Though all offences against the laws of God and the land are highly
criminal in themselves, as well as fatal in their consequences, yet
there is certainly some degree in guilt; and petty thieveries and crimes
of a like nature seem to fall very short in comparison of the atrocious
guilt of murder and the imbrueing one's hands in blood, more especially
when a crime of so deep a dye in itself is heightened by aggravating
circumstances.
Matthias Brinsden, who is to be the subject of our present narration,
was a man in tolerable circumstances at the time the misfortune happened
to him for which he died. He had several children by his wife whom he
murdered, and with whom he had lived in great uneasiness for a long
time. The deceased Mrs. Brinsden was a woman of a great spirit, much
addicted to company and not a little to drinking. This had occasioned
many quarrels between her and her husband on the score of those
extravagancies she was guilty of, Mr. Brinsden thinking it hard that she
should squander away his money when he had a large family, and scarce
knew how to maintain it.
Their quarrels frequently rose to such a height as to alarm the
neighbourhood, the man being of a cruel, and the woman of an obstinate
temper, and it seemed rather a wonder that the murder had not ensued
before than that it happened when it did, they seldom falling out and
fighting without drawing blood, or having some grievous accident or
other happening therefrom. Once he burnt her arms with a red-hot iron,
and but a week before her death he ran a great pair of scissors into her
skull, which covered her with blood, and made him and all who saw her
think he had murdered her then. But after bleeding prodigiously she came
a little to herself, and on the application of proper remedies
recovered. Brinsden, in the meanwhile fled, and was hardly prevailed
with to return, upon repeated assurances that she was in no danger,
promising himself that if she escaped with life then, he would never
suffer himself to be so far transported with passion as to do her an
injury again.
The fatal occasion of that quarrel which produced the immediate death of
the woman, warm with liquor, and in the midst of passion, and which soon
after brought on a shameful and ignominious end to the man himself,
happened by Mrs. Brinsden's drinking cheerfully with some company at
home, and after their going away, demanding of her husband what she
should have for supper? He answered, bread and cheese; to which the
deceased replied that she thought bread and cheese once a day was
enough, and as she had eaten it for dinner, she would not eat it for
supper. Brinsden said, she should have no better than the rest of his
family, who were like to be contented with the same, except his eldest
daughter for whom he had provided a pie, and towards whom on all
occasions he showed a peculiar affection, occasioned as he said, from
the care she took of his other children and of his affairs, though
malicious and ill-natured people gave out that it sprang from a much
worse and, indeed, the basest of reasons.
On the discourse I have mentioned between him and his wife, Mrs.
Brinsden in a violent passion declared she would go to the general shop
and sup with her friends, who were gone from her but a little before.
He, therefore, having got between her and the door, having the knife in
his hand with which he cut the bread and cheese, and she still
persisting with great violence in endeavouring to go out, he threw her
down with one hand and stabbed her with the other. This is the account
of this bloody action as it was sworn against him at his trial by his
own daughter, though he persisted in it that what she called throwing
down was only gently laying her on the bed after she received the blow,
which as he averred happened only by chance, and her own pressing
against him as the knife was in his hand. However that was, he sent for
basilicon and sugar to dress the wound, in hopes she might at least
recover so far as to declare there was no malice between them, but those
endeavours were in vain, for she never spoke after.
In the meanwhile, Brinsden took occasion during the bustle that this sad
accident occasioned, and fled to one Mr. Kegg's at Shadwell Dock, where,
though for some small space he continued safe, yet the terrors and
apprehensions he was under were more choking and uneasy than all the
miseries he experienced after his being taken up. Such is the weight of
blood, and such the dreadful condition of the wicked.
At his trial he put on an air of boldness and intrepidity, saying that
though the clamour of the town was very strong against him, yet he hoped
it would not make an impression to his disadvantage on the jury, since
the death of his wife happened with no premeditated design. The surgeon
who examined the wound, having deposed that it was six inches deep, he
objected to his evidence by observing that the knife, when produced in
Court, was not quite so long. He pleaded also, very strongly, the
insupportable temper of his wife, and said she was of such a disposition
that nothing would do with her but blows. But all this signifying
little, the evidence of this daughter appearing also full and direct
against him, the jury showed very small regard to his excuses, and after
a short reflection on the evidence, they found him guilty.
Under sentence he behaved himself indolently and sottishly, doing
nothing but eat his victuals and doze in his bed; thinking it at the
same time a very great indignity that he should be obliged to take up
with those thieves and robbers who were in the same state of
condemnation with himself, always behaving himself towards then very
distantly, and as if it would have been a great debasement to him if he
had joined with them in devotion.
His daughter who had borne witness against him at his trial, came to him
at chapel and begged his forgiveness, even for having testified the
truth. At first he turned away from her with much indignation; the
second day she came, after great entreaty and persuasion of his friends,
he at last muttered out, _I forgive you._ But the girl coming the third
day and earnestly desiring he would kiss her, which at first he refused,
and at last turning to her and weeping lamentably, he took her in his
arms, and said: _For Christ's sake, my child, forgive me. I have robbed
you of your own mother. Be a good child, rather die than steal, never be
in a passion, but curb your anger. Honour your mistress, for she will be
both a father and a mother to you. Pray for your father and think of him
as well as you can._
At the place of execution he composed himself to suffer with as much
patience as he could, and while the rest threw books and handkerchiefs
to their friends, he seemed wrapped up in a profound meditation, out of
which he drew himself as soon as prayers began and assisted with much
cheerfulness and attention. When they were ended he stood up and
desiring the Ordinary to repeat after him the following speech, which he
dictated word for word as I have transcribed it, seeming most
passionately affected with the reflection the world had cast on himself
and daughter, as my readers will perceive from the speech itself. After
the making of which, he was immediately turned off, on the sixteenth of
July, 1722.