Tyburn to be executed. He was dressed in a light-coloured coat, red
waistcoat and breeches, and a new bag-wig. He looked much at the
spectators in the houses and balconies, as well as at those in the
street, and bowed to several persons with whom he was acquainted. He was
attended at the scaffold by a clergyman of the Church of England; and
before his being turned off, he declared that he was at peace with all
men, and that he died firmly hoping for the forgiveness of his sins
through the merits of his blessed Redeemer. When his body had hung
during twenty minutes it was cut down, and the heart was taken out and
burned, but the sentence was not further fulfilled. On the following
Sunday, his remains were interred in a large vault in the Savoy chapel.
Dr. Cameron, it appears, was the last person who suffered punishment on
account of connection with the rebellion of Scotland; and of all those
who were concerned in it, probably he least of all deserved the unhappy
fate which befel him. The very small, and apparently unwilling part
which he took in the proceedings, should have screened him from condign
punishment, more especially at a period when all appearance of
discontent having vanished, no further harm was to be apprehended.
CAPTAIN JOHN LANCEY.
EXECUTED FOR BURNING HIS SHIP.
Captain Lancey was a native of Biddeford, in Devonshire, and was
respectably connected. At an early age, he exhibited a predilection for
a seafaring life, and having served his apprenticeship, he was employed
as mate of a vessel belonging to Mr. Benson, a rich merchant of
Biddeford, at that time M.P. for Barnstaple.
Having married a sister of Benson's, Lancey was soon advanced to the
command of the vessel; and on his return from a voyage, he was surprised
at receiving an order from his employer to refit as soon as possible,
Mr. Benson saying that he would insure the vessel for twice her value,
and that Lancey should destroy her. The latter hesitated at first to
assent to this extraordinary proposition, and for a time the suggestion
was not again mentioned; but another opportunity being afforded to
Benson, on his brother-in-law dining with him, he plied him with wine,
and having pointed out to him the poverty to which his family might be
reduced in case of his refusal, by his being dismissed from employment,
the unhappy man at length yielded to his persuasions.
A ship was now fitted out, and bound for Maryland: goods to a large
amount were shipped on board, but re-landed before the vessel sailed,
and a lading of brick-bats taken in by way of ballast; and the vessel
had not been long at sea before a hole was bored in her side, and a cask
of combustible ingredients set on fire with a view to destroy her. The
fire no sooner appeared than the captain called to some convicted
transports, then in the hold, to inquire if they had fired the vessel;
but this appears to have been only a feint to conceal the real design.
The boat being hoisted out, all the crew got safely on shore; and then
Lancey repaired immediately to Benson to inform him of what had passed.
The latter instantly despatched him to a proctor, before whom he swore
that the ship had accidentally taken fire, and that it was impossible to
prevent the consequences which followed.
The crime was soon afterwards discovered, however, and Lancey was taken
into custody; but, secure in his anticipation of protection from Benson,
he did not express much concern at his situation. His employer, in the
mean time, was perfectly aware of the consequences which would fall upon
him, and fled to avoid them; and his unhappy dupe being brought to
trial, was capitally convicted, and received sentence of death. He
subsequently lay in prison for about four months, during which time he
pursued his devotional exercises with the utmost regularity, and was
hanged on the 7th June, 1754, at Execution Dock, in the 27th year of his
age.
NICOL BROWN.
EXECUTED FOR THE MURDER OF HIS WIFE.
This malefactor appears to have suffered for a crime as savagely
ferocious as it was deliberate. He was a native of Cramond, near
Edinburgh, where he was decently educated, and was apprenticed to a
butcher; but his taste tending towards a seafaring life, he entered on
board a man-of-war as a sailor, and remained in that situation for four
years. On his return, he married the widow of a respectable butcher, who
had left her a decent fortune.
Taking to a habit of drinking, he seldom came home sober at night; and
his wife following his example, he used frequently to beat her for
copying his own crime. This conduct rendered both parties obnoxious to
their acquaintance; and the following revolting anecdote of Brown will
incontestably prove the unfeeling brutality of his nature.
About a week after the execution of Norman Ross (already mentioned) for
murder, Brown had been drinking with some company at Leith, till, in the
height of their jollity, they boasted what extravagant actions they
could perform. Brown swore that he would cut off a piece of flesh from
the leg of the dead man and eat it. His companions, drunk as they were,
appeared shocked at the very idea; while Brown, to prove that he was in
earnest, procured a ladder, which he carried to the gibbet, and cutting
off a piece of flesh from the leg of the suspended body of Ross, brought
it back, broiled and ate it.
The circumstances of the crime for which he was executed were as follow.
After having been drinking at an alehouse in the Canongate, he went home
at about eleven at night, in a high degree of intoxication. His wife was
also much in liquor; but, though equally criminal himself, he was
exasperated against her, and struck her so violently that she fell from
her chair. The noise of her fall alarmed the neighbours; but, as
frequent quarrels had happened between them, no immediate notice was
taken of the affair. In about fifteen minutes, the wife was heard to cry
out "Murder! help! fire! the rogue is murdering me!" and the
neighbours, now apprehending real danger, knocked at the door; but no
person being in the house but Brown and his wife, admission was refused.
The woman, meantime, was heard to groan most shockingly, and a person
looking through the keyhole, saw Brown holding his wife to the fire. He
was called on to open the door, but refused to do so; and the candle
being extinguished, and the woman still continuing her cries, the door
was at length forced open. When the neighbours went in, they beheld her
a most shocking spectacle, lying half naked before the fire, and her
flesh in part broiled. In the interim, Brown had got into bed,
pretending to be asleep, and when spoken to, appeared ignorant of the
transaction. The woman, though so dreadfully burnt, retained her senses,
and accused her husband of the murder, and told in what manner it was
perpetrated. She survived till the following morning, still continuing
in the same tale, and then expired in the utmost agony.
The murderer was now seized, and being lodged in the jail of Edinburgh,
was brought to trial and capitally convicted.
On August the 14th, 1754, he was attended to the place of execution at
Edinburgh by the Rev. Dr. Brown; but to the last he denied having been
guilty of the crime for which he suffered.
After execution he was hung in chains; but the body was stolen from the
gibbet, and thrown into a pond, where being found, it was exposed as
before. In a few days, however, it was again stolen; and though a reward
was offered for its discovery, it was not again found.
EDWARD MORGAN.
EXECUTED FOR MURDER.
The circumstances which came out on the trial of Edward Morgan, at the
assizes of Glamorgan, were these:--According to annual custom, he had
been invited by Mr. Rees Morgan, of Lanvabon, his cousin, to spend the
Christmas holidays. He had partaken of the first day's festivity, and
retired to bed along with a young man, apprentice to Mr. Rees Morgan. No
sooner had he laid his head upon the pillow, to use his own expression,
than the devil whispered him to get up and murder the whole family, and
he determined to obey.
He first made an attempt on the apprentice, his bedfellow; but he
struggled so far as to effect his escape, and hid himself. The murderer
then provided himself with a knife, which he sharpened on a stone as
deliberately as the butcher uses his steel; and thus prepared, he softly
crept to the bedchamber of his host and hostess, and cut their throats
in their sleep. He then proceeded to the bed of their beautiful
daughter, with whom the monster had but an hour before been sporting and
playing, and with equal expedition, and by the same means, robbed her of
life. Not satisfied, however, with these deeds of blood, he seized a
firebrand, and proceeded to the barn and outhouses, setting fire to them
all; and, to complete the sum of his crime, he fired the dwelling-house,
after plundering it of some articles.
"The Gloucester Journal," of the year 1757, describes the property
consumed by fire on this melancholy occasion to have been "the
dwelling-house, a barn full of corn, a beast-house, with twelve head of
cattle in it."
It was at first conjectured that the unfortunate people had perished in
the conflagration. Their murdered bodies, it is too true, were consumed
to ashes; but the manner of their death was subsequently proved, partly
by what the concealed apprentice overheard, but chiefly from the
murderer's own confession. Morgan was executed at Glamorgan, April the
6th, 1757.
THE REV. JOHN GRIERSON AND THE REV. MR. WILKINSON
TRANSPORTED FOR UNLAWFULLY PERFORMING THE MARRIAGE CEREMONY.
Among the singular customs of our forefathers, arising in a great
measure from their indifference to decorum, one of the most remarkable
was matrimony, solemnised, we were going to say, but the fittest word
would be "performed," by the parsons in the Fleet prison, to which
reference has already frequently been made. These clerical functionaries
were disreputable and dissolute men, mostly prisoners for debt, who, to
the great injury of public morals, dared to insult the dignity of their
holy profession by marrying in the precincts of the Fleet prison, at a
minute's notice, any persons who might present themselves for that
purpose. No questions were asked, no stipulations made, except as to the
amount of the fee for the service, or the quantity of liquor to be drunk
on the occasion. It not unfrequently happened, indeed, that the
clergyman, the clerk, the bride groom and the bride, were drunk at the
very time the ceremony was performed. These disgraceful members of the
sacred calling had their "plyers," or "barkers," who, if they caught
sight of a man and woman walking together along the streets of the
neighbourhood, pestered them as the Jew clothesmen in the present day
tease the passers-by in Holywell Street, with solicitations, not easily
to be shaken off, as to whether they wanted a clergyman to marry them.
Mr. Burn, a gentleman who has recently published a curious work on the
Fleet Registers, says he has in his possession an engraving (published
about 1747) of "A Fleet Wedding between a brisk young Sailor and
Landlady's daughter at Rederiff." "The print," he adds, "represents the
old Fleet market and prison, with the sailor, landlady, and daughter,
just stepping from a hackney-coach, while two Fleet parsons in
canonicals are contending for the job. The following verses are in the
margin:
"Scarce had the coach discharg'd its trusty fare,
But gaping crowds surround th' amorous pair;
The busy Plyers make a mighty stir,
And whisp'ring cry, D'ye want the Parson, Sir?
Pray step this way--just to the Pen in Hand,
The Doctor's ready there at your command:
This way (another cries), Sir, I declare,
The true and ancient Register is here:
"Th' alarmed Parsons quickly hear the din,
And haste with soothing words t' invite 'em in:
In this confusion jostled to and fro,
Th' inamour'd couple know not where to go,
Till, slow advancing from the coach's side,
Th' experienc'd matron came, (an artful guide,)
She led the way without regarding either,
And the first Parson splic'd 'em both together."
One of the most notorious of these scandalous officials was a man of the
name of George Keith, a Scotch minister, who, being in desperate
circumstances, set up a marriage-office in May-Fair, and subsequently in
the Fleet, and carried on the same trade which has since been practised
in front of the blacksmith's anvil at Gretna Green. This man's
wedding-business was so extensive and so scandalous, that the Bishop of
London found it necessary to excommunicate him. It has been said of this
person and "_his journeyman_," that one morning, during the Whitsun
holidays, they united a greater number of couples than had been married
at any ten churches within the bills of mortality. Keith lived till he
was eighty-nine years of age, and died in 1735. The Rev. Dr. Gaynham,
another infamous functionary, was familiarly called the Bishop of Hell.
"Many of the early Fleet weddings," observes Mr. Burn, "were _really_
performed at the chapel of the Fleet; but as the practice extended, it
was found more convenient to have other places, within the Rules of the
Fleet, (added to which, the Warden was forbidden, by act of parliament,
to suffer them,) and, thereupon, many of the Fleet parsons and
tavern-keepers in the neighbourhood fitted up a room in their respective
lodgings or houses as a chapel! The parsons took the fees, allowing a
portion to the plyers, &c.; and the tavern-keepers, besides sharing in
the money paid, derived a profit from the sale of liquors which the
wedding-party drank. In some instances, the tavern-keepers _kept a
parson on the establishment_, at a weekly salary of twenty shillings!
Most of the taverns near the Fleet kept their own registers, in which
(as well as in their own books) the parsons entered the weddings." Some
of these scandalous members of the highest of all professions were in
the habit of hanging signs out of their windows with the words "WEDDINGS
PERFORMED CHEAP HERE."
Keith, of whom we have already spoken, seems to have been a bare-faced
profligate; but there is something exceedingly affecting in the stings
of conscience and forlorn compunction of one Walter Wyatt, a Fleet
parson, in one of whose pocket-books of 1716 are the following secret
(as he intended them to be) outpourings of remorse:--
"Give to every man his due, and learn ye way of Truth."
"This advice cannot be taken by those that are concerned in ye Fleet
marriages; not so much as ye Priest can do ye thing yt it is
just and right there, unless he designs to starve. For by lying,
bullying, and swearing, to extort money from the silly and unwary
people, you advance your business and get ye pelf, which always
wastes like snow in sunshiney day."
"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. The marrying in the
Fleet is the beginning of eternal woe."
"If a clerk or plyer tells a lye, you must vouch it to be as true as
ye Gospel, and if disputed, you must affirm with an oath to ye
truth of a downright damnable falsehood.--Virtus laudatur &
algetr."[9]
"May God forgive me what is past, and give me grace to forsake such a
wicked place, where truth and virtue can't take place unless you are
resolved to starve."
[Illustration]
But this very man, whose sense of his own disgrace was so deep and
apparently so contrite, was one of the most notorious, active, and
money-making of all the Fleet parsons. His practice was chiefly in
taverns, and he has been known to earn nearly sixty pounds in less than
a month.
With such facilities for marriage, and such unprincipled ministers, it
may easily be imagined that iniquitous schemes of all sorts were
perpetrated under the name of Fleet weddings. The parsons were ready,
for a bribe, to make false entries in their registers, to ante-date
weddings, to give fictitious certificates, and to marry persons who
would declare only the initials of their names. Thus, if a spinster or
widow in debt desired to cheat her creditors by pretending to have been
married before the debt was contracted, she had only to present herself
at one of the marriage-houses in the Fleet, and, upon payment of a small
additional fee to the clergyman, a man could instantly be found on the
spot to act as bridegroom for a few shillings, and the worthless
chaplain could find a blank place in his Register for any year desired,
so that there was no difficulty in making the necessary record. They
would also, for a consideration, obliterate any given entry. The sham
bridegrooms, under different names, were married over and over again,
with the full knowledge of the clerical practitioners. If, in other
instances, a libertine desired to possess himself of any young and
unsuspecting woman, who would not yield without being married, nothing
was easier than to get the service performed at the Fleet without even
the specification of names; so that the poor girl might with impunity be
shaken off at pleasure. Or if a parent found it necessary to
legitimatise his natural children, a Fleet parson could be procured to
give a marriage-certificate at any required date. In fact, all manner of
people presented themselves for marriage at the unholy dens in the Fleet
taverns,--runaway sons and daughters of peers,--Irish adventurers and
foolish rich widows,--clodhoppers and ladies from St. Giles's,--footmen
and decayed beauties,--soldiers and servant-girls,--boys in their teens
and old women of seventy,--discarded mistresses, "given away" by their
former admirers to pitiable and sordid bridegrooms,--night-wanderers and
intoxicated apprentices,--men and women having already wives and
husbands,--young heiresses conveyed thither by force, and compelled, _in
terrorem_, to be brides,--and common labourers and female paupers
dragged by parish-officers to the profane altar, stained by the relics
of drunken orgies, and reeking with the fumes of liquor and tobacco!
Nay, it sometimes happened that the "contracting parties" would send
from houses of vile repute for a Fleet parson, who could readily be
found to attend even in such places and under such circumstances, and
there unite the couple in matrimony!
Of what were called the "Parish Weddings" it is impossible to speak in
terms of sufficient reprobation. Many of the churchwardens and overseers
of that day were in the frequent practice of "getting up" marriages in
order to throw their paupers on neighbouring parishes. For example, in
the _Daily Post_ of the 4th July, 1741, is the following paragraph:--
"On Saturday last the churchwardens for a certain parish in the city, in
order to remove a load from their own shoulders, gave forty shillings,
and paid the expense of a Fleet marriage, to a miserable blind youth,
known by the name of Ambrose Tally, who plays on the violin in
Moorfields, in order to make a settlement on the wife and future family
in Shoreditch parish. To secure their point they sent a parish-officer
to see the ceremony performed. One cannot but admire the ungenerous
proceeding of this city parish, as well as their unjustifiable abetting
and encouraging an irregularity so much and so justly complained of, as
these Fleet matches. Invited and uninvited were a great number of poor
wretches, in order to spend the bride's parish fortune."
In the _Grub Street Journal_ for 1735, is the following letter,
faithfully describing, says Mr. Burn, the treachery and low habits of
the Fleet parsons:--
"SIR,--There is a very great evil in this town, and of dangerous
consequence to our sex, that has never been suppressed, to the great
prejudice and ruin of many hundreds of young people every year, which I
beg some of your learned heads to consider of, and consult of proper
ways and means to prevent for the future. I mean the ruinous marriages
that are practised in the liberty of the Fleet and thereabouts, by a set
of drunken swearing parsons, with their myrmidons, that wear black
coats, and pretend to be clerks and registers to the Fleet. These
ministers of wickedness ply about Ludgate-hill, pulling and forcing
people to some pedling ale-house or a brandy-shop to be married, even on
a Sunday stopping them as they go to church, and almost tearing their
clothes off their backs. To confirm the truth of these facts I will give
you a case or two which lately happened.
"Since Midsummer last a young lady of birth and fortune was deluded and
forced from her friends, and, by the assistance of a wry-necked swearing
parson, married to an atheistical wretch, whose life is a continued
practice of all manner of vice and debauchery. And since the ruin of my
relation, another lady of my acquaintance had like to have been
trepanned in the following manner. This lady had appointed to meet a
gentlewoman at the Old Playhouse in Drury-lane, but extraordinary
business prevented her coming. Being alone when the play was done, she
bade a boy call a coach for the city. One dressed like a gentleman helps
her into it, and jumps in after her. 'Madam,' says he, 'this coach was
called for me, and since the weather is so bad, and there is no other, I
beg leave to bear you company. I am going into the city, and will set
you down wherever you please.' The lady begged to be excused; but he
bade the coachman drive on. Being come to Ludgate-hill, he told her his
sister, who waited his coming but five doors up the court, would go with
her in two minutes. He went, and returned with his pretended sister, who
asked her to step in one minute, and she would wait upon her in the
coach. Deluded with the assurance of having his sister's company, the
poor lady foolishly followed her into the house, when instantly the
sister vanished, and a tawny fellow in a black coat and black wig
appeared. 'Madam, you are come in good time; the Doctor was just
a-going.'--'The Doctor!' says she, horribly frighted, fearing it was a
madhouse: 'what has the Doctor to do with me?'--'To marry you to that
gentleman. The Doctor has waited for you these three hours, and will be
payed by you or that gentleman before you go!'--'That gentleman,' says
she, recovering herself, 'is worthy a better fortune than mine,' and
begged hard to be gone. But Doctor Wryneck swore she should be married,
or if she would not, he would still have his fee, and register the
marriage from that night. The lady, finding she could not escape without
money or a pledge, told them she liked the gentleman so well, she would
certainly meet him to-morrow night, and gave them a ring as a pledge,
which, says she, 'was my mother's gift on her death-bed, enjoining that
if ever I married it should be my wedding-ring.' By which cunning
contrivance she was delivered from the black Doctor and his tawny crew.
Some time after this I went with this lady and her brother in a coach to
Ludgate-hill in the day-time, to see the manner of their picking up
people to be married. As soon as our coach stopped near Fleet Bridge, up
comes one of the myrmidons. 'Madam,' says he, 'you want a parson?'--'Who
are you?' says I.--'I am the clerk and register of the Fleet.'--'Show me
the chapel.' 'At which comes a second, desiring me to go along with him.
Says he, 'That fellow will carry you to a pedling alehouse.' Says a
third, 'Go with me; he wilt carry you to a brandy-shop.' In the interim
comes the Doctor. 'Madam,' says he, 'I'll do your job for you
presently!'--'Well, gentlemen,' says I, 'since you can't agree, and I
can't be married quietly, I'll put it off 'till another time:' so drove
away. Learned sirs, I wrote this in regard to the honour and safety of
my own sex: and if for our sakes you will be so good as to publish it,
correcting the errors of a woman's pen, you will oblige our whole sex,
and none more than, sir,
"Your constant reader and admirer, "VIRTUOUS."
Such are but a few of the iniquities practised by the ministers of the
Fleet. Similar transactions were carried on at the Chapel in May Fair,
the Mint in the Borough, the Savoy, and other places about London; until
the public scandal became so great, especially in consequence of the
marriage at the Fleet of the Hon. Henry Fox with Georgiana Caroline,
eldest daughter of the Duke of Richmond, that at length,--not, however,
without much and zealous opposition,--a Marriage Bill was passed,
enacting that any person solemnising matrimony in any other than a
church or public chapel, without banns or license, should, on
conviction, be adjudged _guilty of felony_, and be transported for
fourteen years, and that all such marriages _should be void_. This act
was to take effect from the 25th of March, 1754.