Johnson's evidence was confirmed in part by Alstone, another officer of
the prison. He said he told Johnson to get the bag from the prisoner, as
it might have something about it whereby it could be identified. Johnson
called the girl, while Alstone watched from a dark corner. He saw Sarah
give Johnson the bag, and heard her ask him to burn it. Alstone also
deposed that Sarah told him (Alstone) part of the money found on her was
Mrs Duncomb's.
There is no need here to enlarge upon the oddly slack and casual
conditions of the prison life of the time as revealed in this evidence.
It will be no news to anyone who has studied contemporary criminal
history. There is a point, however, that may be considered here, and
that is the familiarity it suggests on the part of Sarah with prison
conditions and with the cant terms employed by criminals and the people
handling them.
Sarah, though still in her earliest twenties,[20] was known already--if
not in the Temple--to have a bad reputation. It is said that her closest
friends were thieves of the worst sort. She was the daughter of an
Englishman, at one time a public official in a small way in Dublin. Her
father had come to London with his wife and daughter, but on the death
of the mother had gone back to Ireland. He had left his daughter behind
him, servant in an ale-house called the Black Horse.
Sarah was a fairly well-educated girl. At the ale-house, however, she
formed an acquaintance with a woman named Mary Tracey, a dissolute
character, and with two thieves called Alexander. Of these three
disreputable people we shall be hearing presently, for Sarah tried to
implicate them in this crime which she certainly committed alone. It is
said that the Newgate officers recognized Sarah on her arrival. She had
often been to the prison to visit an Irish thief, convicted for stealing
the pack of a Scots pedlar.
It will be seen from Sarah's own defence how she tried to implicate
Tracey and the two Alexanders:
"I freely own that my crimes deserve death; I own that I was accessory
to the robbery, but I was innocent of the murder, and will give an
account of the whole affair.
"I lived with Mrs Lydia Duncomb about three months before she was
murdered. The robbery was contrived by Mary Tracey, who is now in
confinement, and myself, my own vicious inclinations agreeing with hers.
We likewise proposed to rob Mr Oakes in Thames Street. She came to me at
my master's, Mr Kerrel's chambers, on the Sunday before the murder
was committed; he not being then at home, we talked about robbing Mrs
Duncomb. I told her I could not pretend to do it by myself, for I should
be found out. 'No,' says she, 'there are the two Alexanders will help
us.' Next day I had seventeen pounds sent me out of the country, which
I left in Mr Kerrel's drawers. I met them all in Cheapside the following
Friday, and we agreed on the next night, and so parted.
"Next day, being Saturday, I went between seven and eight in the evening
to see Mrs Duncomb's maid, Elizabeth Harrison, who was very bad. I
stayed a little while with her, and went down, and Mary Tracey and the
two Alexanders came to me about ten o'clock, according to appointment."
On this statement the whole implication of Tracey and the Alexanders by
Sarah stands or falls. It falls for the reason that the Temple porter
had seen no stranger pass the gate that night, nobody but Templars going
to their chambers. The one fact riddles the rest of Sarah's statement in
defence, but, as it is somewhat of a masterpiece in lying invention,
I shall continue to quote it. "Mary Tracey would have gone about the
robbery just then, but I said it was too soon. Between ten and eleven
she said, 'We can do it now.' I told her I would go and see, and so went
upstairs, and they followed me. I met the young maid on the stairs with
a blue mug; she was going for some milk to make a sack posset. She asked
me who were those that came after me. I told her they were people going
to Mr Knight's below. As soon as she was gone I said to Mary Tracey,
'Now do you and Tom Alexander go down. I know the door is ajar, because
the old maid is ill, and can't get up to let the young maid in when she
comes back.' Upon that, James Alexander, by my order, went in and hid
himself under the bed; and as I was going down myself I met the young
maid coming up again. She asked me if I spoke to Mrs Betty. I told her
no; though I should have told her otherwise, but only that I was afraid
she might say something to Mrs Betty about me, and Mrs Betty might tell
her I had not been there, and so they might have a suspicion of me."
There is a possibility that this part of her confession, the tale of
having met the young maid, Nanny, may be true.[21] And here may the
truth of the murder be hidden away. Very likely it is, indeed, that
Sarah encountered the girl going out with the blue mug for milk to make
a sack posset, and she may have slipped in by the open door to hide
under the bed until the moment was ripe for her terrible intention. On
the other hand, if there is truth in the tale of her encountering the
girl again as she returned with the milk--and her cunning in answering
"no" to the maid's query if she had seen Mrs Betty has the real
ring--other ways of getting an entry were open to her. We know that the
lock of the vacant chambers opposite Mrs Duncomb's would have yielded
to small manipulation. It is not at all unlikely that Sarah, having been
charwoman to the old lady, and with the propensities picked up from her
Shoreditch acquaintances, had made herself familiar with the locks on
the landing. So that she may have waited her hour in the empty rooms,
and have got into Mrs Duncomb's by the same method used by Mrs Oliphant
after the murder. She may even have slipped back the spring-catch of the
outer door. One account of the murder suggests that she may have
asked Ann Price, on one pretext or other, to let her share her bed. It
certainly was not beyond the callousness of Sarah Malcolm to have chosen
this method, murdering the girl in her sleep, and then going on to
finish off the two helpless old women.
The truth, as I have said, lies hidden in this extraordinarily
mendacious confection. Liars of Sarah's quality are apt to base their
fabrications on a structure, however slight, of truth. I continue with
the confession, then, for what the reader may get out of it.
"I passed her [Nanny Price] and went down, and spoke with Tracey and
Alexander, and then went to my master's chambers, and stirred up the
fire. I stayed about a quarter of an hour, and when I came back I saw
Tracey and Tom Alexander sitting on Mrs Duncomb's stairs, and I sat down
with them. At twelve o'clock we heard some people walking, and by and by
Mr Knight came home, went to his room, and shut the door. It was a very
stormy night; there was hardly anybody stirring abroad, and the watchmen
kept up close, except just when they cried the hour. At two o'clock
another gentleman came, and called the watch to light his candle, upon
which I went farther upstairs, and soon after this I heard Mrs Duncomb's
door open; James Alexander came out, and said, 'Now is the time.' Then
Mary Tracey and Thomas Alexander went in, but I stayed upon the stair
to watch. I had told them where Mrs Duncomb's box stood. They came out
between four and five, and one of them called to me softly, and said,
'Hip! How shall I shut the door?' Says I, ''Tis a spring-lock; pull it
to, and it will be fast.' And so one of them did. They would have shared
the money and goods upon the stairs, but I told them we had better go
down; so we went under the arch by Fig-tree Court, where there was a
lamp. I asked them how much they had got. They said they had found fifty
guineas and some silver in the maid's purse, about one hundred pounds
in the chest of drawers, besides the silver tankard and the money in the
box and several other things; so that in all they had got to the value
of about three hundred pounds in money and goods. They told me that they
had been forced to gag the people. They gave me the tankard with what
was in it and some linen for my share, and they had a silver spoon and
a ring and the rest of the money among themselves. They advised me to be
cunning and plant the money and goods underground, and not to be seen to
be flush. Then we appointed to meet at Greenwich, but we did not go.[22]
"I was taken in the manner the witnesses have sworn, and carried to the
watch-house, from whence I was sent to the Compter, and so to Newgate.
I own that I said the tankard was mine, and that it was left me by my
mother: several witnesses have swore what account I gave of the tankard
being bloody; I had hurt my finger, and that was the occasion of it. I
am sure of death, and therefore have no occasion to speak anything but
the truth. When I was in the Compter I happened to see a young man[23]
whom I knew, with a fetter on. I told him I was sorry to see him there,
and I gave him a shilling, and called for half a quartern of rum to make
him drink. I afterwards went into my room, and heard a voice call
me, and perceived something poking behind the curtain. I was a little
surprised, and looking to see what it was, I found a hole in the wall,
through which the young man I had given the shilling to spoke to me, and
asked me if I had sent for my friends. I told him no. He said he would
do what he could for me, and so went away; and some time after he called
to me again, and said, 'Here is a friend.'
"I looked through, and saw Will Gibbs come in. Says he, 'Who is there
to swear against you?' I told him my two masters would be the chief
witnesses. 'And what can they charge you with?' says he. I told him the
tankard was the only thing, for there was nothing else that I thought
could hurt me. 'Never fear, then,' says he; 'we'll do well enough. We
will get them that will rap the tankard was your grandmother's, and that
you was in Shoreditch the night the act was committed; and we'll have
two men that shall shoot your masters. But,' said he, 'one of the
witnesses is a woman, and she won't swear under four guineas; but the
men will swear for two guineas apiece,' and he brought a woman and three
men. I gave them ten guineas, and they promised to wait for me at the
Bull Head in Broad Street. But when I called for them, when I was going
before Sir Richard Brocas, they were not there. Then I found I should
be sent to Newgate, and I was full of anxious thoughts; but a young man
told me I had better go to the Whit than to the Compter.
"When I came to Newgate I had but eighteenpence in silver, besides the
money in my hair, and I gave eighteenpence for my garnish. I was ordered
to a high place in the gaol. Buck, as I said before, having seen my hair
loose, told Johnson of it, and Johnson asked me if I had got any cole
planted there. He searched and found the bag, and there was in
it thirty-six moidores, eighteen guineas, five crown pieces, two
half-crowns, two broad pieces of twenty-five shillings, four of
twenty-three shillings, and one half-broad piece. He told me I must be
cunning, and not to be seen to be flush of money. Says I, 'What would
you advise me to do with it?' 'Why,' says he, 'you might have thrown it
down the sink, or have burnt it, but give it to me, and I'll take care
of it.' And so I gave it to him. Mr Alstone then brought me to the
condemned hold and examined me. I denied all till I found he had
heard of the money, and then I knew my life was gone. And therefore I
confessed all that I knew. I gave him the same account of the robbers as
I have given you. I told him I heard my masters were to be shot, and
I desired him to send them word. I described Tracey and the two
Alexanders, and when they were first taken they denied that they knew Mr
Oakes, whom they and I had agreed to rob.
"All that I have now declared is fact, and I have no occasion to murder
three persons on a false accusation; for I know I am a condemned woman.
I know I must suffer an ignominious death which my crimes deserve, and I
shall suffer willingly. I thank God He has given me time to repent, when
I might have been snatched off in the midst of my crimes, and without
having an opportunity of preparing myself for another world." There is
a glibness and an occasional turn of phrase in this confession which
suggests some touching up from the pen of a pamphleteer, but one may
take it that it is, in substance, a fairly accurate report. In spite of
the pleading which threads it that she should be regarded as accessory
only in the robbery, the jury took something less than a quarter of
an hour to come back with their verdict of "Guilty of murder." Sarah
Malcolm was sentenced to death in due form.
V
Having regard to the period in which this confession was made, and
considering the not too savoury reputations of Mary Tracey and the
brothers Alexander, we can believe that those three may well have
thought themselves lucky to escape from the mesh of lies Sarah tried to
weave about them.[24] It was not to be doubted on all the evidence that
she alone committed that cruel triple murder, and that she alone stole
the money which was found hidden in her hair. The bulk of the stolen
clothing was found in her possession, bloodstained. A white-handled
case-knife, presumably that used to cut Nanny Price's throat, was seen
on a table by the three women who, with Sarah herself, were first on the
scene of the murder. It disappeared later, and it is to be surmised that
Sarah Malcolm managed to get it out of the room unseen. But to the last
moment possible Sarah tried to get her three friends involved with her.
Say, which is not at all unlikely, that Tracey and the Alexanders may
have first suggested the robbery to her, and her vindictive maneouvring
may be understood.
It is said that when she heard that Tracey and the Alexanders had been
taken she was highly pleased. She smiled, and said that she could now
die happy, since the real murderers had been seized. Even when the three
were brought face to face with her for identification she did not lack
brazenness. "Ay," she said, "these are the persons who committed the
murder." "You know this to be true," she said to Tracey. "See, Mary,
what you have brought me to. It is through you and the two Alexanders
that I am brought to this shame, and must die for it. You all promised
me you would do no murder, but, to my great surprise, I found the
contrary."
She was, you will perceive, a determined liar. Condemned, she behaved
with no fortitude. "I am a dead woman!" she cried, when brought back to
Newgate. She wept and prayed, lied still more, pretended illness, and
had fits of hysteria. They put her in the old condemned hold with a
constant guard over her, for fear that she would attempt suicide.
The idlers of the town crowded to the prison to see her, for in the time
of his Blessed Majesty King George II Newgate, with the condemned hold
and its content, composed one of the fashionable spectacles. Young
Mr Hogarth, the painter, was one of those who found occasion to visit
Newgate to view the notorious murderess. He even painted her portrait.
It is said that Sarah dressed specially for him in a red dress, but that
copy--one which belonged to Horace Walpole--which is now in the National
Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, shows her in a grey gown, with a white
cap and apron. Seated to the left, she leans her folded hands on a table
on which a rosary and a crucifix lie. Behind her is a dark grey wall,
with a heavy grating over a dark door to the right. There are varied
mezzotints of this picture by Hogarth himself still extant, and there is
a pen-and-wash drawing of Sarah by Samuel Wale in the British Museum.
The stories regarding the last days in life of Sarah Malcolm would
occupy more pages than this book can afford to spend on them. To the
last she hoped for a reprieve. After the "dead warrant" had arrived, to
account for a paroxysm of terror that seized her, she said that it was
from shame at the idea that, instead of going to Tyburn, she was to be
hanged in Fleet Street among all the people that knew her, she having
just heard the news in chapel. This too was one of her lies. She had
heard the news hours before. A turnkey, pointing out the lie to her,
urged her to confess for the easing of her mind.
One account I have of the Tanfield Court murders speaks of the custom
there was at this time of the bellman of St Sepulchre's appearing
outside the gratings of the condemned hold just after midnight on the
morning of executions.[25] This performance was provided for by bequest
from one Robert Dove, or Dow, a merchant-tailor. Having rung his bell
to draw the attention of the condemned (who, it may be gathered, were
not supposed to be at all in want of sleep), the bellman recited these
verses:
All you that in the condemned hold do lie,
Prepare you, for to-morrow you shall die.
Watch all and pray; the hour is drawing near
That you before th' Almighty must appear.
Examine well yourselves, in time repent,
That you may not t'eternal flames be sent:
And when St 'Pulchre's bell to-morrow tolls,
The Lord above have mercy on your souls!
Past twelve o'clock![26]
A fellow-prisoner or a keeper bade Sarah Malcolm heed what the bellman
said, urging her to take it to heart. Sarah said she did, and threw the
bellman down a shilling with which to buy himself a pint of wine.
Sarah, as we have seen, was denied the honour of procession to Tyburn.
Her sentence was that she was to be hanged in Fleet Street, opposite the
Mitre Court, on the 7th of March, 1733. And hanged she was accordingly.
She fainted in the tumbril, and took some time to recover. Her last
words were exemplary in their piety, but in the face of her vindictive
lying, unretracted to the last, it were hardly exemplary to repeat them.
She was buried in the churchyard of St Sepulchre's.