York Read online

  CHAPTER NINE

  GENTLEMEN OF THE ROAD

  * * *

  Before improvements in policing, road transport and banking and credit facilities led to the demise of the mounted robber from England’s highways in the late 1820s, the somewhat romanticised image of the highwayman as a dashing ‘gentleman thief’ belied the true impact of being stopped and asked to ‘stand and deliver!’

  Probably the most famous (or should that be infamous?) of English highwaymen was Dick Turpin, notorious in life and in death thanks to his flamboyant final performance on the gallows at York. The legend of Dick Turpin was thoroughly romanticised by nineteenth-century novelist William Harrison Ainsworth, whose first literary success Rookwood, published in 1834, featured Turpin as the leading character.

  A typical interpretation of a highwayman.

  Turpin was born in 1705 in Hempstead, near Saffron Walden. His initial career path as a butcher led him into theft early on as the meat he sold by day had been previously stolen by night. Forced to go on the run in the depths of the Essex countryside after he was witnessed stealing two oxen, the young Turpin tried his hand at smuggling, joining a group known as the ‘Essex Gang’. They were not very successful and before long pressure from customs officers curtailed this particular criminal venture, and the gang (amongst them one woman, Mary Brazier) turned to robbing remote and isolated farmhouses instead; it was only towards the end of his criminal career that Turpin became involved in actual highway robbery. By 1735, the press was regularly reporting on the exploits of the Essex Gang who were robbing their way around the Home Counties. King George II offered a £50 reward for their capture and eventually two members of the Essex Gang were apprehended by local constables – Turpin himself only narrowly escaped arrest by jumping out of an upstairs window.

  After his narrow escape and a spell of living rough, Turpin struck up a working partnership with one of the most notorious highwaymen of the day, ‘Captain’ Tom King. His association with King proved fruitful and by 1737, the bounty on Turpin’s head had been increased to £100.

  However, their affiliation was abruptly curtailed when Turpin, who was apparently a dreadful shot, accidentally hit King while trying to assist his escape after King had been arrested while collecting a stabled horse that Turpin had previously stolen. Turpin’s poor aim proved fatal, but before King died he managed to furnish the constables with enough information to force Turpin to flee to Yorkshire by way of evading capture. In the north he settled under the false name of John Palmer and financed a high style of living by continuing to rustle livestock and committing the occasional highway robbery. Returning disgruntled one day from an unsuccessful hunt, ‘Palmer’ shot his landlord’s cockerel, then threatened the landlord himself when he remonstrated over the loss of his prizefighting cock. Taken into custody and held in York Castle Gaol, Turpin was subsequently convicted after a positive identification was made by chance. Turpin had written a letter to his brother-in-law who had refused to pay the sixpence postage due and consequently the correspondence was returned to the post office where, by a sheer twist of fate, Turpin’s former schoolmaster, Mr Smith, saw it and recognised the handwriting. Smith also claimed the reward on Turpin’s head, which today would be the equivalent of £30,000.

  Between his sentence and execution, Turpin’s cell was frequently filled with visitors. In preparation for his execution he bought new clothes and shoes, and also hired five mourners at 10s each.

  On 7 April 1739, Dick Turpin was conveyed through the streets of York in an open cart, bowing to the crowds that lined the route along Castlegate, over the Ouse Bridge and on along Ousegate, before continuing up the steep slope of Micklegate. He was driven underneath Micklegate’s bar and onto Blossom Street, past The Mount and finally reaching the Knavesmire, where Turpin faced his ultimate date with the noose.

  After climbing the ladder to the gallows with a firm step, Turpin then spent half an hour chatting to the executioner and guards. Turpin’s bravado did not fail him, as reported in the York Courant, ‘With undaunted courage looked about him, and after speaking a few words to the topsman, he threw himself off the ladder and expired in about five minutes.’

  Dick Turpin’s cell, York Castle Museum.

  John Palmer/Dick Turpin’s grave in St George’s churchyard.

  In spite of being buried in a deep grave in the churchyard of St George’s, Turpin’s body was later found disinterred and in the garden of one of the city surgeons. However, the thieves were thwarted as after keeping Turpin’s body in the Blue Boar Inn overnight (in those days a public house often had a room that was used as a temporary mortuary), to prevent any further ‘body snatching’ attempts Turpin was re-buried in St George’s churchyard, this time the coffin was filled with unslacked quicklime.

  ‘The Glamorous Highwayman’: John ‘Swift Nick’ Nevison

  * * *

  John (also known as William) Nevison was renowned as one of the most flamboyant highwaymen in the litany of England’s thieving highway rogues. A charming man of tall, gentlemanly appearance, his exploits even gained the notice of King Charles II who allegedly nicknamed Nevison ‘Swift Nick’.

  Swift Nick’s escapades are the subject of confused and conflicting accounts, although the overnight ride to York mistakenly attributed to Dick Turpin seems to be founded in fact. At 4 a.m. on a summer’s morning in 1676, Nevison robbed a traveller on the highway at Gads Hill in Kent. Mounted on a bay mare, he crossed the Thames by ferry and travelled on to Chelmsford, where he rested his horse for half an hour before riding through Cambridge and Huntingdon until he met the Great North Road and headed for York. Arriving at sunset, he stabled his exhausted horse after the 200-mile journey – considered an impossible journey at that time – and proceeded to secure himself an unquestionable alibi. After washing and changing into clean clothes, Nevison made his way to the bowling green where he knew the Lord Mayor of York was playing – what better upstanding witness could he have chosen to converse with – and also laid a wager on the outcome of the match, placing his bet at eight o’clock that evening. Nevison was later arrested for the Gads Hill hold-up, but producing the Lord Mayor as witness in his defence ensured that a verdict of ‘not guilty’ was returned, as well as propelling him into folk history.

  While Nevison’s romantic reputation seems to be based on the claim that he never used violence against those he robbed, the death of a constable named Fletcher, who died while trying to arrest him, was ultimately Nevison’s undoing. After this incident, he was targeted by bounty hunters before finally being arrested – his whereabouts were given away by the landlady of the Three Houses Inn at Sandal Magna, near Wakefield. Nevison had been previously arrested and made his escape on numerous occasions (when arrested in 1681 he escaped by feigning death and an accomplice masquerading as a doctor pronounced him dead from plague, which gave rise to the tales that Nevison’s ghost was perpetrating further highway robberies), however, this was the end of the road for Swift Nick. After making a farewell speech to the large crowd, Nevison was hanged at the York Tyburn on Saturday, 4 May 1684 and buried at St Mary’s Church, Castlegate, in an unmarked grave.

  The Forest Of Galtres: ‘Haunted by Robbers’

  * * *

  The royal Forest of Galtres was ancient woodland that once extended right up to the city walls of York, the possible sylvan remnants of which are still present in Rawcliffe Meadows. In 1870, John Marius Wilson described how the forest was once ‘tenanted by wild beasts, and haunted by robbers; was the scene of many and frequent perils and exploits.’ The forest was thought to be so treacherous that patrols were sent out from Bootham Bar, the northern entrance to the city, to guide travellers and protect them from the marauding packs of wolves, bandits and robbers therein. The fifteenth-century lantern tower of All Saints’ Church on the Pavement was built especially in order to house a lamp that was kept burning to guide the way for those approaching York through the gloaming of Galtres.

  The lantern tower at
All Saints’ Church.

  The Burton Stone.

  Also, at the corner of Burton Stone Lane stood the chapel of St Mary Magdalen, where travellers would pray for safe passage and guidance through the forest. In front of the Burton Stone Inn is the Burton Stone itself, enclosed by iron railings, marking the limit of the old jurisdiction of the city and a reminder that in 1604, over 3,500 people died in a violent outbreak of plague in the city; the Burton Stone was used as a point for quarantined food exchange in an effort to limit infection.

  Gibbeting in Galtres

  * * *

  As an example to other would-be highway robbers, the body of Barnhard Siegfred was hung in chains in the Forest at Stockton (the village of Stockton on the Forest was originally a settlement that was established in a clearing in the Forest of Galtres) after being hanged for highway robbery and the attempted murder of one Master John Dolland on a dark winter’s evening in December 1570. Clearly the example was not grim enough, as on Saturday, 27 June 1574 a gang of robbers were executed at the York Tyburn for wounding with intent to murder Baron de Cavallo as he was returning through the forest on his way back from Penrith. The bodies of gang members Robert de Fleury, George de Abbott and William de Abbott were not gibbeted, instead their bodies were given over to the city surgeons for dissection.

  On Saturday, 29 March 1615, Mark Trumble and Robert Martinson were hanged at the Knavesmire for highway robbery in the Forest of Galtres, near the village of Shipton. Martinson was a native of Haxby, a neighbouring forest village, and Trumble was from Ripon. Both were buried in the churchyard of St Olave’s (pronounced ‘Olive’) in Marygate.

  A number of ‘noteworthy’ highwaymen were also apprehended in the forest, with the execution of ‘daring highwayman’ Amos Lawson attracting a sizeable crowd – the Knavesmire resembled ‘more a fair for business and pleasure than a place of execution’ when he was hanged on Wednesday, 30 July 1644. Lawson had been operating as a highway robber for some time, but was at last captured in the Forest of Galtres on the night of 3 April, when he made the mistake of attempting to rob Willam Taylor, the Sheriff of York. Lawson was buried in the churchyard of St George’s.

  * * *

  ‘his nose was cut off’

  * * *

  Jeremiah Balderson and Richard Souly were two other notorious highwaymen who were apprehended after the aggravated robbery of George Melrose when he was travelling through the forest on the night of 3 February 1661. Not only was Melrose robbed, but his nose was cut off as well. Balderson and Souly were hanged on Saturday, 19 August – however, they escaped the fate of dissection and were buried in Holy Trinity, Curia Regis.

  Possibly not as visually arresting as a gibbeted body, but certainly an enduring reminder, the Nichol’s Stone commemorates a highway robber who was hanged at York for theft and murder committed on a stretch of the A684 known as Conyers Lane, between Constable Burton and Patrick Brompton. Inscribed with the words, ‘May 19, 1826 Do No Murder’, this ashlar sandstone slab reputedly relates to the death of Nicholas Carter of Crakehall, who was robbed and murdered on the spot by Leonard Wilkinson. Carter had been seen by Wilkinson driving some livestock to Leyburn market that May morning in 1826. Lying in wait and waylaying Carter on his return journey in order to steal the pocket full of money his cattle had made at sale, Wilkinson was subsequently brought to justice and hanged at the New Drop on Monday, 17 July 1826. His body was brought back and buried in unconsecrated ground outside the churchyard of Finghall Church, a stone’s throw from where his crime was committed and where he is said to have sought sanctuary for some time.

  The Nichol’s Stone, or the ‘Murder Stone’ as it is known.

  Known locally as the ‘Murder Stone’, during work to widen the carriageway on this stretch of A-road some twenty years ago, it was found necessary to relocate the stone to a position further back on the verge. To this day, however, those passing Nichol’s Stone on particularly dark, moonless nights, and aware of its grim history, report feeling an eerie foreboding about the route taken by the lifeless corpse of Wilkinson making his final journey from York’s gallows to his unconsecrated grave.

  CHAPTER TEN

  POISONOUS PERPETRATORS

  * * *

  To use poison as a murder weapon takes planning and some degree of skill, a poisoner could never claim that the crime was committed in the ‘heat of the moment’, which makes this premeditated attack seem more controlled and sinister.

  Poison became a popular method of killing in medieval times, as the increase in the establishment of apothecary shops in many towns and cities offered the sale of substances for medicinal use that could be employed for more malign purposes. After all, as nineteenth-century toxicologist Alfred Swaine Taylor is quoted as saying, ‘A poison in a small dose is a medicine, a medicine in a large dose is a poison.’

  Before the development of analytical chemistry increased the risk that a poisoner would be caught, it was popularly seen as a method of murder more frequently employed by females. As it required no physical exertion, the lady of the house was ideally placed to conveniently administer a poison, because they were predominantly involved with the preparation of food and the household management of remedies and medicines. However, as we shall see, the balance of past poisoners is very far from being gender specific.

  Since aconite has earned the sobriquet of ‘Queen of Poisons’, arsenic should surely be crowned ‘King’ since it has probably claimed more lives than any other poison. William Farr, the Statistic Head of the General Register Office in 1840, said, ‘It is generally asked for to kill “rats”, but it is questionable whether arsenic kills more rats than human beings.’ In France, arsenic came to be called poudre de succession, meaning ‘inheritance powder’. Perhaps its popularity lay in its virtual tastelessness with a cumulative effect acting particularly on the liver and kidneys – it could be administered in small doses over a span of time until a critical level was reached. Conveniently for the murderer, the symptoms of arsenic poisoning closely resembled those of cholera, as well as those of dysentery, and as a result many murders went undetected. In the past, arsenic was administered as a yellow-coloured sulphide, however, the white oxide form derived from metallic ore was progressively employed, which induced symptoms such as irritation and burning to the throat, faintness, nausea and vomiting mucous flecked with blood. Progressive abdominal pain, respiratory constriction and a white ‘furry’ covering to the tongue signalled that within the next twelve to eighteen hours severe diarrhoea and a weakened, irregular pulse would cause collapse and result in death. Not a good way to go.

  Eventually, because of the level of murder cases in the nineteenth century involving the poison, the Government was forced to introduce the Arsenic Act in 1851, forbidding the sale of any arsenic compounds to a purchaser who was unknown to the supplying pharmacist. Would-be poisoners were further thwarted by the introduction of a requirement that all manufacturers of arsenic powder mix 1oz of a colouring agent (indigo or soot were employed) to every 1lb of arsenic powder produced.

  However, before this legislation was introduced, there were many murders committed using this particular poison. In the case of Hannah Whitley, a pie was used to deliver the fatal dose of arsenic, with the poison concentrated in the crust. Hannah claimed she had been coerced into the act of poisoning her employer, and certainly her culinary efforts had the desired effect as her pastry made the entire Rhodes family ill, and ultimately killed five-year-old John Rhodes.

  In her defence, Hannah claimed that a man named Horseman, a local linen weaver, had forced her to put the poison into the food, threatening to kill her if she refused (Rhodes and Horseman were involved in an on-going feud), and Rhodes’ children were not the intended victims. Nonetheless, while Horseman faced no formal proceedings, it was Hannah who paid the penalty with her life. She was hanged at the York Tyburn on 3 August 1789.

  Twenty-two-year-old William Smith employed an ingenious and indeed seasonal method of administering arsenic t
o poison not only his stepfather but his two half-siblings as well. William’s mother had re-married Thomas Harper, who already had two children of his own, William and Anne. Faced with the ultimate division and diminution of his inheritance, Smith purchased two pennyworth of arsenic from the local apothecary, whose suspicions he failed to arouse because he also purchased some remedies for his horses at the same time, and allegedly had a problem with rats in his barn.

  Smith decided the perfect way to administer the poison would be to mix it with the ingredients of the Good Friday cake that was being prepared for the household. But, unbeknownst to Smith, a maid-servant had seen him interfering with the flour.

  The Harpers’ neighbours had been invited over to partake of the Easter treat too, but clearly providence was on their side when they were unable to make dinner, and as it turned out only Tom Harper and his two children ended up eating any of the fatal cake.

  As soon as the poison began to take effect Smith fled to Liverpool, leaving his victims to suffer in agony until father and both children died the following day. In spite of the motives that had driven Smith’s actions, he found he was unable to live with his crime, and returned home, where he was immediately apprehended and confessed all.

  At the Autumn Assizes of 1753, Smith’s own confession, along with the evidence of the apothecary and the maid-servant, ensured he was found guilty and sentenced to death. On Monday 15 August, Smith was hanged at the Tyburn and afterwards his body was sent for dissection.