Description of lottery-office keepers--Insuring numbers in
the lottery--Servants bitten by the mania--_Morocco
men_--Many prosecutions--Cost to the country--Several
law cases--Story of Mr. Bartholomew.
What class of men these lottery-office keepers were, we learn in a
little book[29] believed to have been published about 1770.
[29] “The Frauds of London,” by Richard King. London, 1770? 12mo.
“For several years past these lottery-office keepers have had an ample
share in imposing on the town, and cheating the country; by vending of
books, handkerchiefs, and other things of little value, with shares of
tickets, said to be impending, or then drawing, in the State lottery,
with a note of hand, importing that if No. 45 should come a prize of
£20,000, the bearer of that ticket would be entitled to £50, and so for
other prizes in proportion; by this means thousands were taken in with
their eyes open (such an itch has the world for gambling), and paid
thrice the value for the commodity they purchased (allured by the hopes
of a prize in the lottery) than its real worth.
“On the drawing of the lottery, the lower part of the creation, who
were concerned in the above schemes for enriching themselves, would
quit their labour and industry, and repair to the Guildhall, to be
present at the drawing, in expectation of every next number called
being theirs, when twenty thousand to one of their getting a prize of
£10. Some few have been so lucky as to get the £20,000 and £10,000, but
I never knew that they received the sum stipulated, in the promissory
note given for that purpose. On the contrary, I have seen the
office-keeper’s windows and shops demolished by a deluded and justly
enraged mob, who have been ruined by the purchase of tickets, shares,
chances, and insurances thereon.
“The keepers had a custom, a day or two before the finishing the
drawing, to shut up their shops and decamp, for fear of their being
brought to account for their cheats and roguery, practised on the
ignorant and unthinking. The countryman, hearing that he had a prize in
the lottery, hastened up to town, at no small expense, to receive the
money due thereon; when, to his great sorrow, there was no keeper to be
found; but, as an alleviation of his grief, he saw hundreds deceived as
well as himself.
“To such an height were these lottery offices carried (as they called
themselves) that you might purchase shares and chances at sixpence
apiece, one of which is worth observing. An advertisement in the
_Morning Chronicle_, intimating that shares and chances were to be
disposed of at Fuller’s Eating House, in Wych Street, and tickets
insured; that whoever bought six pennyworth of beef, would be presented
with a ticket, and a note of hand to receive the sums inserted therein,
if the number of the ticket was drawn a prize of £20,000, etc.; and
told you that this was the most rational of all schemes hitherto
projected, as the purchaser, at least, would have, for his sixpence,
three pennyworth of meat, besides a chance in the lottery.
“Notwithstanding the law has taken every precaution to guard against
the itinerant cheat, who practises as lottery-office keeper, yet ways
are, and always will be, found to evade it. Therefore let me dissuade
the countryman, and others, from adventuring at this losing game, as
it is at best, there being better than two to one against you in the
State lottery, and more than fifty to one of your getting anything from
such as I have already described.”
The custom of insuring numbers in the lottery has already been noticed,
but only _en passant_. It was, in reality, pure betting. In return
for, say, a shilling, a pound would be promised if a certain specified
number turned up. Of course, these insurances were illegal, but they
were so profitable to the office-keepers, that no penalties could
keep them down. Many attempts had been made by magistrates and police
officers to enter houses and places kept for the purpose of carrying
on illegal insurances, and apprehending the offenders; but the parties
concerned opposed their attempts in every possible way, and employed
a desperate set of ruffians to defend them, who, with every kind of
offensive weapon, bade defiance to the execution of the warrants issued
for their apprehension. They also secured the rooms within the house
where this illicit business was transacted, with strong oak doors and
iron bars and bolts, so that the police officers could only obtain
admission by using force.
Such a state of things, of course, could not be tolerated in any
civilized community, and an Act was passed (33 Geo. III. c. 62), in
1793, empowering magistrates to allow any person authorized by the
Commissioners of Stamps, by day or night (but, if by night, then in
the presence of a constable), to break open the doors and apprehend
the offenders; and all persons who should obstruct the officers in the
execution of their duty, were liable to be seized and prosecuted, and
subject, on conviction, to be fined, imprisoned, and publicly whipped.
By a subsequent Act, this power was extended to any person or persons
authorized by a magistrate without restriction; and these provisions
were also introduced into the Act of 1802 (42 Geo. III. c. 119).
We have seen how, by the Act of 1793, no person, except the clerks of
licensed lottery-office keepers, were allowed to be in the Guildhall
during the drawing of the lottery; but, though this undoubtedly checked
this gambling, it was far from putting a stop to it. Mr. Colquhoun, a
well-known magistrate, declared that the keepers of these unlicensed
insurance offices were “as a class, in general, of very depraved
or distressed characters,” and the class they preyed upon were
principally male and female domestic servants; indeed, it was computed,
in 1800, that, on an average, each servant in the metropolis spent,
annually, as much as twenty-five shillings in this vile practice of
lottery insurance; the sum total so expended in a year, by the wage
earning-classes, being estimated at half a million sterling. They were,
especially the footmen, undoubtedly led away by the example of their
superiors in rank, and, from their idle and dissipated habits, they
entered keenly into the lottery. So long as they won, all went well;
but the chances were so great against them that this never happened for
long, and then, impelled by that fearful gambling fever, which we now
see in those who bet on horse-racing, money must be got, by any means,
fair or foul, and pilfering and peculation were the necessary results.
The insurance offices in the metropolis are said to have exceeded four
hundred in number. These had jackals, touts who provided prey for
them, in the shape of _Morocco men_, so called from the red Morocco
pocket-books they used to carry with them, and in which their notes
were made. These men haunted the public-houses and coffee-shops; nay,
they pushed themselves into every village, and into every house in
the village, to collect premiums from all sorts and conditions of men.
These people would take their books to their employers by night, and
receive the money from them to pay those who were fortunate enough to
obtain prizes.
Mr. Francis,[30] writing of these Morocco men, says, “They began life
as pigeons; they closed it as rooks. They had lost their own fortunes
in their youth; they ruined those of others in their age. Generally
educated, and of bland manners, a mixture of the gentleman and the
debauchee, they easily penetrated into the society they sought to
destroy. They were seen in the deepest alleys of St. Giles’s, and were
met in the fairest scenes of England. In the old hall of the country
gentleman, in the mansion of the city merchant, in the butlery of the
rural squire, in the homestead of the farmer, among the reapers as they
worked on the hillside, with the peasant as he rested from his daily
toil, addressing all with specious promises, and telling lies like
truth, was the Morocco man found, treading alike the finest and the
foulest scenes of society. They whispered temptation to the innocent;
they hinted at fraud to the novice. They lured the youthful; they
excited the aged; and no place was so pure and no spot so degraded,
but, for love of 7½ per cent., did the Morocco man mark it with his
pestilential presence. No valley was so lonely but what it found some
victim, no hill so remote but what it offered some chance; and so
enticing were their manners, that their presence was sought, and their
appearance welcomed, with all the eagerness of avarice.
[30] “Chronicles and Characters of the Stock Exchange,” by John
Francis. London, 1855.
“And little were they who dealt with these persons aware of the
characters with whom they trafficked. Of bland behaviour, but gross
habits, the nature of their influence on the unpolluted minds with
which they had to deal, may be judged from the fact that some of the
Morocco men ended their days at Tyburn; that transportation was the
doom of others, and the pillory the frequent punishment of many. To
such men as these were the morals of the people exposed through the
lottery.”
The Act was occasionally put in force, and once, in particular, a Mr.
Wood (according to the Report of the Commissioners in 1808) “was
seized with a sudden fit of severity, and, in the course of one term,
he caused to be arrested (for the crime of insuring lottery tickets),
by writs of _capias_, perhaps from 300 to 400 persons; who, with the
exception of a very few, perhaps about twelve, were persons of the
very lowest class of life, many of them married women, washerwomen,
charwomen, and persons of that description; so that Government
necessarily had to pay to the Solicitor of Stamps heavy costs for
having instituted so great a number of unproductive suits, and the
Treasury was greatly displeased. The poor were put into prison, and,
after remaining there, some a month, some two months, and some three
months, and so on.... When the Commissioners (of Stamps) came to know
what sort of wretched beings they had in prison, their humanity urged
them to set them at liberty by degrees.”
Mr. Baker, a magistrate, gave evidence before the Commission, and
stated that the annual loss to the public, by the lottery, was
£1,275,000, which loss was made up by the cost of tickets, the cost
of illegal insurances, and the profits of the agents, contractors,
office-keepers, etc. He also said that “no revenue has been obtained
to the State at half the expense, in point of pecuniary sacrifice to
the public, independent of the excessive injury to the morals of the
people, as lotteries, in the manner they are now constituted. They
have been a productive harvest to the most idle, the most profligate,
and the most abandoned and depraved members of the community, many of
whom have through this medium acquired princely fortunes within the
last thirty years. These successes have stimulated others to follow the
evil example; great capitals have been employed in the trade of illegal
insurances, and long practice has enabled these mischievous agents to
systematize their designs in so perfect a manner as to elude detection.
Their profits on the money received during each lottery are estimated
at 33⅓ per cent., clear of all expenses. From 7½ to 10 per cent. is
generally allowed to Morocco men, who go about soliciting persons to
insure. A very considerable portion of women who could write, and who
know a little of figures, are employed in this nefarious trade; and,
whenever any of them are convicted and imprisoned, there is generally
a stipulation with their principal that they shall be allowed two
guineas per week during the term of their imprisonment.”
[Illustration]
At all events, if their profits were great, they seem, according
to this illustration (date, October 5, 1780), to behave somewhat
generously to their clients, by paying quickly, and giving free
refreshment.
They were occasionally caught, but not always punished, as shown by the
following case. On March 1, 1773, a case came on to be tried before
Lord Mansfield, at the Guildhall, wherein the Lord Mayor was plaintiff,
and Messrs. Barnes and Golightly were defendants, in order to determine
the legality of insuring lottery tickets; but, on account of an error
in the declaration, the plaintiff was nonsuited.
On June 26, 1775, a case was tried in the Court of Common Pleas,
Guildhall, between a gentleman, plaintiff, and a lottery-office keeper,
who was the defendant. The cause of the action was as follows: The
gentleman, passing by the lottery office, observed a woman and boy
crying, on which he asked the reason of their tears; they informed him
that they had insured a number in the lottery on the over-night, and,
upon inquiry at another office, found it to have been drawn five days
before, and, therefore, wanted their money returned. The gentleman,
taking their part, was assaulted and beaten by the office-keeper, for
which the jury gave a verdict for the gentleman, with five pounds
damages.
In July, 1778, Lord Mansfield, at the Guildhall, tried a case in which
a merchant was plaintiff, and a lottery-office keeper defendant.
The action was brought for suffering a young man, the plaintiff’s
apprentice, to insure with the defendant during the drawing of the
last lottery, contrary to the statute, whereby the youth lost a
considerable sum, the property of the merchant. The jury, without going
out of court, gave a verdict for the plaintiff, thereby subjecting the
defendant to pay £500 penalty, and to three months’ imprisonment.
About the beginning of January, 1785, several lottery-office keepers
were convicted, before the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, in penalties of £50
each, for insuring numbers, contrary to law; and, in Trinity Term, the
following cause was tried at Westminster, before Lord Loughborough.
A lottery-office keeper near Charing Cross was plaintiff, and the
Sheriff of Middlesex defendant. The action was to recover one thousand
five hundred and sixty-six pounds, levied by the Sheriff, about a year
past, on the plaintiff’s goods, by virtue of three writs of _fieri
facias_, issued from the Court of King’s Bench. It seems that the
above plaintiff was convicted in three penalties of five hundred pounds
each, for insuring lottery tickets; but, previous to the trials coming
on, for some indulgence, he had, by himself or agents, consented not
to bring any writ of error, and an order of _nisi prius_ was drawn up,
and served upon his attorney; notwithstanding which, three writs of
error were sued out. The Court of Queen’s Bench being then moved, made
an order that the executions should be levied according to the original
rule of Court; the Sheriff made the levy, and, the money being paid
and impounded in his hands, the above action was brought to get the
same returned. The novelty of the action caused much laughter among the
counsel; and, after a few minutes’ hearing, his lordship ordered the
plaintiff to be nonsuited.
I cannot leave the subject of insurance without mentioning an instance
of infatuation, recorded by Nelson in his “History of Islington.”
“Some years ago, this house and premises (_White Conduit House_) were
kept by Mr. Christopher Bartholomew, a person who inherited a good
fortune from his parents, and who brought much trade to the place, by
the taste he displayed in laying out the gardens and walks, and the
excellent manner in which he conducted the business of the house.
“This person, with every prospect of success and eminence in life, fell
a victim to an unconquerable itch for gambling in the lottery. At one
time the tea-gardens and premises, as also the Angel Inn at Islington,
were his freeholds; he rented land to the amount of £2000 a year in the
neighbourhood of Islington and Holloway; and was remarkable for having
the greatest quantity of haystacks of any grower in the neighbourhood
of London. At that time he is believed to have been worth £50,000, kept
his carriage and servants in livery; and, upon one occasion, having
been unusually successful at insuring in the lottery, gave a public
breakfast at his tea-gardens, '_to commemorate the Smiles of Fortune_,’
as it was expressed upon the tickets of admission to this _fête
champêtre_.
“He, at times, had some very fortunate hits in the lottery, and which,
perhaps, tended to increase the mania which hurried him to his ruin. He
has been known to spend upwards of 2000 guineas in a day for insurance,
to raise which, stack after stack of his immense crops of hay have been
cut down and hurried to market, as the readiest way to obtain the
supplies necessary for these extraordinary outgoings. Having at last
been obliged to part with his house from accumulated difficulties and
embarrassments, he passed the last thirteen years of his life in great
poverty, subsisting by the charity of those who knew his better days,
and the emolument he received as a juryman of the Sheriff’s Court for
the County.
“Still, his propensity to be engaged in this ruinous pursuit never
forsook him, and meeting, one day in the year 1807, with an old
acquaintance, he related to him a strong presentiment he entertained,
that, if he could purchase a particular number in the ensuing lottery
(which he was not then in a position to accomplish), it would prove
successful. His friend, after remonstrating with him on the impropriety
of persevering in a practice that had already been attended with such
evil consequences, was at last persuaded to go halves with him in a
sixteenth part of the favourite number, which, being procured, was most
fortunately drawn a prize of £20,000. With the money arising from this
extraordinary turn of fortune, he was prevailed upon by his friends to
purchase an annuity of £60 _per annum_; yet, fatally addicted to the
pernicious habit of insurance, he disposed of it, and lost it all. He
has been known frequently to apply to those persons who had been served
by him in his prosperity, for an old coat, or some other article of
cast-off apparel; and, not many days before he died, he solicited a few
shillings to buy him necessaries.
“A gentleman in his manners, with a mind rather superior to the
generality of men, he, at one time, possessed the esteem of all who
knew him; but was reduced from a state of affluence and respectability
to wretchedness and want, by following that baneful practice, which,
in spite of all laws made to the contrary, will ever exist whilst the
Government continues to resort to the unwise expedient of inducing the
individual to pay £20 for the liberty of gambling for £10. Let his fate
be a warning to all ranks, particularly to those engaged in trade, not
to engage in a pursuit which will, ultimately, be their ruin; and,
when tempted to insure, let them remember the fate of Bartholomew. He
died in a two-pair-of-stairs room, in Angel Court, Windmill Street,
Haymarket, in March, 1809, aged 68.”