Lives of the Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed Part 23

At the next sessions he was indicted, first for the murder of Thomas Rawlins, by giving him with a knife a mortal wound of the breadth of an inch, and of the depth of seven inches, whereby he immediately expired; he was a second time indicted on the Statute of Stabbing[71]; and a third time also on the coroner's inquest, for the same offence. Upon each of the which indictments the evidence was so dear that the jury, notwithstanding some witnesses which he called to his reputation, and which indeed deposed that he was a very civil and honest, and peaceable neighbour, found him guilty on them all, and he thereupon received sentence of death.

In pa.s.sing this sentence, the then deputy-recorder, Mr. Faby, took particular notice of the heinousness of the crime of murder, and expatiated on the equity of the Divine Law, whereby it was required that he who had shed man's blood, by man should his blood be shed; and from thence took occasion to warn the prisoner from being misled into any delusive hopes of pardon, since the nature of his offence was such as he could not reasonably expect it from the Royal breast, which had ever been cautious of extending mercy to those who had denied it unto their fellow-subjects.

Under sentence of death this unhappy man behaved himself very devoutly, and with many signs of true penitence. He was, from the first, very desirous to acquaint himself with the true nature of that crime which he had committed, and finding it at once repugnant to religion, and contrary to even the dictates of human nature, he began to loath himself and his own cruelty, crying out frequently when alone. Oh! Murder! Murder! it is the guilt of that great sin which distracts my soul. When at chapel he attended with great devotion to the duties of prayer and service there; but whenever the Commandments came to be repeated, at the words, Thou shalt do no murder, he would tremble, turn pale, shed tears, and with a violent agitation of spirit pray to G.o.d to pardon him that great offence.

To say truth never any man seemed to have a truer sense or a more quick feeling of his crimes, than this unhappy man testified during his confinement. His heart was so far from being hardened, as is too commonly the case with those wretches who fall into the same condition, that he, on the contrary, afflicted himself continually and without ceasing, as fearing that all his penitence would be but too little in the sight of G.o.d, for destroying His creature and taking away a life which he could not restore. Amidst these apprehensions, covered with terrors and sinking under the weight of his afflictions, he received spiritual a.s.sistance of the Ordinary and other ministers, with much meekness, and it is to be hoped with great benefit; since they encouraged him to rely on the Mercy of G.o.d, and not by an unseasonable diffidence to add the throwing away his own soul by despair, to the taking away the life of another in his wrath.

What added to the heavy load of his sorrows, was the unkindness of his wife, who neither visited him in his misfortunes, and administered but indifferently to his wants. It seems the quarrels they had, had so embittered them towards one another that very little of that friends.h.i.+p was to be seen in either, which makes the marriage bond easy and the yoke of matrimony light. His complaints with respect to her occasioned some enquiries as to whether he were not jealous of her person; such suspicions being generally the cause of married people's greatest dislikes. What he spoke on this head was exceedingly modest, far from that rancour which might have been expected from a man whom the world insinuated had brought himself to death by a too violent resentment of what related to her conduit; though no such thing appeared from what he declared to those who attended him. He said he was indeed uneasy at the too large credit she gave to the deceased, but that it was her purse only that he entertained suspicions of, and that as he was a dying man, he had no ill thought of her in any other way. But with regard to his daughter, he expressed a very great dislike to her behaviour, and said her conduct had been such as forced her husband to leave her; and that though he had treated her with the greatest kindness and affection, yet such was the untowardness of her disposition that he had received but very sorry returns. However, to the last he expressed great uneasiness lest after his decease his little grand-daughter-in-law might suffer in her education, of which he had intended to take the greatest care; his dislike to the mother being far enough from giving him any aversion to the child. It seems from the time he had taken it home he had placed his affections strongly upon it, and did not withdraw them even to the hour of his departure.

As death grew near, he was afflicted with a violent disease, which reduced him so low that he was incapable of coming to the chapel; and when it abated a little it yet left his head so weak that he seemed to be somewhat distracted, crying out in chapel the Sunday before he died, like one grievously disturbed in mind, and expressing the greatest agonies under the apprehension of his own guilt, and the strict justice of Him to whom he was shortly to answer. However, he forgave with all outward appearance of sincerity, all who had been in any degree accessory to his death.

Being carried in a mourning coach to the place of execution, he appeared somewhat more composed than he had been for some time before. He told the people that, except the crime for which he died, he had never been guilty of anything which might bring him within the fear of meeting with such a death. And in this disposition of mind he suffered at Tyburn, on the 3rd day of November, 1725, being about fifty-five years of age. Immediately after his death a paper was published under the t.i.tle of his case, full of circ.u.mstances tending to extenuate his guilt but such as in no way appeared upon his trial.

The Court of Old Bailey at the next sessions taking this paper into their consideration, were of opinion that it reflected highly on the justice of those who tried him, and therefore ordered the printer to attend them to answer for this offence. Accordingly he attended the next day, and being told that the Court was highly displeased with his publis.h.i.+ng a thing of that nature, in order to misrepresent the justice of their proceedings, and that they were ready to punish him for his contempt in the aforesaid publication of such a libel; Mr. Leech thought fit to prevent it by making his most humble submission, and asking pardon of the Court for his offence, a.s.suring them that it proceeded only from inadvertency, and promising never to print anything of the like sort again. Whereupon the Court were graciously pleased to dismiss him only with a reprimand, and to admonish others of the same profession, that they should be cautious for the future of doing anything which might reflect in any degree upon the proceedings had before them.

[71]

See note, page 218.

The Life of JOHN WHALEBONE, alias WELBONE, a Thief, etc.

This malefactor was born in the midst of the City of London, in the Parish of St. Dionis Back Church. His parents were persons in but mean circ.u.mstances, who however strained them to the uttermost to give this their son a tolerable education. They were especially careful to instruct him in the principles of religion, and were therefore under an excessive concern when they found that neglecting all other business, he endeavoured only to qualify himself for the sea. However, finding this inclinations so strong that way, they got him on board a man-of-war, and procured such a recommendation to the captain that he was treated with great civility during the voyage, and if he had had any inclinations to have done well, he might in all probability have been much encouraged. But after several voyages to sea, he took it as strongly in his head to go no more as he had before to go, whether his parents would or no.

He then cried old clothes about the streets; but not finding any great encouragement in that employment, he was easily drawn in by some wicked people of his acquaintance, to take what they called the shortest method of getting money, which was in plain English to go a-thieving. He had very ill-luck in his new occupation, for in six weeks' time, after his first setting out on the information of one of his companions, he was apprehended, tried, convicted, and ordered for transportation.

It was his fortune to be delivered to a planter in South Carolina, who employed him to labour in his plantations, afforded him good meat and drink, and treated him rather better than our farmers treat their servants here. Which leads me to say something concerning the usage such people met with, when carried as the Law directs to our plantations, in order to rectify certain gross mistakes; as if Englishmen abroad had totally lost all humanity, and treated their fellow-creatures and fellow-countrymen as slaves, or as brutes.

The Colonies on the Continent of America are those which now take off the greatest part of those who are transported for felony from Britain, most of the Island Colonies having long ago refused to receive them. The countries into which they now go, trading chiefly in such kind of commodities as are produced in England (unless it be tobacco), the employment, therefore, of persons thus sent over, is either in attending husbandry, or in the culture of the plant which we have before mentioned. They are thereby exposed to no more hards.h.i.+ps than they would have been obliged to have undergone at home, in order to have got an honest livelihood, so that unless their being obliged to work for their living is to pa.s.s for great hards.h.i.+p, I do not conceive where else it can lie, since the Law, rather than shed the blood of persons for small offences, or where they appear not to have gone on for a length of time in them, by its lenity changes the punishment of death into sending them amongst their own countrymen at a distance from their ill-disposed companions, who might probably seduce them to commit the same offences again. It directs also, that this banishment shall be for such a length of time as may be suitable to the guilt of the crime, and render it impracticable for them on their return to meet with their old gangs and acquaintance, making by this means a happy mixture both of justice and clemency, dealing mildly with them for the offence already committed and endeavouring to put it ever out of their own power by fresh offences, to draw a heavier judgment upon themselves.

But to return to this Whalebone. The kind usage of his master, the easiness of the life which he lived, and the certainty of death if he attempted to return home, could not all of them prevail upon him to lay aside the thoughts of coming back again to London, and there giving himself up to those sensual delights which he had formerly enjoyed. Opportunities are seldom wanting where men incline to make use of diem; especially to one who had been bred as he was to the sea. So that in a year and a half after ms being settled there, he took such ways of recommending himself to a certain captain as induced him to bring him home, and set him safe on sh.o.r.e near Harwich. He travelled on foot up to London, and was in town but a very few days before being accidentally taken notice of by a person who knew him, he caused him to be apprehended, and at the next sessions at the Old Bailey, he was convicted of such illegal return, and ordered for execution.

At first he pretended that he thought it no crime for a man to return to his own country, and therefore did not think himself bound to repent of that. Whatever arguments the Ordinary made use of to persuade him to sense of his guilt I know not. But because this is an error into which such people are very apt to fall; and as there want not some of the vulgar who take it for a great hards.h.i.+p, also making it one of those topics upon which they take occasion to harangue against the severity of a Law that they do not understand, I think it will not, therefore, be improper to explain it.

Transportation is a punishment whereby the British law commutes for offences which would otherways be capital, and therefore a contract is plainly presumed between every felon transported and the Court by whose authority he is ordered for transportation, that the said felon shall remain for such term of years as the Law directs, without returning into any of the King's European dominions; and the Court plainly acquaints the felon that if, in breach of his agreement, he shall so return, that in such case the contract shall be deemed void, and the capital punishment shall again take place. To say, then, that a person who enters into an agreement like this, and is perfectly acquainted with its conditions, knowing that no less than his life must be forfeited by the breach of them, and yet wilfully breaks them, to say that such a person as this is guilty of no offence, must in the opinion of every person of common understanding be the greatest absurdity that can be a.s.serted; and to call that severity which only is the Law's taking its forfeit, is a very great impropriety, and proceeds from a foolish and unreasonable compa.s.sion. This I think so plain that nothing but prepossession or stupidity can hinder people from comprehending it.

As to Whalebone, when death approached, he laid aside all these excuses and applied himself to what was much more material, the making a proper use of that little time which yet remained for repentance. He acknowledged all the crimes which he had committed in the former part of his life, and the justice of his sentence by which he had been condemned to transportation; and having warned the people at his execution to avoid of all things being led into ill company, he suffered with much seeming penitence, together with the afore-mentioned malefactors, at Tyburn, being then about thirty-eight years of age.

The Life of JAMES LITTLE, a Footpad and Highwayman

James Little was a person descended from parents very honest and industrious, though of small fortune. They bred him up with all the care they were able, and when he came to a fit age put him out to an honest employment. But in his youth having taken peculiar fancy to his father's profession of a painter, he thereto attained in so great a degree as to be able to earn twelve or fifteen s.h.i.+llings in a week, when he thought fit to work hard. But that was very seldom, and he soon contracted such a hatred to working at all that a.s.sociating with some wild young fellows, he kept himself continually drunk and mad, not caring what he did for money, so long as he supplied himself with enough to procure himself liquor.

Amongst the rest of those debauched persons with whom he conversed there was especially one Sandford, with whom he was peculiarly intimate. This fellow was a soldier, of a rude, loose disposition, who took a particular delight in making persons whom he conversed with as bad as himself. Having one Sunday, therefore, got Little into his company and drank him to such a pitch that he had scarce any sense, he next began to open to him a new method of living, as he called it, which was neither more than less than going on the highway. Little was so far gone in his cups that be did not so much as know what he was saying; at last Sandford rose up, and told him it was a good time now to go out upon their attempts. Upon this Little got up, too, and went out with him. They had not gone far before the soldier drew out a pair of pistols, and robbed two or three persons, while Little stood by, so very drunk that he was both unable to have hurt the persons, or to have defended himself, he said.

He robbed no more with the soldier, who was soon after taken up and hanged at the same time with Jonathan Wild, yet the sad fate of his companion had very little effect upon this unhappy lad. He fell afterwards into an acquaintance with some of John Shepherd's mistresses, and they continually dinning in his ears what great exploits that famous robber had committed, they unfortunately prevailed upon him to go again into the same way. But it was just as fatal to him as it had been to his companion; for Little having robbed one Lionel Mills in the open fields, put him in fear, and taken from him a handkerchief, three keys and sixteen s.h.i.+llings in money, not contented with this he pulled the turnover off from his neck hastily, and thereby nearly strangled him. For this offence the man pursued him with unwearied diligence, and he being taken up thereupon was quickly after charged with another robbery committed on one Mr. Evans, in the same month, who lost a cane, three keys, and twenty pounds in money. On these two offences he was severally convicted at the next sessions at the Old Bailey; and having no friends, could therefore entertain little expectation of pardon; especially considering how short a time it was since he received mercy before; being under sentence at the same time with the soldier before-mentioned and Jonathan Wild, and discharged then upon his making certain discoveries.

He pretended to much penitence and sorrow, but it did not appear in his behaviour, having been guilty of many levities when brought up to chapel, to which perhaps the crowds of strangers, who from an unaccountable humour desire to be present on these melancholy occasions, did not a little contribute; for at other times, it must be owned, he did not behave himself in any such manner, but seemed rather grave and willing to be instructed, of which he had indeed sufficient want, knowing very little, but of debauchery and vice. How ever, he reconciled himself by degrees to the thoughts of death, and behaved with tranquility enough during that small s.p.a.ce that was left him to prepare for it. At the place of execution, he looked less astonished though he spoke much less to the people than the rest, and died seemingly composed, at the same time with the other malefactors Snow, and Whalebone, being at the time of his execution in his seventeenth year.

The Life of JOHN HAMP, Footpad and Highwayman

This unhappy person, John Hamp, was born of both honest and reputable parents in the parish of St. Giles-without-Cripplegate. They took abundance of pains in his education, and the lad seemed in his juvenile years to deserve it; he was a boy of abundance of spirit, and his friends at his own request put him out apprentice to a man whose trade it was to lath houses. He did not stay out his time with him, but being one evening with some drunken companions at an alehouse near the Iron Gate by the Tower, three of them sailors on board a man-of-war (there being at that time a great want of men, a squadron being fitted out for the Baltic), these sailors, therefore, observing all the company very drunk, put into their heard to make an agreement for their going altogether this voyage to the North. Drink wrought powerfully in their favour, and in less than two hours time, Hamp and two other of his companions fell in with the sailors' motion, and talked of nothing but braving the Czar, and seeing the rarities of Copenhagen. The fourth man of Hamp's company stood out a little, but half an hour's rhodomantade and another bowl of punch brought him to a sailor, upon which one of the seamen stepped out, and gave notice to his lieutenant, who was drinking not far off, of the great service he had performed, the lieutenant was mightily pleased with Jack Tar's diligence, promised to pay the reckoning, and give each of them a guinea besides. A quarter of an hour after, the Lieutenant came in. The fellows were all so very drunk that he was forced to send for more hands belonging to the s.h.i.+p, who carried them to the long-boat, and there laying them down and covering them with men's coats, carried them on board that night.

There is no doubt that Hamp was very surprised when he found the situation he was in next morning, but as there was no remedy, he acquiesced without making any words, and so began the voyage cheerfully. Everybody knows that there was no fighting in these Baltic expeditions, so that all the hards.h.i.+ps they had to combat with were those of the sea and the weather, which was indeed bad enough to people of an English const.i.tution, who were very unfit to bear the extremity of cold.

While they by before Copenhagen, an accident happened to one of Hamp's great acquaintance, which much affected him at that time, and it would have certainly have been happy for him if he had retained a just sense of it always. There was one Scrimgeour, a very merry debonair fellow, who used to make not only the men, but sometimes the officers merry on board the s.h.i.+p. He was particularly remarkable for being always full of money, of which he was no n.i.g.g.ard, but ready to do anybody a service, and consequently was very far from being ill-beloved. This man being one day on sh.o.r.e and going to purchase some fresh provisions to make merry with amongst his companions, somebody took notice of a dollar that was in his hand, and Scrimgeour wanting change, the man readily offered to give smaller money. Scrimgeour thereupon gave him the dollar, and having afterwards bargained for what he wanted, was just going on board when a Danish officer with a file of men, came to apprehend him for a coiner. The fellow, conscious of his guilt, and suspicious of their intent, seeing the man amongst them who had changed the dollar, took to his heels, and springing into the boat, the men rowed him on board immediately, where as soon as he was got, Scrimgeour fancied himself out of all danger.

But in this he was terribly mistaken, for early the next morning three Danish commissaries came on board the admiral, and acquainted him that a seaman on board his fleet had counterfeited their coin to a very considerable value, and was yesterday detected in putting off a dollar; that thereupon an officer had been ordered to seize him, but that he had made his escape by jumping into the long-boat of such a s.h.i.+p, on board of which they were informed he was; they therefore desired he might be given up in order to be punished. The admiral declined that, but a.s.sured them that, upon due proof, he would punish him with the greatest severity on board; and having in the meanwhile dispatched a lieutenant and twenty men on board Scrimgeour's s.h.i.+p, with the Dane who detected him in putting off false money, he was secured immediately. Upon searching his trunk they found there near a hundred false dollars, so excellently made that none of the s.h.i.+p's crew could have distinguished them from the true.

He was immediately carried on board the admiral, who ordered him to be confined. Soon after a court-martial condemned him to be whipped from s.h.i.+p to s.h.i.+p, which was performed in the view of the Danish commissaries, with so much rigour that instead of expressing any notion of the Englishmen showing favour to their countryman upon any such occasion, they interposed to mitigate the fellow's sufferings, and humbly besought the admiral to omit las.h.i.+ng him on board three of the last s.h.i.+ps. But in this request they were civilly refused, and the sentence which had been p.r.o.nounced against him was executed upon him with the utmost severity; and it happening that Hamp was one of the persons who rowed him from s.h.i.+p to s.h.i.+p, it filled him with so much terror that he was scarce able to perform his duty; the wretch, himself, being made such a terrible spectacle of misery that not only Hamp, but all the rest who saw him after his last las.h.i.+ng, were shocked at the sight. And though it was shrewdly suspected that some others had been concerned with him, yet this example had such an effect that there were no more instances of any false money uttered from that time.

It was near five years after Hamp went first to sea that he began to think of returning home and working at his trade again; and after this thought had once got into his head, as is usual with such fellows, he was never easy until he had accomplished it. An opportunity offered soon after, the s.h.i.+p he belonged to being recalled and paid off. John had, however, very little to receive, the great delight he took in drinking made him so constant a customer to a certain officer in the s.h.i.+p that all was near spent by the time he came home. That, however, would have been no great misfortune had he stuck close to his employment and avoided those excesses of which he been formerly guilty. But alas! this was by no means in his power; he drank rather harder after his return than he had done before, and if he might be credited at that time when the Law allows what is said to pa.s.s for evidence, viz., in the agony of death, it was this love of drink that brought him, without any other crime, to his shameful end. The manner of which, I shall next fully relate.

Hamp, pa.s.sing one night very drunk through the street, a woman, as is usual enough for common street-walkers to do, took him by the sleeve, and after some immodest discourse, asked him if he would not go into her mother's and take a pot with her. To this motion Hamp readily agreed, and had not been long in the house before he fell fast asleep in the company of James Bird (who was hanged with him), the woman who brought him into the house, and an old woman, whom she called her mother. By and by certain persons came who apprehended him and James Bird for being in a disorderly house; and having carried them to the watch house, they were there both charged with robbing and beating, in a most cruel and barbarous manner, a poor old woman near Rag Fair.[72]

At the next Old Bailey sessions they were both tried for the fact, and the woman's evidence being positive against them, they were likewise convicted. Hamp behaved himself with great serenity while under sentence, declaring always that he had not the least knowledge of Bird until the time they were taken up; that in all his life time he had never acquired a halfpenny in a dishonest manner, and that although he had so much abandoned himself to drinking and other debaucheries, yet he constantly worked hard at his employment, in order to get money to support them. As to the robbery, he knew no more of it than the child unborn, that he readily believed all that the woman swore to be true, except her mistake in the persons; and that as to Bird, he could not take upon himself to say that he was concerned in it.

A divine of eminency in the Church, being so charitable as to visit him, spoke to him very particularly on this head; he told him that a jury of his countrymen on their oaths had unanimously found him guilty; that the Law upon such a conviction had appointed him to death, and that there appeared not the least hopes of his being anyways able to prevent it; that the denying of his guilt therefore, could not possibly be of any use to him here, but might probably ruin him for ever hereafter; that he would act wisely in this unfortunate situation into which his vices had brought him, if he would make an ample acknowledgment of the crime he had committed, and own the justice of Providence in bringing him to condemnation, instead of leaving the world in the a.s.sertion of a falsehood, and rus.h.i.+ng into the presence of Almighty G.o.d with a lie in his mouth.

This exhortation was made publicly, and Hamp after having heard it with great attention, answered it in the following terms. I am very sensible, sir, of your goodness in affording me this visit and am no less obliged to you for your pressing instances to induce me confession. But as I know the matter of fact, so I am sure, you would not press me to own it if it be not true; I aver that the charge against me is utterly false in every particular. I freely acknowledge that I have led a most dissolute life, and abandoned myself in working all kind of wickedness; but should I so satisfy some persons' importunities as to own also the justice of my present sentence, as arising from the truth of the fact, I should thereby become guilty of the very crime you warn me of, and go out of the world, indeed, in the very act of telling an untruth. Besides, of what use would it be to me, who have not the least hopes of pardon, to persist in a lie, merely for the sake of deceiving others, who may take my miserable death as a piece of news, and at the same time cheat myself in what is my last and greatest concern? I beg, therefore, to be troubled no more on this head, but to be left to make my peace with G.o.d for those sins which I have really committed, without being pressed to offend Him yet more, by taking upon me that which I really know nothing of.

The Ordinary of Newgate hereupon went into the hold to examine Bird, who lay there in a sick and lamentable condition. He confirmed all that Hamp had said, declared he never saw him in his life before the night in which they were taken up, acknowledged himself to be a great sinner, and an old offender, that he had been often taken up before for thefts; but as to the present case, he peremptorily insisted on his innocence, and that he knew nothing of it.

At the place of execution, Hamp appeared very composed and with a cheerfulness that is seldom seen in the countenances of persons when they come to the tree, and are on the very verge of death. He spoke for a few moments to the people saying that he been a grievous sinner, much addicted to women, and much more to drinking; that for these crimes, he thought the Justice of G.o.d righteous in bringing him to a shameful death; but as to a.s.saulting the woman in Rag Fair, he again protested his innocence, and declared he never committed any robbery whatsoever, desired the prayers of the people in his last moments, and then applied himself to some short private devotions. He resigned himself with much calmness to his fate, on Wednesday, the 22nd of December, 1725, at Tyburn, being then in the twenty-fifth year of his age. Bird confirmed, as well as the craziness of his distempered head would give him leave, the truth of what Hamp had said.

[72]

This was in Rosemary Lane, Wellclose Square, Whitechapel-"a place near the Tower of London where old clothes and frippery are sold"-according to Pope.

The Lives of JOHN AUSTIN, a Footpad, JOHN FOSTER, a Housebreaker, and RICHARD SCURRIER, a Shoplifter

Amongst the number of those extraordinary events which may be remarked in the course of these melancholy memoirs of those who have fallen martyrs to sin, and victims to justice, there is scarce anything more remarkable than the finding a man who hath led an honest and reputable life, till he hath attained the summit of life, and then, without abandoning himself to any notorious vices that may be supposed to lead him into rapine and stealth in order to support him, to take himself on a sudden to robbing on the highway, and to finish a painful and industrious life by a violent and shameful death. Yet this is exactly the case before us.

The criminal of whom we are first to speak, viz., John Austin, was the son of very honest people, having not only been bred up in good principles, but seeming also to retain them. He was put out young to a gardener, in which employment being brought up, he became afterwards a master for himself, and lived, as all his neighbours report it, with as fair character as any man thereabout. On a sudden he was taken up for a.s.saulting and knocking down a man in Stepney Fields, with a short, round, heavy club, and taking from him his coat, in the beginning of November, 1725, about seven o'clock in the morning. The evidence being very clear and direct, the jury, notwithstanding the persons he called to his character, found him guilty. He received sentence of death accordingly, and after a report had been made to his Majesty he was ordered for execution.

During the s.p.a.ce he lay under conviction, he at first denied, then endeavoured to extenuate his crime, by saying he did indeed knock the man down, but that the man struck him first with an iron rod he had in his hand; and in this story for some time he firmly persisted. But when death made a nearer approach he acknowledged the falsity of these pretences, and owned the robbery in the manner in which he had been charged therewith. Being asked how a man in his circ.u.mstances, being under no necessities, but on the contrary, in a way very likely to do well, came to be guilty of so unaccountable an act as the knocking down a poor man and taking away his coat, he said that though he was in a fair way of living, and had a very careful and industrious wife, yet for some time past, he had been disturbed in his mind, and that the morning he committed the robbery he took the club out of his own house, being an instrument made use of by his wife in the trade of a silk-throwster, and from a sudden impulse of mind attacked the man in the manner which had been sworn against him.

He appeared to be a person of no vicious principles, had been guilty of very few enormous crimes, except drinking to excess sometimes, and that but seldom. The sin which most troubled him was (his ordinary practice) as a gardener, in spending the Lord's day mostly in hard work, viz., in packing up things for Monday's market. He was very penitent for the offence which he had committed; he attended the service of chapel daily, prayed constantly and fervently in the place of his confinement, and suffered death with much serenity and resolution; averring with his last breath, that it was the first and last act which he had ever committed, being at the time of death about thirty-seven years old.

The second of these malefactors, John Foster, was the son of a very poor man, who yet did his utmost to give his son all the education that was in his power; and finding he was resolved to do nothing else, sent him with a very honest gentleman to sea. He continued there about seven years, and as he met with no remarkable accidents in the voyages he made himself, my readers may perhaps not be displeased if I mention a very singular one which befell his master. His s.h.i.+p having the misfortune to fall into the hands of the French, they plundered it of everything that was in the least degree valuable, and then left him, with thirty-five men, to the mercy of the waves. In this distressed condition, he with much difficulty made the sh.o.r.e of Newfoundland, and had nothing to subsist on but biscuit and a little water. Knowing it was no purpose to ask those who were settled there for provisions without money or effects, he landed himself and eighteen men, and carried off a dozen sheep and eight pigs. They were scarce returned on board, before it sprung up a brisk gale, which driving them from their anchors, obliged them to be put to sea. It blew hard all that day and the next night; the morning following the wind abated and they discovered a little vessel before them which, by crowding all the sails she was able, endeavoured to bear away. The captain thereupon gave her chase, and coming at last up with her, perceived she was French, upon which he gave her a broadside, and the master knowing it was impossible to defend her, immediately struck. They found in her a large quant.i.ty of provisions and in the master's cabin a bag with seven hundred pistoles. No sooner had the English taken out the booty, but they gave the captain and his crew liberty to sail where they pleased, leaving them sufficient provisions for a subsistance, themselves standing in again for Newfoundland, where the captain paid the person who was owner of the sheep and hogs he had taken as much as he demanded, making him also a handsome present besides; thereby giving Foster a remarkable example of integrity and justice, if he had had grace enough to have followed it.

When the s.h.i.+p came home, and its crew were paid off, Foster betook himself to loose company, loved drinking and idling about, especially with ill women. At last he was drawn in by some of his companions to a.s.sist in breaking open the house of Captain Tolson, and stealing thence linen and other things to a very great value. For this offence being apprehended, some promises were made him in case of discoveries, which, as he said, he made accordingly, and therefore thought it a great hards.h.i.+p that they were not performed. But the gentleman, whoever he was, that made him those promises, took no further notice of him, so that Foster being tried thereupon, the evidence was very dear against him, and the jury, after a very short consideration, found him guilty.

Under sentence he behaved with very great sorrow for his offence; he wept whenever any exhortations were made to him, confessed himself one of the greatest of sinners, and with many heavy expressions of grief, seemed to doubt whether even from the mercy of G.o.d he could expect forgiveness. Those whose duty it was to instruct him how to prepare himself for death, did all they could to convince him that the greatest danger of not being forgiven arose from such doubtings, and persuaded him to allay the fears of death by a settled faith and hope in Jesus Christ. When he had a while reflected on the promises made in Scripture on the nature of repentance itself, and the relation there is between creatures and their Creator, he became at last better satisfied, and bore the approach of death with tolerable cheerfulness.

When the day of execution came, he received the Sacrament, as is usual for persons in his condition. He declared, then, that he heartily forgave him who had injured him, and particularly the person who, by giving him hopes of life, had endangered his eternal safety. He submitted cheerfully to the decrees of Providence and the Law of the land; being at the time he suffered about thirty-seven years of age.

Richard Scurrier was the son of a blacksmith of the same name, at Kingston-upon-Thames. He followed for a time his father's business, but growing totally weary of working honestly for his bread, he left his relations, and without any just motive or expectation came up to London. He here betook himself to driving a hackney-coach, which, as he himself acknowledged, was the first inlet into all his misfortunes, for thereby he got into loose and extravagant company, living in a continued series of vice, unenlightened by the grace of G.o.d, or any intervals of a virtuous practice.

Such a road of wickedness soon induced him to take illegal methods for money to support it. The papers which I have in my hands concerning him, do not say whether the fact he committed was done at the persuasion of others, or merely out of his own wicked inclinations; nay, I cannot be so much as positive whether he had any a.s.sociates or no; but in the beginning of his thievish practices, he committed pet.i.t larceny, which was immediately discovered. He thereupon was apprehended and committed to Newgate. At the next sessions he was tried, and the fact being plain, he was convicted; but being very young, the Court, through its usual tenderness, determined to soften his punishment into a private whipping. But before that was done, he joined with some other desperate fellows, forced the outward door of the prison as the keeper was going in and escaped.

He was no sooner at liberty but he fell to his old trade, and was just as unlucky as he was before; for taking it into his head to rub off with a firkin of b.u.t.ter, which he saw standing in a cheesemonger's shop, he was again taken in the fact, and in the s.p.a.ce of a few weeks recommitted to his old lodging. At first he apprehended the crime to be so trivial that he was not in the least afraid of death, and therefore his amazement was the greater when he was capitally convicted. During the first day after sentence had been p.r.o.nounced, the extremity of grief and fear made him behave like one distracted; as he came a little to himself, and was instructed by those who charitably visited him, he owned the justice of his sentence, which had been pa.s.sed upon him, and the notorious wickedness of his misspent life. He behaved with great decency at chapel, and as well as a mean capacity and a small education would give him leave, prayed in the place of his confinement.