On the day of execution the friends of the families of the unfortunate
men who were executed met at a public-house, and after some discussion
upon the subject of raising a subscription for the wives and children
of those who were transported, as well as of those who were hanged,
adopted a resolution to apply through Lord Sidmouth for leave to take
away the bodies of the deceased from Newgate.
The following petition was accordingly drawn up, in the names of the
widows of the wretched criminals, and forwarded to Lord Sidmouth, to be
by him delivered to his majesty:
_To His Most Gracious Majesty the King._
“SIRE,
“The Petition of Susan Thistlewood, Mary Tidd, Mary Brunt, Celia
Ings, and Sarah Davidson, humbly sheweth, That your Petitioners
are the widows of the unfortunate men who this morning suffered
the dreadful sentence of the law at the Old Bailey.
“Your petitioners most earnestly entreat your Majesty to grant
them one consolation, by restoring to them the mangled remains
of their late unfortunate husbands, that they, your petitioners,
may shed a silent tear over their mutilated remains, ere they are
consigned to the tomb.
“We are confident that all desire of further vengeance has ceased,
and that your Majesty will be graciously pleased to order the
restoration of the bodies to your humble Petitioners, that they
may have them decently interred; and your Petitioners will, as in
duty bound, for ever pray, _&c._
(Signed)
“SUSAN THISTLEWOOD,
“MARY TIDD,
“MARY BRUNT,
“CELIA INGS,
“SARAH DAVIDSON.”
The petition was accompanied by a request to his Lordship that the
bodies might be given up to the friends of the deceased, and stating,
that the object was the humane one of raising the means of support for
the wives and children by a public exhibition.
It is almost unnecessary to state that Lord Sidmouth did not hesitate
to refuse the request, a compliance with which would be attended with
great inconvenience at least. His lordship stated, in the mildest
terms, the impossibility of granting it, contrary as such compliance
would be to established usage.
At a late hour in the evening, the wives of the executed men were
informed by the keeper of Newgate, that the bodies of their husbands
were buried.
In the course of the afternoon a channel had been dug alongside of the
subterraneous passage that leads to the cells, and, about seven in
the evening, after the coffins had been filled with quick lime, they
were strongly screwed up, placed in a line with each other, strewed
over with earth, and finally covered with stones, and of course no
trace of their end remains for any future public observation. On this
circumstance being communicated to their unhappy wives, they were
entirely overcome by the poignancy of their feelings.
On the following morning an individual petition was forwarded to the
Privy-Council on the part of Mrs. Thistlewood, and was presented to
his Majesty, for the body of her husband. A laconic answer was almost
immediately returned, “That Thistlewood was buried.”
_Transportation of the respited Traitors, Discharge of the suspected
Persons, &c._
VERY early in the morning of Tuesday, the 2d of May, the day following
the execution of their partners in crime, five of the respited
traitors, namely, Wilson, Harrison, Cooper, Strange, and Bradburn, were
removed from Newgate in three post-chaises, and conveyed under a proper
escort to Portsmouth, where they were put on board a convict-ship,
which soon after sailed for New South Wales.
Gilchrist was still detained in Newgate, but it was expected his
confinement would not be of long duration; the peculiar circumstances
of his case having excited a feeling of mercy towards him.
On Saturday the 6th of May, the following persons, whose arrests on
suspicion we have previously mentioned, were placed at the bar of the
Old Bailey, previous to the adjournment of the court, _viz._ Thomas
Preston, William Simmons, Abel Hall, Robert George, William Firth, and
William Hazard. The prisoners being addressed by order of the court,
and informed that, as no prosecutors appeared against them, they were
discharged, bowed respectfully, and departed, with the exception of
Preston, who made an attempt to address the Court, but was immediately
silenced.
We have now completed, as far as the individuals arrested were
concerned, our narration of the whole of the proceedings relative
to the horrid conspiracy, which at one time threatened such awful
consequences; but as many circumstances connected with the personal
history of the conspirators have been brought to light in the course of
the proceedings, which could not well be interwoven in the history of
their crimes, we have added in an APPENDIX such particulars respecting
the principal actors in this dreadful tragedy, as we have been able to
collect, from a conviction that every circumstance connected with the
lives of the ferocious criminals will be considered as interesting.
The infamous Spy and instigator, GEORGE EDWARDS, has also been
frequently named as playing a very prominent part in this horrid
drama, and, independent of the disclosures of his criminal conduct,
incidentally made in the course of the judicial proceedings against the
conspirators, the answers given by Thistlewood to the questions put to
him by Mr. Alderman Wood, on the morning of the fatal first of May,
imparted a certain degree of interest to every circumstance connected
with that vile character, and a feeling of indignation, horror, and
disgust, was excited in the public mind relative to this consummate
villain, which had never been equalled but in the sensation caused by
the first discovery of the plot itself.
Consonant with these feelings were the proceedings instituted by Mr.
Alderman Wood, both in and out of Parliament, for the apprehension and
bringing to trial of this worthless wretch on charges of diverse acts
of high treason alleged to have been committed by him; and although we
stop not to inquire whether the protection from the consequences of his
crimes, experienced by this fellow, be justifiable, or otherwise, we
shall certainly be rendering an acceptable service to society and to
future generations, in tracing this serpent through all his intricate
paths of villany, and cautioning the thoughtless and unsuspecting from
becoming the dupes of similar villains, (if any such exist) in their
intemperate moments of political animosity.
With this view we have collected all the particulars attainable of the
conduct of this arch-fiend both in public or private, as an appropriate
addition to the lives of his partners in crime, and, perhaps, in some
respects, the victims of his villany.