There cannot be a greater misfortune than to want education, except it
be the having a bad one. The minds of young persons are generally
compared to paper on which we may write whatever we think fit, but if it
be once blurred and blotted with improper characters, it becomes much
harder to impress proper sentiments thereon, because those which were
first there must be totally erased. This seems to have been too much the
case with the unhappy person of whom the thread of these narrations
requires that I should speak, viz., Captain Stanley.
This unhappy young gentleman was the son of an officer in the army who
married the sister of Mr. Palmer, of Duce Hill, in Essex, where she was
brought to bed of this unfortunate son John, in the year 1698. The first
rudiments he received were those of cruelty and blood, his father at
five years old often parrying and thrusting him with a sword, pricking
him himself and encouraging other officers to play with him in the same
manner, so that his boy, as old Stanley phrased it, might never be
afraid of a point--a wretched method of bringing up a child and which
was highly likely to produce the sad end he came to.
He served afterwards in the army with his father in Spain and Portugal,
where he suffered hardships enough, but they did not very much affect
him, who acquired by his hopeful education so savage a temper as to
delight in nothing so much as trampling on the dead carcasses in the
fields after an engagement.
Returning into England with his father, old Stanley had the misfortune
to slab a near relation of my Lord Newbury's, in the Tilt Yard,[34] for
which he was committed prisoner to Newgate. Afterwards being released
and commanded into Ireland, he carried over with him this son John and
procured for him an ensign's commission in a regiment there. Poor young
Stanley's sprightly temper gained him abundance of acquaintance and (if
it be not to profane the name) of friends amongst the young rakes in
Ireland, some of whom were persons of very great quality, and had such
an affection for him as to continue their visits and relieve his
necessities when under his last misfortunes in Newgate. But such company
involving him at that time in expenses he was no way able to support, he
was obliged shortly to part for ready money with his ensign's
commission, which gave his father great pain and uneasiness.
Not long after, he came again into England and to London, where he
pursued the same methods, though his father importuned him to apply to
General Stanhope, as a person he was sure would assist him, having been
always a friend to their family, and particularly to old Stanley
himself. But Jack was become a favourite with the ladies, and had taken
an easier road to what he accounted happiness, living either upon the
benevolence of friends, the fortune of the dice, or the favours of the
sex. A continual round of sensual delights employed his time, and he was
so far from endeavouring to attain any other commission or employment in
order to support him, that there was nothing he so much feared as his
being obliged to quit that life he loved; for old Stanley was
continually soliciting for him, and as he had very good interest,
nothing but his son's notorious misbehaviour made him not prevail. In
the current of his extravagancies Jack fixed himself often upon young
men coming into the world, and under pretence of being their tutor in
the fashionable vices of the town, shared in their pleasures and helped
them squander their estates.
Of this stamp was a gay young Yorkshire squire, who by the death of an
uncle and by the loss of his father while a boy, had had so little
education as not to know how to use it. Him Stanley got hold of, and
persuaded him that nothing was so advantageous to a young gentleman as
travel, and drew him to make a tour of Flanders and Holland in his
company. Though a very wild young fellow, Stanley gave a very tolerable
account of the places, especially the fortifications which he had seen,
and sufficiently demonstrated how capable he might have been of making
an exalted figure in the world, if due care had been taken to furnish
him with any principles in his youth. But the neglect of that undid him,
and every opportunity which he afterwards had of acquiring anything,
instead of making him an accomplished gentleman, did him mischief. Thus
his journey to Paris in company with the afore-mentioned gentleman
helped him to an opportunity of learning to fence to the greatest
perfection, so that the skill he was sensible he had in the sword made
him ever ready to quarrel and seek occasions to use it.
Amongst the multitude of his amours he became acquainted and
passionately fond of one Mrs. Maycock, whose husband was once an eminent
tradesman upon Ludgate Hill. By her he had a child of which also he was
very fond. This woman was the source of the far greater part of his
misfortunes, for when his father had procured him a handsome commission
in the service of the African Company, and he had received a
considerable sum of money for his voyage, appearing perfectly satisfied
himself, and behaving in so grave and decent a manner as filled his
family and relations with very agreeable hopes, they were all blasted by
Mrs. Maycock's coming with her child to Portsmouth, where he was to
embark. She so far prevailed upon his inclinations as to get him to give
her one half of the Company's money and to return to town with the other
half himself. On his coming up to London he avoided going to his
father's, who no sooner heard how dishonourably his son had behaved, but
laying it more to heart than all the rest of his misfortunes, grief in a
short time put an end to them all by his death.
When the news of it came to young Stanley, he fell into transports of
grief and passion, which as many of his intimate companions said, so
disturbed his brain that he never afterwards was in a right temper.
This, indeed, appeared by several accidents, some of which were sworn at
his trial, particularly that while he lodged in the house of Mr.
Underhill, somebody having quoted a sentence of Latin in his company, he
was so disturbed at the thoughts of his having had such opportunities of
acquiring the knowledge of that language and yet continuing ignorant
thereof, through his negligence and debauchery, that it made at that
time so strong an impression on his spirits, that starting up, he drew
a penknife and attempted to stab himself, without any other cause of
passion. At other times he would fall into sudden and grievous rages,
either at trifles, or at nothing at all, abuse his best friends, and
endeavour to injure himself, and then coming to a better temper, begged
them to forgive him, for he did not know what he did.
During the latter part of his life, his circumstances were so bad that
he was reduced to doing many dirty actions which I am persuaded
otherwise would not have happened, such as going into gentlemen's select
companies at taverns, without any other ceremony than telling them that
his impudence must make him welcome to a dinner with them, after which,
instead of thanking them for their kindness, he would often pick a
quarrel with them, though strangers, drawing his sword and fighting
before he left the room. Such behaviour made him obnoxious to all who
were not downright debauchees like himself, and hindered persons of rank
conversing with him as they were wont.
In the meantime his favourite Mrs. Maycock, whom he had some time lived
with as a wife and even prevailed with his mother to visit her as such,
being no longer able to live at his rate, or bear with his temper,
frequented a house in the Old Bailey, where it was supposed, and perhaps
with truth, that she received other company. This made Stanley very
uneasy, who like most young rakes thought himself at liberty to pursue
as many women as he pleased, but could not forgive any liberties taken
by a woman whom he, forsooth, had honoured with his affections.
One night therefore, seeing her in Fleet Street with a man and a woman,
he came up to her and gently tapped her on the shoulder. She turning,
cried, _What! My dear Captain!_ And so on they went walking to his house
in the Old Bailey. There some words happened about the mutual
misfortunes they had brought upon one another. Mrs. Maycock reproached
him with seducing her, and bringing on all the miseries she had ever
felt; Stanley reflected on her hindering his voyage to Cape Coast, the
extravagant sums he had spent upon her, and her now conversing with
other men, though she had had three or four children by him. At last
they grew very high, and Mrs. Maycock, who was naturally a very
sweet-tempered woman, was so far provoked, as Stanley said, that she
threw a cup of beer at him; upon which some ill-names passing between
them, Stanley drew his sword and stabbed her between the breasts eight
inches deep; immediately upon which he stopped his handkerchief into the
wound.
He was quickly secured and committed to Wood Street Compter,[35] where
he expressed very little concern at what had happened, laughing and
giving himself abundance of airs, such as by no means became a man in
his condition. On his commitment to Newgate, he seemed not to abate the
least of that vivacity which was natural to his temper, and as he had
too much mistaken vice for the characteristic of a fine gentleman, so
nothing appeared to him so great a testimony of gallantry and courage as
behaving intrepidly while death was so near its approach. He therefore
entertained all who conversed with him in the prison, and all who
visited him from without, with the history of his amours and the favours
that had been bestowed on him by a multitude of fine ladies. Nay, his
vanity and impudence was so great as to mention some of their names, and
especially to asperse two ladies who lived near Cheapside Conduit.[36]
But there is great reason to believe that part of this was put on to
make his madness more probable at his trial, where he behaved very
oddly, and when he received sentence of death, took snuff at the bar,
and put on abundance of airs that were even ridiculous anywhere, and
shocking and scandalous upon so melancholy an occasion.
After sentence, his carriage under his confinement altered not so much
as one would have expected; he offering to lay wagers that he should
never be hanged, notwithstanding his sentence, for he was resolved not
to die like a dog on a string, when he had it in his power always to go
out of the world a nobler way, by which he meant either a knife or
opium, which were the two methods by one of which he resolved to prevent
his fate. But when he found that all his pretences of madness were like
to produce nothing, and that he was in danger of dying in every respect
like a brute, he laid aside much of his ill-timed gaiety, and began to
think of preparing for death after another manner.
These gentlemen who assisted him while in Newgate, were so kind as to
offer to make up a considerable sum of money, if it could have been of
any use; but finding that neither that nor their interest could do
anything to save him, they frankly acquainted him therewith and begged
him not to delude himself with false hopes. All the while he was in
Newgate, a little boy whom he had by Mrs. Maycock, continued with him,
and lay constantly in his bosom. He manifested the utmost tenderness
and concern for that poor child, who by his rashness had been deprived
of his mother, and whom the Law would, by its just sentence, now
likewise deprive of its father. Being told that Mr. Bryan, Mrs.
Maycock's brother on Tower Hill was dead, merely through concern at his
sister's misfortunes and the deplorable end that followed them, Stanley
clapped his hands together and cried, _What, more death still? Sure I am
the most unfortunate wretch that was ever born._
Some few days before his execution, talking to one of his friends, he
said, _I am perfectly convinced that it is false courage to avoid the
just sentence of the Law, by executing the rash dictates of one's rage
by one's own head. I am heartily sorry for the rash expression I have
been guilty of, of that sort, and am determined to let the world see my
courage fails me no more in my death than it has done in my life; and,
my dear friend_, added he, _I never felt so much ease, quiet and
satisfaction in all my life, as I have experienced, since my coming to
this resolution._
But though he sometimes expressed himself in a serious and religious
manner yet passion would sometimes break in upon him to the last and
make him burst out into frightful and horrid speeches. Then again he
would grow calm and cool, and speak with great seeming sense of God's
providence in his afflictions.
He was particularly affected with two accidents which happened to him
not long before his death, and which struck him with great concern at
the time they happened. The first of these was a fall from his horse
under Tyburn, in which he was stunned so that he could not recover
strength enough to remount, but was helped on his horse again by the
assistance of two friends. Not long after which, he had as bad an
accident of the same kind under Newgate, which he said, made such an
impression on him, that he did not go abroad for many mornings
afterwards, without recommending himself in the most serious manner to
the Divine protection.
Another story he also told, with many marks of real thankfulness for the
narrow escape he then made from death, which happened thus. At a
cider-cellar in Covent Garden he fell out with one Captain Chickley, and
challenging him to fight in a dark room, they were then shut up together
for some space. But a constable being sent for by the people of the
house, and breaking the door open, delivered him from being sent
altogether unprepared out of the world, Chickley being much too hard for
him, and having given him a wound quite through the body, himself
escaping with only a slight cut or two.
As the day of execution drew near, Mr. Stanley appeared more serious
and much more attentive to his devotions than hitherto he had been. Yet
could he not wholly contain himself even then, for the Sunday before he
died, after sermon, at which he had behaved himself decently and
modestly, he broke out into this wild expression, that he was only sorry
he had not fired the whole house where he killed Mrs. Maycock. When he
was reproved for these things he would look ashamed, and say, 'twas
true, they were very unbecoming, but they were what he could not help,
arising from certain starts in his imagination that hurried him into a
short madness, for which he was very sorry as soon as he came to
himself.
At the place of execution, to which he was conveyed in a mourning coach,
he turned pale, seemed uneasy, and complained that he was very sick,
entreating a gentleman by him to support him with his hand. He desired
to be unbound that he might be at liberty to pray kneeling, which with
some difficulty was granted. He then applied himself to his devotions
with much fervency, and then submitted to his fate, but when the cap was
drawn over his eyes he seemed to shed tears abundantly. Immediately
before he was turned off he said his friends had provided a hearse to
carry away his body and he hoped nobody would be so cruel as to deny his
relations his dead limbs to be interred, adding, that unless he were
assured of this, he could not die in peace.
Such was the end of a young man in person and capacity every way fitted
to have made a reputable figure in the world, if either his natural
principles, or his education had laid any restraint upon his vices; but
as his passions hurried him beyond all bounds, so they brought a just
end upon themselves, by finishing a life spent in sensual pleasures with
an ignominious death, which happened at Tyburn in the twenty-fifth year
of his age, on the 23rd of December, 1722.