Carousing," these characters are intensely dramatic in their
attitudes; but the carousing highwaymen are unexpectedly wooden;
although they look capable of being daredevil fellows when the generous
wine, or the old ale—whichever it may be—has done its work. Even the
"Maid of the Inn" is a creature of romance.
[Illustration: MAID OF THE INN.
(_Skelt._)]
[Illustration: HIGHWAYMEN CAROUSING.
(_Skelt._)]
Although Ainsworth invented Turpin's Ride to York, he certainly did
not invent Black Bess, nor did he conceive the ride as an attempt to
establish an _alibi_; for he shows him hotly pursued by the officers of
the law, nearly all the way. In Ainsworth's pages you find no reason
why the ride should have been undertaken. I have elsewhere remarked
that Ainsworth invented Black Bess, as well as robbed Swiftnicks of
the glory of the ride; but a further acquaintance with the literature
of the early part of the nineteenth century discloses the curious
fact that Horace Smith in 1825, in a volume entitled _Gaieties and
Gravities_, included a story called "Harry Halter," in which that
highwayman hero is represented as sitting at the "Wig and Water
Spaniel," in Monmouth Street, with his friends of the same persuasion,
Ned Noose, and Old Charley Crape, and singing the ballad of
TURPIN AND THE BISHOP
Bold Turpin upon Hounslow Heath
His black mare Bess bestrode,
When he saw a Bishop's coach and four
Sweeping along the road;
He bade the coachman stop, but he,
Suspecting of the job,
His horses lash'd—but soon roll'd off,
With a brace of slugs in his nob.
Galloping to the carriage-door,
He thrust his face within,
When the Chaplain said—"Sure as eggs is eggs,
That is the bold Turpin."
Quoth Turpin, "You shall eat your words
With sauce of leaden bullet";
So he clapp'd his pistol to his mouth,
And fired it down his gullet.
The Bishop fell upon his knees,
When Turpin bade him stand,
And gave him his watch, a bag of gold,
And six bright rings from his hand.
Rolling with laughter, Turpin pluck'd
The Bishop's wig from his head,
And popp'd it on the Chaplain's poll,
As he sate in the corner dead.
Upon the box he tied him then,
With the reins behind his back,
Put a pipe in his mouth, the whip in his hand,
And set off the horses, smack!
Then whisper'd in his black mare's ear,
Who luckily wasn't fagg'd,
"You must gallop fast and far, my dear,
Or I shall be surely scragg'd."
He never drew bit, nor stopp'd to bait,
Nor walk'd up hill or down,
Until he came to Gloucester's gate,
Which is the Assizes town.
Full eighty miles in one dark night,
He made his black mare fly,
And walk'd into Court at nine o'clock
To swear an Alibi.
A hue and cry the Bishop raised,
And so did Sheriff Foster,
But stared to hear that Turpin was
By nine o'clock at Gloucester.
So all agreed it couldn't be him,
Neither by hook nor crook;
And said that the Bishop and Chaplain was
Most certainly mistook.
Here we certainly find Black Bess, not treated to two capital letters,
and only referred to as "his black mare Bess" (it was reserved for
Ainsworth to discover the worth of the alliteration and the demand it
made for two capital B's), but we thus have traced the invention of
that coal-black steed one remove further back, and there it must rest,
for a time, at any rate.
It seems pretty clear that Smith was acquainted with the exploit of
Swiftnicks, but why he transferred the ride to Turpin, and the purpose
of establishing an _alibi_ to Gloucester, does not appear, unless
indeed he wanted a rhyme to "Foster."
[Illustration: INNKEEPER.
(_Skelt._)]
Dickens, who wrote _Pickwick_ in 1836, eleven years after _Gaieties
and Gravities_ was published, had evidently read Smith's book, for
in Chapter XLIII. we find Sam Weller represented as singing to the
coachman a condensed and greatly altered version, beginning:
Bold Turpin vunce, on Hounslow Heath
His bold mare Bess bestrode—er;
Ven there he see'd the Bishop's coach
A-coming along the road—er.
That Swiftnicks actually performed the famous ride was generally
believed, as elsewhere described in these pages; and unless any
later evidence can be adduced to deprive him of the credit, he must
continue to enjoy it. But it is curious to note that riding horseback
between York and London under exceptional circumstances has often been
mentioned. A prominent instance is the wager accepted by John Lepton,
esquire to James the First, that he would ride six times between London
and York on six consecutive days. Fuller, in his _Worthies_, tells us
all about it. He first set out on May 20th, 1606, from Aldersgate,
London, and completed the journey before nightfall, returning the next
day; and so on until he had won the wager, "to the great praise of his
strength in acting, than to his discretion in undertaking it," says
Fuller, with an unwonted sneer.
Turpin was certainly described in his own lifetime as "the noted," "the
renowned," "the famous," but those were merely newspaper phrases, and
the notability, the renown, or the fame commented upon in to-day's
paper is, we are by way of seeing in our own age, the oblivion of next
week. The _London Magazine_, commenting briefly on his execution,
styles him a "mean and stupid wretch," and that estimate of him is
little likely ever to be revised, although it may readily and justly
be amplified by the epithets "brutal" and "cowardly." The brutalities
of himself and his associates kept the suburbs of London for a while
in terror, but he evidently had made little impression on the mind
of Captain Charles Johnson, whose book on _The General History of
Highwaymen_, published in 1742, three years after Turpin's execution,
has no mention of him.
Yet, side by side with these facts, we are confronted with the
undoubted immediate ballad fame he acquired in the north, of which here
are two pitiful specimen verses:
For shooting of a dunghill cock
Poor Turpin he at last was took;
And carried straight into a jail,
Where his misfortune he does bewail,
O rare Turpin hero,
O rare Turpin O!
Now some do say that he will hang—
Turpin the last of all the gang;
I wish the cock had ne'er been hatched,
For like a fish in the net he's catched.
Pedlars hawked these untutored productions widely over the country,
and it will be noticed with some amusement that, just as Robin Hood
had been made a popular ballad hero, robbing the rich to give to the
poor, and succouring the widow and the orphan, and just as Nevison had
been similarly enshrined, so Turpin, who would have been mean enough
to rob a poor man of his beer, a poor widow of her last groat, or to
steal a penny out of a blind man's pannikin (the worst of crimes), was
instantly converted into a blameless martyr. We may, however, readily
imagine the ill-treated Mr. Lawrence of Edgewarebury, rubbing his
roasted posteriors and vehemently dissenting from that estimate of
Turpin.
But the ballad-writers did not pretend to historical accuracy, or to
grammar, scansion, or anything but a rude way of appealing to the
feelings of the rustics, whose lives of unremitting toil for poor wages
embittered them more than they knew against the rich; to this extent,
that they imagined virtue resided solely in the lowly cot, and vice
and oppressive feelings exclusively in the lordly hall. Those who were
poor were virtuous, and the highwayman who emptied the pockets of the
rich performed a meritorious service. Hence ballads like the following
grievous example, in which Turpin appears, in spite of well-ascertained
facts, to have been executed at Salisbury:
TURPEN'S APPEAL TO THE JUDGE IN HIS DEFENCE; OR THE GEN'ROUS ROBBER
Printed and sold by J. Pitts, 6, Great St. Andrew Street, Seven
Dials
Come all you wild and wicked young men
A warning take by me,
A story now to you I'll tell
Of Turpen of Salisbury.
He was a wild and wicked blade
On the High road did he hie,
But at last was tried, and cast,
And condemn'd he was to die.
When before the Judge he came
And at the Bar he did stand,
For no pardon he did ask,
But boldly he held up his hand,
Declared the truth before the Judge
Who was to try him then:—
"I hope, my Lord, you'll pardon me,
I'm not the worst of men,
I the Scripture have fulfilled,
Tho' a wicked life I led,
When the naked I've beheld,
I've cloathed them and fed;
Sometimes in a Coat of Winter's pride,
Sometimes in a russet grey,
The naked I've cloathed, the hungry fed,
And the Rich I've sent empty away.
As I was riding out one day,
I saw a Prisoner going to Jail,
Because his debts he could not pay,
Or yet sufficient bail.
A true and faithful friend he found
In me that very day;
I paid the Creditor forty pounds
Which set the Prisoner free.
When he had my guineas bright,
He told them into his purse,
But I could not be satisfied:
To have 'em again I must.
Boldly I mounted my prancing steed,
And crossing a point of land,
There I met the Creditor,
And boldly bade him stand.
Sir, the debt you owe to me
Amounts to Forty pounds
Which I am resolved to have
Before I quit this ground.
I search'd his pockets all around,
And robb'd him of his store,
Wherein I found my forty pounds
And Twenty Guineas more.
What harm, my Lord Judge, he said,
What harm was there in this,
To Rob a Miser of his store,
By my stout heartedness.
I never rob'd or wrong'd the poor,
As it plainly does appear;
So I hope you'll pardon me
And be not too severe."
Then the Judge unto bold Turpen said
"Your stories are but in vain,
For by our laws you are condemn'd,
And must receive your pain.
Repent, repent, young man, he said,
For what is done and past,
You say the hungry you've cloathed and fed,
But you must die at last."
It is of course possible that this ballad was not meant for Dick Turpin
at all; for, so widespread in rural districts had his fame early grown,
that "Turpin" became almost a generic name for local highwaymen, just
as after Julius Cæsar all the Emperors of Rome were Cæsars. It was
a name to conjure with: and this no doubt goes some way to explain
the infinitely many alleged "Turpin's haunts" in widely separated
districts: places Turpin could not have found time to haunt, unless he
had been a syndicate.
Away down in Wiltshire, in the neighbourhood of Trowbridge, between
Keevil and Bulkington, and in a soggy level plain watered by an
affluent of the Wiltshire Avon, there stands in a wayside ditch a
hoary object called "Turpin's Stone," inscribed, in letters now almost
entirely obliterated,
Dick Turpin's dead and gone,
This Stone's set up to think upon.
[Illustration: TURPIN'S STONE.]
This curious wayside relic may be found on the boundary-line of the
parishes of Bulkington and Keevil, near a spot oddly named Brass Pan
Bridge, and standing in an evil-smelling ditch that receives the
drainage of the neighbouring pigsties. It is a battered and moss-grown
object, and its inscription, despite the local version of it given
above, is not really decipherable, as a whole. "Turpin" may be read,
easily enough, but if the word above it is meant for "Dick," why then
the sculptor of it spelled the name "Dicq," a feat of illiterate
ingenuity that rather staggers belief. Brake-loads of Wiltshire
archæologists have visited the spot in summer, when county antiquaries
mostly archælogise, and, braving typhoid fever, have descended into the
ditch and sought to unravel the mystery of this Sphinx: without result.
The village of Poulshot, birthplace of Thomas Boulter, a once-dreaded
highwayman, is not far off, and it is possible that Boulter, who had
a very busy and distinguished career on the highways of England in
general, and of Salisbury Plain in particular,[2] may have been named
locally "Dick Turpin," after the hero who died at York under tragical
circumstances, with the aid of a rope, in 1739. Boulter himself ended
in that way in 1778, at Winchester, and so the transference of names
was quite possible. He, it is significant to note, had a mare named
"Black Bess," which he stole in 1736 from Mr. Peter Delmé's stables at
Erle Stoke.
[2] See the "Exeter Road," pp. 217-228.
There are Turpin "relics" and associations at the "Spaniards," on
Hampstead Heath, and we find the _Times_ of August 22nd, 1838, saying:
"The rear of the houses on Holborn Bridge has for many years been the
receptacle for characters of the most daring and desperate condition.
There, in a secret _manège_ (now a slaughter-house for her species),
did Turpin suffer his favourite Black Bess to repose for many a
night previously to her disastrous journey to York." The _Times_ had
evidently swallowed the Ride to York story whole, and relished it.
Another, and more cautious commentator says, "He shot people like
partridges. Many wild and improbable stories are told of him, such as
his rapid ride to York, his horse chewing a beef-steak on the way; but,
setting these aside, he was hardy and cruel enough to shine as a mighty
malefactor. He seems, to quote the Newgate jest, to have been booked,
at his very birth, for the _Gravesend Coach_ that leaves at eight in
the morning."
"Many years ago," we read in Pink's _History of Clerkenwell_, "a small
leather portmanteau was found at the 'Coach and Horses' tavern, at
Hockley-in-the-Hole, with the ends of wood, large enough to contain a
change of linen, besides other little _etceteras_. On the inner side
of the lid, lightly cut in the surface of the leather, is the name,
'R. TVRPIN.' Whether or no this portmanteau (such an one as horsemen
formerly carried behind them, strapped to the saddle), belonged to that
famous highwayman," says Pink, "we will not attempt to decide."
[Illustration: PORTMANTEAU, FORMERLY BELONGING TO TURPIN, DISCOVERED AT
CLERKENWELL.]
But here there should not be much room for doubt. The relic was
probably genuine. It was illustrated in Pink's book, but the
whereabouts of it are not now known.
The irons worn by Turpin in his cell at York Castle are now preserved
in the York Museum, together with those used for Nevison. They have a
total weight of 28 lb.
WILLIAM PARSONS, THE BARONET'S SON
William Parsons, born in 1717, was the youngest son of a respectable
baronet, Sir William Parsons, of Nottingham; and was so well
connected that he could claim no less a personage than the Duchess of
Northumberland for aunt. Sent to Eton, to complete his education, he
left "Henry's holy shade" in considerable disfavour, and on a visit to
an uncle at Epsom so misconducted himself, that he was bidden never
show his face there again. His behaviour was no better at Cheshunt,
where another relative had the misfortune to receive him for a time.
He was then packed off to sea, as midshipman, aboard the _Drake_.
Returning at the end of a cruise to England, he continued in the gaming
habits he had early learnt, and, to provide funds for his amusements,
called upon his highly-placed aunt and stole a gold-mounted miniature
from her dressing-room. This he was obliged to sell for one-fourth its
value. We next find him at Buxton, stealing a gold-buckled pair of
shoes in the assembly-room belonging to a Mr. Graham, and realising on
them while the owner, vainly seeking, lost all his dances.
A cruise aboard the _Romney_ then took him to Newfoundland. He played
cards and cheated aboard ship, and acquired so bad a character that
it was plainly intimated the Navy was not his vocation and he had
better leave it. He accordingly left the service and soon found himself
deserted by his friends and without a stiver in his breeches pockets.
Realising his wild nature, his father thought it best to secure him
some post that should take him abroad for at least a few years, by
which time his hot blood might have cooled down. To this end, he
procured him a billet with the Royal African Company, on the West
Coast of that then very Dark Continent; but the scapegrace was soon
back in England, having quarrelled with the governor of James Fort on
the Gambia River, to whom he had been accredited. He landed even more
destitute, if possible, than before, and of necessity lived the simple
life, by existing for four whole days on three half-penny worth of
bread. The public fountains supplied him freely with water, wherewith
to wash down those frugal meals.
[Illustration: WILLIAM PARSONS.]
He dared make no more applications to his father for assistance, for
that father was then smarting at having paid £70 to redeem his honour
over a discreditable affair that had taken place in Africa, where the
reckless youth had forged a letter purporting to come from his aunt,
the Duchess, saying she would be answerable for any debts her nephew
might incur, up to that amount. It was folly of the worst, and most
unremunerative, kind, for that aunt, with whom he had originally been
a favourite, revoked the will she had made in his favour, and left the
£25,000, that would have come to him, to his sister.
It is evident that William Parsons was what would be called in modern
times a "degenerate." In 1740 he borrowed a large sum of money by a
pretence that he was his elder brother, who was the prospective owner
of a considerable legacy. He then succeeded in making a respectable
appearance for a time, and married a young lady of good family and
fortune. By that marriage he acquired a sum of £4,000, but his wife's
trustees, being not quite satisfied with him, took care to secure the
bulk of her property in such a manner that he could not touch it.
Entering the Army in 1741, as an ensign in a foot regiment, he embarked
upon an extravagant manner of living: obtained a quantity of gold and
silver plate from confiding tradesmen, and kept a large number of
servants. He could never resist the gaming-tables, and although himself
a rogue and a swindler, always found others there who proved more
finished than himself, and thoroughly fleeced him.
He would then turn to forgery, and successfully negotiate forged bills
under well-known names. The Duke of Cumberland's signature was used
for £500. Nothing came amiss to his perverse ingenuity; and he would
even, as an army officer, call upon tailors and pretend to having
a contract for the supply of uniforms. He would pocket a handsome
commission and receive the goods and sell them for what they would
fetch. To be his friend was to be marked down for being defrauded, and
often to be placed in the most embarrassing situations. Thus in 1745,
when the Jacobite rebellion was disturbing the country, he borrowed
a horse of a brother officer and rode away with it, intending to
desert to the rebels. But, thinking better of it, he went no further
than Clerkenwell, where he sold the horse. The late owner was, in
consequence, arrested on charges of desertion and high treason, and
things might quite conceivably have gone hard with him.
Accounts of Parsons' next doings do not quite agree. By one of them
we learn that he went to Florida as a lieutenant, but according to
another and a more probable version, he was shipped to the plantations
in Virginia as a convict, who had been found guilty of forgery at
Maidstone Assizes, and sentenced to be transported. Family influence
had no doubt prevented his being hanged.
Working as a slave in the plantations belonging to Lord Fairfax, he
attracted the attention of that nobleman, who took him from the gang
of convicted malefactors, with whom, under strict supervision, he hoed
and delved under the blazing sun, and befriended him. It did not pay
to befriend William Parsons. He stole one of the best horses belonging
to his benefactor, and, going upon those early colonial roads, soon
accumulated, as a highwayman, a sufficient sum to buy himself a
passage back to old England.
By fraud, backed up with consummate assurance, he obtained £70 at his
port of landing, and came at once to London. A scheme for plundering
his sister, who by this time had succeeded to her aunt's legacy
of £25,000, then engaged his attention. He hatched a plot with a
discharged footman, for that man to pose as a gentleman of fortune, and
to make advances to her, and even to forcibly carry her off and marry
her against her will, if needs were. Some women servants were also in
the plot, and were even given duly signed bonds in £500 and lesser
sums, to lend their aid. The footman and Parsons were, in the event of
this scheme proving successful, to share the £25,000 in equal parts.
[Illustration: WILLIAM PARSONS.]
By a mere accident, the plot was discovered in a milliner's shop in the
West End, where a lady friend of Miss Parsons had pointed out to her a
finely dressed gentleman, "who was going to marry Miss Parsons." This
led to enquiries, and an exposure of the whole affair.
The last resource of this thorough-paced scoundrel was the road. He
chiefly affected the western suburbs and Hounslow Heath, and it was
in a robbery on that widespreading waste that he was captured. He
had obtained information that a servant, with a valise containing a
large sum in notes and gold, was to leave town and meet his master at
Windsor; and so set out to lie in wait for him. But he had already
been so active on the Heath that his face was too well known, and he
was recognised at Brentford by a traveller who had suffered from him
before. Following him into Hounslow Town, this former victim suddenly
raised an alarm and caused him to be seized. Taken to the "Rose and
Crown" inn, Parsons was recognised by the landlord and others, as one
who had for some time scoured the Heath and committed robberies. His
pistols were taken from him, and he was committed to Newgate, and in
the fulness of time tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. The
efforts of his family connections were again used to save him from the
gallows, and themselves from the stigma of it; but his career was too
notorious for further leniency, and he was hanged at Tyburn on February
11th, 1751.
WILLIAM PAGE
"There is always room on top" has long been the conclusive reply to
complaints of overcrowding in the professions. However many duffers may
already be struggling for a bare livelihood in them, there yet remains
an excellent career for the recruit with energy and new methods. The
profession of highwayman aptly illustrates the truth of these remarks.
It was shockingly over-crowded in the middle of the eighteenth century,
even though the duffers were generally caught in their initial efforts
and hanged; and really it is wonderful where all the wealth came from,
to keep such an army of "money-changers" in funds.
William Page, who for twelve years carried on a flourishing practice
in the "Stand and Deliver!" profession, was one of those few who
lived very near the top of it. His name is not so familiar as those
of Du Vall, Hind, Maclean, or Turpin, but not always do the really
eminent come down to us with their eminence properly acknowledged.
He was born about 1730, the son of a bargeman to a coal merchant at
Hampton-on-Thames. The bargeman was unfortunately drowned at Putney
in 1740, and his widow was reduced to eking out a meagre livelihood
by the distilling of waters from medicinal herbs. She is described
as "a notable industrious woman," and certainly it was not from her
example that William learned the haughty and offensive ways that
would not permit him long to keep any of the numerous situations he
took, after leaving the Charity School at Hampton, where he acquired
what small education he had. He started life as tapster's boy at
the "Bell" alehouse, in his native town, and thence changed to
errand-boy in the employment of "Mr. Mackenzie," apothecary. Soon his
youthful ambition took him to London, where he obtained a situation
in the printing-office of Woodfall, in Little Britain, who became in
after-years notorious as printer of the "Letters of Junius"; but "that
business being too great a confinement for his rambling temper, he
left it, and went footboy to Mr. Dalrymple, Scots Holland warehouse in
London."
He rapidly filled the situations of footman to one Mr. Hodges, in
Lincoln's Inn Fields; porter to a gentleman in Cork Street, and footman
to Mr. Macartney in Argyle Buildings. He then entered the service
of the Earl of Glencairn, but left that situation to become valet
to a certain Captain Jasper. Frequently discharged for "his proud
and haughty spirit, which would not brook orders from his masters,"
and prevented him, on the other hand, being on good terms with his
fellow-servants, he at last found himself unable to obtain another
place. This was a sad time for William Page. In service he had learned
extravagant habits, the love of fine clothes and the fascination of
gambling; but his arrogant ways had brought him low indeed.