upon his companion to go thither and screwing a gimlet fast into the post of the door they then tied the knocker there too with a spring and then boldly breaking the windows they snatched three watches before a boy that was in the shop could open the door and so marched clear off shepherd having the impudence upon this occasion to pass underneath Newgate however he did not long enjoy his liberty for strolling about Finchley Common he was apprehended and committed to Newgate and was put immediately in the stone room where they put him on a heavy pair of irons and then stapled him fast down to the floor being left there alone in the sessions time most of the people in the jail then attending at the old Bailey with a crooked nail he opened the lock and by that means got rid of his chain and went directly to the chimney in the room where with incessant working he got out a couple of stones and by that means climbed up into a room called the red room where nobody had been lodged for a considerable time here he threw down a door which one would have thought impossible to have been done by the strength of man though with ever so much noise from hence with a great deal to do he forced his passage into the chapel there he broke a spike off the door forcing open by its help for other doors getting at last upon the leads he from thence descended gently by the help of the blanket on which he lay for which he went back through the whole prison upon the leads of Mr. Bird a turner who lives next door to Newgate and looking in at the garret window he saw the maid going to bed as soon as he thought she was asleep he stepped downstairs went through the shop opened the door then into the street leaving the door open behind him in the morning when the keepers were in search after him hearing of this circumstance by the watchmen they were then perfectly satisfied of the method by which he went off however they were obliged to publish a reward and to make the strictest inquiry after him some foolish people having propagated a report that he had not got out without connivance in the meanwhile shepherd found it a very difficult thing to get rid of his irons being obliged to lurk about and lie hid near a village not far from town until with much adieu he fell upon a method of procuring a hammer and taking his irons off he was no sooner freed from the encumbrance that remained upon him than he came secretly into the town that night and robbed Mr. Rowland's house upon broker in Drury Lane here he got a very large booty and amongst other things a very handsome black suit of clothes and a gold watch being dressed in this manner he carried the rest of the goods and valuable effects to two women one of whom was a poor young creature whom shepherd had seduced and who was imprisoned on this account no sooner had she taken care of the booty but he went among his old companions pickpockets and whores in Drury Lane and Clare Market there being accidentally espied fuddling at a little brandy shop by a boy belonging to an ale house who knew him very well the lad immediately gave information upon which he was apprehended and reconducted with a vast mob to his old mansion house of Newgate being so much intoxicated with liquor that he was hardly sensible of his miserable fate however they took effectual care to prevent a third escape never suffering him to be alone a moment which as it put the keepers to a great expense they took care to pay themselves with the money they took of all who came to see him in this last confinement it was that Mr. Shepherd and his adventures became the sole topic of conversation about town numbers flocked daily to behold him and far from being displeased at being made a spectacle of he entertained all who came with the greatest gaiety that could be he acquainted them with all his adventures related each of his robberies in the most ludicrous manner and endeavored to set off every circumstance of his vicious life as well as his capacity would give him leave which to say truth was excellent at cunning and buffoonery and nothing else nor were the crowds that thronged to Newgate on this occasion made up of the dregs of the people only for them there would have been no wonder but instead of that they were persons of the first distinction and not a few even dignified with titles to certain that the noise made about him and this curiosity of persons of so high a rank was a very great misfortune to the poor wretch himself who from these circumstances began to conceive grand ideas of himself as well as strong hopes of pardon which encouraged him to play over all his heirs and divert as many as thought it worth their while by their presence to prevent a dying man from considering his latter end who instead of repenting of his crimes gloried in rehearsing them yet when shepherd came up to chapel it was observed that all his gaiety was laid aside and he both heard and assisted with great attention at divine service though upon other occasions he avoided religious discourse as much as he could and depending upon the petitions he had made to several noblemen to intercede with the king for mercy he seemed rather to aim it diverting his time until he received a pardon then to improve the few days he had to prepare himself for his last on the 10th of November 1724 he was by certiorari removed to the bar of the court of kingsbench at Westminster and affidavit being made that he was the same John Shepherd mentioned in the record of conviction before him Mr. Justice Powis awarded judgment against him and a rule was made for his execution on the 16th such was the unaccountable fondness this criminal had for life and so unwilling was he to lose all hopes of preserving it that he framed in his mind resolutions of cutting the rope when he should be bound in the cart thinking thereby to get amongst the crowd and so into Lincoln's infields and from thence to the Thames for this purpose he had provided a knife which was with great difficulty taken from him by Mr. Watson who was to attend him to death nay his hopes were carried even beyond hanging for when he spoke to a person to whom he gave what money he had remaining out of the large presence he had received from those who came to divert themselves at Shepherd's show or Newgate fair he most earnestly entreated him that as soon as possible his body might be taken out of the hearse which was provided for him put into a warm bed and if it were possible some blood taken from him for he was in great hopes that he might be brought to life again but if he was not he desired him to defray the expenses of his funeral and return the over-plus to his poor mother then he resumed his usual discourse about his robberies and in the last moments of his life endeavored to divert himself from the thoughts of death yet so uncertain and various was he in his behavior that he told one whom he had a great desire to see on the morning that he died that he had then a satisfaction at his heart as if he were going to enjoy two hundred pounds per annum at the place of execution to which he was conveyed in a cart with iron handcuffs on he behaved himself very gravely confessing his robbery of Mr. Phillips and Mrs. Cook but denied that he and Joseph Blake had William Field in their company when they broke open the house of Mr. Kneebone after this he submitted to his fate on the 16th of November 1724 much pitied by the mob end of section 60 recording by Linda Johnson section 61 of lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining or other offenses volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed volume one edited by Arthur L. Hayward section 61 the life of Louis Oussard the French barber a murderer as there is not any crime more shocking to human nature or more contrary to all laws human and divine then murder so perhaps there has been few committed in these last years accompanied with more odd circumstances than that for which this criminal suffered Louis Oussard was born at Sedan a town in Champagne in the kingdom of France his own paper says that he was bred a surgeon and qualified for that business however that were he was here no better than a penny barber only that he let blood and thereby got a little and not much money as to the other circumstances of his life my memoirs are not full enough to assist me in speaking there too all I can say of him is that while his wife and Rondeau was living he married another woman and the night of the marriage before sitting down to supper he went out a little space during the interval between that and his coming in it was judged from the circumstances that I shall mention here after that he cut the throat of the poor woman who was his first wife with a razor for this being apprehended he was tried at the old Bailey but for want of proof sufficient was acquitted not long after he was indicted for bigamy IE for marrying his second wife his first having been yet alive scarce making any defense upon this indictment he was found guilty he said there upon it was no more than he expected and that he did not trouble himself to preserve so much as his reputation in this respect for in the first place he knew they were resolved to convict him and in the next he said where there was no fault there was no shame that his first wife was a Sosinian an irrational creature and was entitled to the advantages of conversation nor people because she was no Christian and accordingly the scripture says with such a one have no conversation no not so much as to eat with them but an appeal was lodged against him by Solomon Rondo brother and heir to Anne his wife yet that appearing to be defective it was quashed and he charged upon the other where on to joining issue upon six points they came to be tried at the old Bailey where the following circumstances appeared upon the trial first that at the time he was at supper at his new wife's house he started on a sudden looked aghast and seemed to be very much frightened a little boy deposed that the prisoner gave him money to go to his own house in a little court and fetch the mother of the deceased Anne Rondo to a gentleman who would be at such a place and wait for her when the mother returned from that place and found nobody wanting her or that had wanted her she was very much out of humor at the boys calling her but that quickly gave way to the surprise of finding her daughter murdered as soon as she entered the room this boy who called her was very young yet out of the number of persons who were in Newgate he singled out Lewis Usa and declared that he was the only man among them who gave him money to go on the errant for old mistress Rondo upon this and several other corroborating proofs the jury found him guilty upon which he arraigned the justice of a court which hitherto had been preserved without a taint declaring that he was innocent and that they might punish him if they would but they could not make him guilty and much more to the like effect but the court were not troubled with that so he scarce endeavored to make any other defense while in the condemned hold amongst the rest of the criminals he behaved himself in a very odd manner insisted upon it that he was innocent of the fact laid to his charge throughout most a probious language against the court that condemned him and when he was advised to lay aside such eats of passionate expressions he said he was sorry he did not more fully expose British justice upon the spot at the old Bailey and that now since they had tied up his hands from acting he would at least have satisfaction in saying what he pleased when this was so was first apprehended he appeared to be very much affected with his condition was continually reading good books praying and meditating and showing the utmost signs of a heart full of concern and under the greatest emotions but after he had once been convicted it made a thorough change in his temper he quite laid aside all the former gravity of his temper and gave way in the contrary to a very extraordinary spirit of obstinacy and unbelief he puzzled himself continually and if Mr. de Val who was then under sentence would have given leave attempted to puzzle him too as to the doctrines of a future state and an identical resurrection of the body he said he could not be persuaded of the truth thereof in a literal sense that when the individual frame of flesh which he bore about him was once dead and from being flesh became again clay he did not either conceive or believe that it after lying in the earth or disposed of otherwise perhaps for the space of a thousand years should at the last day be reanimated by the soul which possessed it now and become answerable even to eternal punishment for crimes committed so long ago it was he said also little agreeable to the notions he entertained of the infinite mercy of God and therefore he was rather to look upon such doctrines as errors received from education then torment and afflict himself with the terrors which must arise from such a belief but after he had once answered as well as he could these objections Mr. de Val refused to harken a second time to any such discourses and was obliged to have recourse to the language to oblige him to desist. In the meanwhile his brother came over from Holland on the news of this dreadful misfortune and went to make him a visit in the place of his confinement while under condemnation going to condole with him on the heavy weight of his misfortunes upon which instead of receiving the kindness of his brother in the manner it deserved Usa began to make light of the affair and treated the death of his wife and his own confinement in such a manner that his brother leaving him abruptly went back to Holland more shocked at the brutality of his behavior than grieved for the misfortune which had befallen him. It being a considerable space of time that Usa lay in confinement in Newgate and even in the condemned hold he had there, of course, abundance of companions. But of them all he affected none so much as John Shepard with whom he had abundance of merry and even loose discourse. Once particularly when the sparks flew very quickly out of the charcoal fire he said to Shepard, See, see, I wish these were so many bullets that might beat the prison down about our ears and then I might die like Samson. It was near a month before he was called up to receive sentence after which he made no scruple of saying that since they had found him guilty of throat cutting they should not lie. He would verify their judgment by cutting his own throat upon which when some who were in the same sad state with himself pointed out to him how great a crime self-murder was he immediately made answer that he was satisfied it was no crime at all and upon this he fell to arguing in favor of the mortality of the soul as if certain that it died with the body endeavoring to cover his opinions with false glosses on that text in Genesis where it is said that God breathed into man a living soul. From hence he would have inferred that when a man ceased to live he totally lost that soul and when it was asked of him where then it went he said he did not know nor did it concern him much.  Sometimes however he would lay aside these skeptical opinions for a time talk in another strain and appear mightily concerned at the misfortunes he had drawn upon his second wife and child. He would then speak of providence and the decrees of God with much seeming submission would own that he had been guilty of many and grievous offenses say that the punishment of God was just and desire the prayers of the minister of the place and those that were about him. When he reflected on the grief it would give his father near 90 years old to hear of his misfortunes and that his son should be shamefully executed for the murder of his wife he was seen to shed tears and to appear very much affected but as soon as these thoughts were a little out of his head he resumed his former temper and was continually asking questions in relation to the truth of the gospel dispensation and the doctrines therein taught of rewards and punishments after this life. Being a Frenchman and not perfectly versed in our language a minister of the reformed church of that nation was prevailed upon him to attend him.  In this strange way he consumed the time allowed him to prepare for another world. The day before his execution he appeared more than ordinarily attentive at the public devotions in the chapel. A sermon was then made with particular regard to that fact for which he was to die. He heard that also seemingly with much care but when he was asked immediately after to unburden his conscience in respect of the death of his wife he not only refused it but also expressed a great indignation that he should be tormented as he called it to confess a thing of which he was not guilty. In the evening of that day the foreign minister and he whose duty it was to attend him both waited upon him at night in order to discourse with him on those strange notions he had of the mortality of the soul and a total cessation of being after this life. But when they came to speak to him to this purpose he said they might spare themselves any arguments upon that head for he believed a God and a resurrection as firmly as they did. They then discourse to him of the nature of a sufficient repentance and of the duty incumbent upon him to confess that great crime for which he was condemned and thereby give glory unto God. He fell at this into his old temper and said with some passion if you will pray with me I'll thank you and pray with you as long as you please but if you come only to torture me with my guilt I desire you would let me alone altogether. His lawyers having pretty well instructed him in the nature of an appeal and he coming thereby to know that he was now under sentence of death at the suit of the subject and not of the king he was very assiduous to learn where it was he was to apply for a reprieve but finding it was the relations of his deceased wife from whom he was to expect it he laid aside all those hopes as conceiving it rightly a thing impossible to prevail upon people to spare his life who had almost undone themselves in prosecuting him. In the morning of the day of execution he was very much disturbed at being refused the sacrament which as the minister told him could not be given him by the canon without his confession yet this did not prevail he said he would die without receiving it as he had before answered a French minister who said Louis Oussard since you are condemned on full evidence and I see no reason but to believe you guilty I must as a just pastor inform you that if you persist in this denial and die without confession you can look for nothing but to be to which Oussard replied you must look for damnation to yourself for judging me guilty when you know nothing of the matter. This confused frame of mind he continued in until he entered the cart for his execution persisting in a like declaration of innocence all the way he went though sometimes intermixed with short prayers to God to forgive his many fold sins and defences at the place of execution he turned very pale and grew very sick the ministers told him they would not pray by him unless he would confess the murder for which he died he said he was very sorry for that but if they would not pray by him he could not help it he would not confess what he was totally ignorant of even at the moment of being tied up he persisted and when such exhortations were again repeated he said pray do not torment me pray cease troubling me I tell you I will not make myself worse than I am and so saying he gave up the ghost without any private prayer when left alone or calling upon God or Christ to receive his spirit he delivered to the minister of Newgate however a paper the copy which follows from whence my readers will receive a more exact idea of the man from this his draft of himself then from any picture I can draw the paper delivered by Lewis Usa at his death I Lewis Usa am 40 years old and was born in Sedan a town in Champagne near Boulogne I have left France above 14 years I was apprentice to a surgeon at Amsterdam and after examination was allowed by the college to be qualified for that business so that I intended to go on board a ship as surgeon but I could never have my health at sea I dwelt some time at Maastricht in the Dutch Brabant where my aged father and brother now dwell I traveled through Holland and was in almost every town my two sisters are in France and also many of my relations for the earth has scarce any family more numerous than ours seven or eight years have I been in London and here I met with Anne Rondeau who was born at the same village with me and therefore I loved her after I had left her she wrote to me and said she would reveal a secret I promised her to be secret and she told me she had not been chased and the consequence of it was upon her upon which I gave her my best help and assistance since she is dead I hope her soul is happy end of section 61 recording by Linda Johnson section 62 of lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed for murder the highway house breaking street robberies coining or other offenses volume one this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org lives of the most remarkable criminals who have been condemned and executed volume one edited by Arthur L. Hayward section 62 the life of Charles Towers a mentor in Wapping not withstanding it must be apparent even to a very ordinary understanding that the law must be executed both in civil and criminal cases and that without such execution those who live under its protection would be very unsafe yet it happens so that those who feel the smart of its judgment though drawn upon them by their own misdeeds follies or misfortunes which the law of man cannot remedy or prevent are always clamoring against its supposed severity and making dreadful complaints of the hardships they from thence sustain this disposition hath engaged numbers under these unhappy circumstances to attempt screening themselves from the rigor of the laws by sheltering in certain places where by virtue of their own authority or rather necessities they set up a right of exemption and endeavor to establish a power of preserving those who live within certain limits from being prosecuted according to the usual course of the law. Anciently indeed there were several sanctuaries which depended on the Roman Catholic religion and which were of course destroyed when popery was done away by law. However those who had sheltered themselves in them kept up such exemption and by force withstood whatever civil officers attempted to execute process for debt and that so vigorously that at length they seemed to have established by prescription what was directly against law. These pretended privileged places increased at last to such an extent that in the ninth year of King William the legislature was obliged to make provision by a clause in an act of parliament requiring the sheriffs of London, Middlesex and Surrey the head bailiff of the Duchy Liberty or the bailiff of Surrey under the penalty of one hundred pounds to execute with the assistance of the Pasi Comitatus any writ or warrant directed to them for seizing any person within any pretended privileged place such as White Friars, the Savoy, Salisbury Court, Ram Alley, Miter Court, Fuller's Rents, Baldwin's Gardens, Montague Close or the Mineries, Mint, Clink or Dead Man's Place. At the same time they ordered the assistance for executing the law of any who obey the sheriff or other person or persons in such places as a force said with the very great penalties upon persons who attempt to rescue persons from the hands of justice in such place. This law had a very good effect with respect to all places accepting those within the jurisdiction of the Mint, though not without some struggle. There, however, they still continued to keep up those privileges they had assumed and accordingly did maintain them by so far misusing persons who attempted to execute processes amongst them by ducking them in ditches, dragging them through privies or lay stalls accompanied by a number of people dressed up in frightful habits who were summoned upon blowing a horn. All which, at last, became so very great a grievance that the legislature was again forced to interpose and by an act of the Ninth of the Late King, the Mint, as it was commonly called, situated in the parish of St. George's, Sotherk, in the county of Surrey, was taken away and the punishment of transportation and even death inflicted upon such who should persist in maintaining their pretended privileges. Yet so far did the government extend its mercy as to suffer all those who, at the time of passing the act, were actually shelterers in the Mint provided that they made a just recovery of their effects to be discharged from any imprisonment of their persons for any debts contracted before that time. By this act of parliament the privilege of the Mint was totally taken away and destroyed. The persons who had so many years supported themselves therein were dissipated and dispersed, but many of them got again into debt and associating themselves with other persons in the same condition with unparalleled impudence they attempted to set up, towards wapping, a new, privileged jurisdiction under the title of the Seven Cities of Refuge. In this attempt they were much furthered and directed by one major Santlo, formerly a justice of peace, but being turned out of commission he came first a shelterer here as a prisoner in the fleet. These people made an addition to these laws, which had formerly been established in such illegal sanctuaries, for they provided large books in which they entered the names of persons who entered into their association, swearing to defend one another against all bailiffs and such like. In consequence of which they very often rescued prisoners out of custody or even entered the houses of officers for that purpose. Amongst the number of these unhappy people who, by protecting themselves against the lesser judgments of the law, involved themselves in greater difficulties, and at last drew on the greatest and most heavy sentence which it could pronounce was him we now speak of. Charles Towers was a person whose circumstances had been bad for many years and, in order to retrieve them, he had turned gamester. For a guinea or two it seems, he engaged for the payment of a very considerable debt for a friend who, not paying it at his time, Towers was obliged to fly for shelter into the old mint then in being. He went into the new, which was just then setting up, and where the shelterers took upon them to act more licentiously and with greater outrages towards officers of justice than the people in any other places had done. Particularly they erected a tribunal on which a person chosen for that purpose sat as a judge with great state and solemnity. When any bailiff had attempted to arrest persons within the limits which they assumed for their jurisdiction he was seized immediately by a mob of their own people and hurried before the judge of their own choosing. There a sort of charge or indictment was preferred against him for attempting to disturb the peace of the shelterers within the jurisdiction of the seven cities of refuge.  One west who had got amongst them being arrested by John Errington who carried him to his house by whapping wall the shelterers in the new mint no sooner heard thereof but assembling on a Sunday morning in a great number with guns, swords, staves and other offensive weapons they went to the house of the said John Errington and there terrifying and affrighting the persons in the house rescued John West pursuant as they said to their oaths he being registered as a protected person in their books of the seven cities of refuge. In this expedition Charles Towers was very forward being dressed with only a blue P-jacket without hat, wig or shirt with a large stick like a quarter staff in his hand his face and to breast being so blackened that it appeared to be done with soot and lace contrary to the statute made against those called the Waltham blacks and done after the first day of June 1723 when that statute took place. Upon an indictment for this the fact being very fully and dearly proved notwithstanding his defense which was that he was no more disguised than his necessity obliged him to be not having to provide himself clothes and his face perhaps dirty and dogged with mud the jury found him guilty and he there upon received sentence of death. Before the execution of that sentence he insisted strenuously on his innocence as to the point on which he was found guilty and condemned that is having his face blacked and disguised within the intent and meaning of the statute but he readily acknowledged that he had been often present and assisted at such mock courts of justice as were held in the new Mint though he absolutely denied sitting as judge when one Mr Westwood a bailiff was most abominably abused by an order of that pretended court. He seemed fully sensible of the ills and injuries he had committed by being concerned amongst such people but often said he thought the bailiffs had sufficiently revenge themselves by the cruel treatment they had used the riotous persons with when they fell within their power particularly since they hacked and chopped a carpenter's right arm in such a manner that it was obliged to be cut off had abused others in so terrible a degree that they were not able to work or do anything for their living. He himself had received several large cuts over the head which though received six weeks before yet were in a very bad condition at the time of his death. As to disguises he constantly averred they were never practiced in the new Mint. He owned they had had some masquerades amongst them to which himself amongst others had gone in the dress of a miller and his face all covered with white but as to any blacking or other means to prevent his face being known when he rescued west he had none but on the contrary was in his usual habit as all the rest were that accompanied him. He framed as well as he could a petition for mercy setting forth the circumstances of the thing and the hardship he conceived it to be to suffer upon the bare construction of an act of parliament. He set forth likewise the miserable of his wife and two children already she being also big of a third. This petition she presented to his majesty at the council chamber door but the necessity there was of preventing such combinations for obstructing justice rendered it of no effect upon her return and towers being acquainted with the result he said he was contented that he went willingly into a land of quiet from a world so troublesome and so tormenting as this had been to him. Then he kneeled down and prayed with great fervency and devotion after which he appeared very composed and showed no rage against the prosecutor and witnesses who had brought on his death as is too often the case with men in his miserable condition. On the day appointed for his execution he was carried in a cart to a gallows whereon he was to suffer in wapping the crowd as is not common on such occasions lamenting him and pouring down showers of tears he himself behaving with great calmness and intrepidity. After prayers had been said he stood up in the cart and turning towards the people professed his innocence in being in a disguise at the time of rescuing Mr. West and with the strongest asservations said that it was Captain Buckland and not himself who sat as judge upon Mr. Jones the bailiff though as he complained he had been ill-used while he remained a prisoner upon that score. To this he added that for the robberies and thefts with which he was charged they were falsities as he was a dying man. Money indeed be said might be shaken out of the breeches pocket of the bailiff when he was ditched but that whether it was or was not so he was no judge for he never saw any of it. That as to any design of breaking opens Sir Isaac Tillard's house he was innocent of that also. In Fene he owned that the judgment of God was exceeding just for the many offenses he committed but that the sentence of the law was too severe as he understood it he had done nothing culpable within the intent of the statute on which he died. After this he invade for some time against bailiffs and then crying with vehemence to God to receive his spirit he gave up the ghost on the 4th of January 1724 to 5. However the death of towers might prevent people committing such acts as breaking open the houses of bailiffs and setting prisoners at liberty yet it did not quite stifle or destroy those attempts which necessitous people made for screening themselves from public justice in so much that the government were obliged at last to cause a bill to be brought into parliament for the preventing such attempts for the future where upon in the 11th year of the late king it passed into a law to this effect that if any number of persons not less than three associate themselves together in the Hamlet of Wapping, Stepney or in any other place within the bills of mortality in order to shelter themselves from their debts after complaint made thereof by presentment of a grand jury and should obstruct any officer legally empowered and authorized in the execution of any rich or warrant against any person whatsoever and in such obstructing or hindering should hurt, wound or injure any person then any offender convicted of such offense should suffer as a felon and be transported for seven years in like manner as other persons are so convicted and it is further enacted by the same law that upon application made to the judge of any court out of which the rits therein mentioned are issued the aforesaid judge if he see proper may grant a warrant directly to the sheriff or other person proper to raise the Posse Comitatus where there is any probability of resistance and if in the execution of such warrant any disturbance should happen and a rescue be made then the persons of such rescue or who harbor or conceal the persons so rescued shall be transported for seven years in like manner as if convicted of felony but all indictments upon this statute are to be commenced within six months after the fact committed.


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