Madam,
I crave leave, with all humility and respect, to address you and
Madam Ellis, and with the utmost submission and concern, do humbly
beg your pardons for the fears and surprise my misfortunes reduced
me to put you and the children into, whose cries moved so much
compassion in me that I had not power to pursue with any rigour my
desperate designs, which your ladyship must have perceived by the
consternation I was struck into on a sudden. My sole intention was,
if I could have got £50 to settle myself in a public house, and to
take up an honest course of life, and do own at best it is a very
heinous crime. Yet, madam, you will recollect after what manner I
treated you, and at the same time consider the methods taken by
others on the like occasion. This necessity I was drove to, by
adhering to a certain master I lately served, and to obey his wicked
and pernicious commands, in following his wicked and pernicious
counsels, brought me to poverty, and consequently to this unhappy
state I now labour under, and was become almost as much as himself,
the scorn and hatred of mankind. I say, madam, if you will be so
good as to consider all these unhappy circumstances, and that
necessity admits of no contradiction, they will, I am persuaded,
inspire compassion in generous souls (a character you both
deservedly bear); and as a fellow-creature, I beg mercy at your
ladyship's hands, by signing a petition to the Recorder for me, to
the end, he may be induced to make a favourable report, and thereby
move his most sacred Majesty to clemency, by the sentence to some
other corporal punishment, and shall dedicate the rest of my days in
praying for both your happiness and prosperity in this world, and
eternal felicity and bliss in that to come, and crave leave, with
due deference, madam, to subscribe myself,
Your ladyship's most devoted,
Afflicted humble servant,
John Everett
The Ordinary of Newgate, in the account he has given of this prisoner,
has drawn as bad a character as he is able, and in order to it, has
gathered together all the ill-terms he could think of, even though some
of them are contrary to one another. The truth is, that the fellow in
himself had abundance of ill-qualities, with some good ones, and
especially good nature of which he had a very large share. Lewd women
were what brought him to his ruin, for to their company he continually
addicted himself, and with his low intrigues amongst them is the book I
have mentioned stuffed from one end to the other.
As to religion, it is certain he had very little of it before he was
confined, so it is not very likely that he should make any great
proficiency while he remained there. He was careless, indeed, under his
misfortunes, but did not give himself up to any loose or profane
expressions, but on the contrary attended at Chapel with decency at
least, if not with devotion.
Some attempts were made to save his life, by engaging him to make
discoveries in an affair of high concern, but all was ineffectual, and
he suffered on the 20th of February, 1729-30, with less apprehension
than might have been expected from a man under his unhappy
circumstances. The executioner, to put the prisoner sooner out of his
pain, jumped upon his shoulders, and thereby broke the rope, but he was
soon tied up again, and there remained until the rest were cut down.
At the time of his execution, he was forty-four years of age or
thereabouts.