Читать книгу The Chronicles of Newgate (Vol. 1&2) - Griffiths Arthur - Страница 9

Table of Contents

More Jesuit emissaries in Newgate—Richardson and others—Their fate—Some escape—Greater favour shown them under Charles I. through intercession of Henrietta Maria—But freedom not easily procured—Case of Thomas Coo—Of John Williams—The Mayor of Sudbury in Newgate—Also an alderman—Pardons and release still given on condition of military service—Troubles with King fill Newgate—Ship-money—Speaking ill of King’s sister entails imprisonment in Newgate for life—Parliament growing more powerful insists of execution of six Jesuits suffered to linger on in Newgate—Irish rebels taken on high seas, in Newgate—Also offenders against plague ordinances, and against religion or morality—Strange news from Newgate—Interior of gaol—Condition of prisoners—Fanatical conduct of keeper—Nefarious practices of turnkeys—They levy black mail—“Coney catching” described—Several cases of such swindling—Civil war reflected in prison records—More Irish arrested at Devonshire—Sent to London and lodged in Newgate for examination—Arbitrary imprisonment imposed by House of Lords on Richard Overton—Case of Colonel Lilburne—“Free born John”—Newgate annals record transfer of power to Commonwealth—Royalists in gaol—Also prisoners of mark—The Portuguese ambassadors’ brother in Newgate charged with murder, and executed—Also Lord Buckhurst and others.

THE disturbing elements of society continued much the same in the early part of the seventeenth century as in the years immediately preceding. There were the same offences against law and order, dealt with in the same summary fashion. Newgate was perpetually crowded with prisoners charged with the same sort of crimes. Bigotry and intolerance continued to breed persecution. All sects which differed from that professed by those in power were in turn under the ban of the law. The Romish priest still ventured into the hostile heretic land where his life was not worth a minute’s purchase; Puritans and Nonconformists were committed to gaol for refusing to surrender their heterodox opinions: these last coming into power were ruthlessly strict towards the openly irreligious backslider. Side by side with these sufferers in the cause of independent thought swarmed the depredators, the wrong-doers, whose criminal instincts and the actions they produced were much the same as they had been before and as they are now.

The devoted courage of the Jesuit emissaries in those days of extreme peril for all priests who dared to cross the channel claims for them a full measure of respect. They were for ever in trouble. When caught they met hard words, scant mercy, often only a short shrift. Repeated references are made to them. In the State Papers July 1602 is a list of priests and recusants in prison, viz. “Newgate—Pound (already mentioned), desperate and obstinate; … in the Clink, Marshalsea, King’s Bench, are others; among them Douce, a forward intelligence, Tichborne, Webster, perverter of youth,” &c. They were ever the victims of treachery and espionage.[49] “William Richardson, a priest of Seville College (the date is 1603), was discovered to the Chief Justice by one whom he trusted, and arraigned and condemned at Newgate for being a priest and coming to England. When examined he answered stoutly, yet with great modesty and discretion, moving many to compassionate him and speak against the Chief Justice, on whom he laid the guilt of his blood.” He was executed at Tyburn, hanged and quartered, but his head and quarters were buried. “Such spectacles,” says the writer, Ant. Rivers, to Giacomo Creleto, Venice, “do nothing increase the gospel. …” A further account says that William Richardson, alias Anderson, was betrayed by a false brother, sent to Newgate, and kept close prisoner over a week, no one being allowed to see him. The Chief Justice, interrupting other trials, called for him, and caused him to be indicted of high treason for being a priest and coming to England. All of which he confessed, and there being no evidence against him, the Chief Justice gave his confession in writing to the jury, who found him guilty. “He thanked God and told the Chief Justice he was a bloody man, and sought the blood of the Catholics. He denied that he was a Jesuit or knew Garnet[50]. …”

These priests were not very rigorously guarded. On the 27th November 1612 seven escaped from Newgate. They must also have been very indifferently lodged. When a number of them were transferred for greater security to Wisbeach Castle, they petitioned that they were unable to provide themselves with bedding and other necessaries for their removal, and begged that orders might be taken for their providing. The keeper was closely watched lest he should be too easy with his prisoners. Questions are suggested to be put to him, examining him as to his connivance with recusants, and allowing them to escape or enjoy great liberty. In 1611 Sir Thomas Lake writes to Lord Salisbury to the effect that the king is resolved the keeper of Newgate shall be very severely punished for allowing reverence to priests and masses to be said in the prison.[51] It was evident they were permitted some license, although contraband, for Secretary Conway issues instructions on May 13, 1626, to the provost marshal of Middlesex directing him to search for popish books, massing stuff, and reliques of popery in Newgate. Even in Elizabeth’s time it appears that mass was said in Newgate, and one John Harrison, when charged in 1595 with being in possession of certain popish relics and papers, admitted that he had been married in Newgate by an old priest then in prison with his (H.’s) wife and himself.

Somewhat better times dawned for the Roman Catholic ministers after the accession of Charles I. His queen, Henrietta Maria, was able to help them. Her favouring of papists was indeed one of the many causes of the discontent which culminated in civil war. The king himself addresses the keeper of Newgate to the effect that “at the instance of the queen we have granted Pulteney Morse, lately indicted upon suspicion of being a priest, and still prisoner at Newgate, to be enlarged upon security to appear before the council when he shall be thereunto called. He has given security to that purpose; we therefore command you to set him at liberty.” The queen herself at times personally applied for the release of prisoners confined in Newgate for matters of religion. Often priests committed escaped incarceration, and were found to be at liberty after arrest. But it was not always easy to obtain enlargement when once laid by the heels. Here is the petition to the queen (State Papers, May 1634) of Thomas Reynolds, a secular priest, who has been more than five years in Newgate, “where by the unwholesomeness of the air, the strictness of the imprisonment, and his great age he is fallen into many dangerous infirmities. He now prays the queen to move the king to release him. His application is backed up by a medical certificate signed by three doctors that petitioner is affected with sciatica, colic, defluxion of rheum, and the stone. He is fifty-eight years of age.” The result of the petition is not given.

It was not only in the case of the religious prisoners that freedom was difficult to compass. A very hard case is that of Thomas Coo, committed to Newgate on grounds that are not traceable. He states, October 1618, to Sir Julius Cæsar and Sir Fulk Greville that his loyal service in preserving the life of his sovereign by discovering the London insurrection has been rewarded with famine and a dungeon. He is resolved to live no longer, leaving his son “to conceal his mystical designs.”[52] Fifteen years later, but still in Newgate, he makes his “submission from Newgate dungeon dunghill, almost famished; acknowledging his contrition of heart, and stating his readiness to do any penance the council may command, beseeches to know what his punishment may be.” His long imprisonments in Newgate and elsewhere have “stript petitioner, even of clothes from his back, and from that of the bearer of the letter, his lame child.” He prays that he may be forthwith either banished according to their order of the 28th October of the 5th King Charles (1630), or be allowed close prisoner in some other place where he may have some allowance to preserve him from starving. Six years more pass, and again (1639) he petitions the council, stating that there was neither legal warrant for his commitment to the Fleet eight years, nor for his six years’ detention in Newgate, whither he was thence removed. There were sent with him certain transcribed papers, importing some orders and rules issuing out of the Star Chamber, Chancery, and King’s Bench, in which courts the prisoner was never defendant, convented, nor convicted. The only paper against him was a supposed Inner Star Chamber order of voluntary banishment, to the effect that the petitioner was to depart the kingdom within twenty days, dated 1629. “Gaolers,” says the poor prisoner, “are made his judges, and jurors only give their verdict to whom his carcase belongs to be interred.”

A light matter sufficed to secure committal to Newgate. John Williams in a petition states that he was committed to Newgate for being one at the depopulation of the forest of Dean. There he has remained for five years, and now prays enlargement, not having wherewith to maintain himself in prison with his wife and poor children, who were seemingly incarcerated with him. The coachmen of even great people were committed to Newgate for contravening the Star Chamber order as to the route they should take to and from the playhouse in Blackfriars. Frequenters were invited to go to and fro by water, but if they drove they were to be set down by the west end of St. Paul’s Churchyard or Fleet Conduit. Again Robert Coleman (1631), having found certain writings of the secretary and other noble personages, and thinking they belonged to the Earl of Dorset, went to the Old Bailey, where Lord Dorset was sitting on the bench, to deliver them up. “One Barnes was to be tried,” states Coleman subsequently in a petition, “and there was some one there to beg his estate, whereupon the Earl of Dorset committed the prisoner (Coleman) to Newgate, where he has been ever since detained, and could not bring the writings to the secretary;” “prays that he may be allowed to come to him for that purpose.” Christopher Crowe, a prisoner in Newgate, and another victim to the oppression of a great noble, about the same date (1632) petitions the council: “I am in great misery,” he says, “having no friends nor means.” For six weeks he has had for his allowance but a halfpenny in bread one day and a farthing’s worth the next. “Is heartily sorry for his words spoken against the Marquis of Hamilton, and prays enlargement.” Others in Newgate sought noble protection, and petitioned the great peers to procure release. John Meredith petitions Henry Earl of Holland, Captain of the Guard, reminding him that when he (Meredith) and his wife were committed to Newgate, his lordship on their appeal had sent an order for their discharge, which had been disregarded, and now, “having lain in prison a fortnight, he prays that he and his wife may forthwith be enlarged.” This has no effect, so Meredith and his wife Joan petition the Earl of Manchester, Lord President. “They had now remained in prison three weeks; pray for an enlargement from Newgate gratis,[53] and that the sergeants who arrested them may be committed.”

Prisoners of still greater consequence languished often hopelessly in Newgate Gaol. Now it is the wardens of divers city companies for not making up their proportion towards the previous year’s provision of corn; now a respectable freeman and stationer, William Cooke, who had built a shed of timber in the open street in High Holborn adjoining Furnival’s Inn. He was committed to Newgate till he should demolish the same. But, as Inigo Jones and others represent to the council, “he lies in prison, and the shed continues,” and they suggest an order to the principals of Furnival’s Inn, or to the sheriffs of London, to take the shed away. Next comes a greater personage, John Andrews, the Mayor of Sudbury, who has unhappily fallen foul of a messenger of the Star Chamber named Potter. This messenger came to Andrews with a warrant claiming his assistance for the apprehension of certain unlicensed dealers in tobacco in Sudbury, to which warrant he “gave due obedience.” Potter was presently himself brought before the mayor, “accused of many blasphemies and oaths,” and for compounding for money with the culprit who had unlawfully trafficked in tobacco. Upon this the mayor told Potter that he thought him worthy to be committed to prison. Potter then fell to abusing the mayor in scoffs and threatening speeches, telling him that he would have him set in the stocks, and that he cared not a pin for the mayor’s authority. The exasperated Andrews committed Potter to prison. But Potter’s threats were not without substantial foundation, for Andrews’ action is deemed improper, and he is himself committed to Newgate. From thence he humbly submits himself, and prays discharge from that loathsome prison.

Even an alderman was not safe. Thomas Middleton in 1603, having been duly elected alderman, refused to be sworn, whereupon he was committed to Newgate by the Lord Mayor and court of aldermen, “according to their oaths and the custom of the city.” For this they were sharply reproved by the king, and ordered to release him immediately, “as he was employed in important state service which privileged him from arrest.”

These were days of widespread oppression, when Strafford, Laud, the Star Chamber, and ecclesiastical courts gave effect to the king’s eager longings for arbitrary power. The following is from a half-mad fanatic who has offended the relentless archbishop. “The petition of Richard Farnham, a prophet of the most high God, a true subject to my king, and a prisoner of my saviour Christ, in Newgate, to Archbishop Laud and the rest of the high commissioners, whom he prays to excuse his plainness, being no scholar. … Desires to know the cause of his being detained so long in prison, where he has been kept a year next April without coming to his answer. Thinks they have forgotten him. If he be a false prophet and a blasphemer and a seducer, as most people report that he is, the high commissioners would do well to bring him to trial. What he wrote before he came into prison and what he has written since he will stand to. … If he does not get his answer this summer he intends to complain to the king, believing that it is not his pleasure his subjects should suffer false imprisonment to satisfy the archbishop’s mind.” Of the same year and the same character is this other petition from William King, a prisoner in Newgate “for a little treatise delivered to Lord Leppington.” Has remained in thraldom twenty-seven months; expresses contrition and prays enlargement on bail, or that he may be called to answer. Forty years more were to elapse before the passing of the Habeas Corpus Act; but the forgoing will show how grievously this so-called palladium of an Englishman’s liberties was required.

Pardons free or more or less conditional were, however, vouchsafed at times. Release from prison was still, as before, and for long after, frequently accompanied by the penalty of military service. This had long been the custom. On declaration of war in the earlier reigns, it was usual to issue a proclamation offering a general pardon to those guilty of homicides and felonies on condition of service for a year and a day. Even without this obligation prisoners in durance might sue out a pardon by intercession of some nobleman serving abroad with the king. But later on the release was distinctly conditional on personal service. The Lord Mayor certifies to the king (1619) that certain prisoners in Newgate, whose names and offences are given, are not committed for murder; so they are reprieved, as being able-bodied and fit to do service in foreign parts. Another certificate states that William Dominic, condemned to death for stealing a purse value £4, is reprieved, “this being his first offence, and he an excellent drummer, fit to do the king service.” Again, the king requires the keeper of Newgate to deliver certain reprieved prisoners to Sir Edward Conway, junior, to be employed in His Majesty’s service in the Low Countries. Recorder Finch reports that he has furnished “Conway’s son with seven prisoners fit for service; sends a list of prisoners now in Newgate, but reprieved. Some have been long in gaol, and were saved from execution by the prince’s return [with Buckingham from Spain?] on that day. They pester the gaol, which is already reported crowded, this hot weather, and would do better service as soldiers if pardoned, ‘for they would not dare to run away.’ ” A warrant is made out June 5, 1629, to the sheriffs of London to deliver to such persons as the Swedish ambassador shall appoint forty-seven persons, of whom one was Elizabeth Leech—was she to be employed as a sutler or vivandière?—being prisoners condemned of felonies, and remaining in the gaols of Newgate and Bridewell, who are released “to the end that they may be employed in the service of the King of Sweden”—Gustavus Adolphus, at that time our ally. There are numerous entries of this kind in the State papers. Sometimes the prisoners volunteer for service. “John Tapps, by the displeasure of the late Lord Chief Justice and the persecution of James the clerk and one of the keepers,[54] has been kept from the benefit of the pardon which has been stayed at the Great Seal. Begs Lord Conway to perfect his work by moving the Lord Keeper in his behalf, and in the mean time sending some powerful warrant for his employment as a soldier.” Certain other convicted prisoners in Newgate, who had been pardoned in respect of the birth of Prince Charles (Charles II.), petition that they are altogether impoverished, and unable to sue out their pardons. They pray that by warrant they may be transported into the State of Venice under the command of Captain Ludovic Hamilton. This document is endorsed with a reference to the Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas to certify concerning these delinquents and their crimes. George Gardener, a prisoner in Newgate, also petitions the king in March 1630, stating that he was committed by the council on the information of James Ingram, deputy warden of the Fleet, to prevent petitioner prosecuting the said Ingram for his notorious extortions. He has remained in Newgate since April previous, and by Ingram’s procurement was shut up amongst felons in the common gaol, whereby he might have been murdered. “Prays that he may be allowed to go abroad on security.” Here is another petition, that of Bridget Gray to the council. She states (July 19, 1618) that her grandson, John Throckmorton, is a prisoner in Newgate for felony, and prays that he may be discharged, this being his first offence, and Sir Thomas Smythe being ready to convey him beyond seas. Upon this is endorsed an order that if the mayor or recorder will certify that Throckmorton was not convicted of murder, burglary, highway robbery, rape, or witchcraft, a warrant may be made for his banishment. The certificate is forthcoming, and is to the effect that Throckmorton’s crime was aiding in stealing a hat, value 6s., for which the principal, Robert Whisson, an old thief, was hanged.

The gaol calendar reflects the vicissitudes of these changing, troublous times. There were many London citizens who, sharing the patriotic spirit of Hampden and Pym, found themselves clapped into prison for refusing to submit to the illegal taxations of Charles I. In a long statement, 16th April, 1639, from Edward Rossingham to Lord Conway he says that the Lord Mayor labours hard to get in the ship-money. “Some pay and many refuse; but such as do refuse he requires to enter into a recognizance of so much money to attend the council. Three citizens stand committed to Newgate, not because they refuse to pay ship-money, but because they refuse to enter into bond to attend the Board to answer their not paying the same. Divers others refused, and were sent to Newgate; but upon better consideration they paid their money, and were released again.” The temper of the Government as regards ship-money is further shown by the arrest and trial of the keeper of Newgate for permitting a prisoner committed for non-payment of this unlawful tax to go at large. It appears that the offender, Richard Chambers, had been several times remanded to the same custody, and had been allowed to escape.

It was highly dangerous to speak lightly of dignities in these ticklish times. The State trials give an account of the hard measure meted out to one Edward Floyde for scandalizing the princess palatine, Elizabeth, James I.’s daughter, and titular Queen of Bohemia. Floyde was charged with having said, while a prisoner in the Fleet, “I have heard that Prague is taken, and goodman Palsgrave and goodwife Palsgrave (Elizabeth) have taken to their heels and run away.” This puerile, gossip seriously occupied both houses of Parliament, and eventually the Lords awarded and adjudged that Edward Floyde be deemed an infamous person, incapable of bearing arms as a gentleman, whose testimony was not to be taken in any court or cause. He was also sentenced to ride with his head to his horse’s tail from Westminster to the pillory in Cheapside; after this to be whipped from the Fleet to Westminster, there again to stand on the pillory. He was to pay a fine of £5000 to the king, and imprisoned in Newgate during his life.

In 1642, according to a published document,[55] Newgate “hath not been more replenished with prisoners these many years than now, there being very nigh three hundred prisoners committed to that infamous castle of misery.” It was still the mere gatehouse prison, and its accommodation must have been of the most limited description. Chief among these inmates were six Jesuit priests who had been condemned to die, but had, no doubt through the powerful advocacy of Henrietta Maria, obtained a reprieve. “Whereupon did arise a tumultuous mutiny among the other prisoners, who refused to die without the Jesuits; but afterwards they (the mutineers) were mitigated in a kind of pacified tranquillity.” Parliament had also petitioned that “execution might be imposed upon” these priests; but the king would not condescend thereunto till his further pleasure, “whereupon they (the Jesuits) have continued secure in Newgate ever since, one man being solely excepted, viz. Goodman, who died last Good Friday, and at once deceived both Gregory[56] and Tyburn.” But the Parliament was at this date too near its rupture with the king to submit to be thus put off, and re-petitioned, stating “these Jesuits were an obstacle to their assiduous proceedings;” and His Majesty replied that if they were “the obstruction and hindrance of reformation in the Church they might be forthwith executed without further delay.” Henrietta Maria’s strong attachment to the Roman Catholic faith is satirized in the old German print, which I have taken from the Crowle ‘Pennant’s London’, and which represents the Queen doing penance at Tyburn over the grave of some recently executed priests. It is said that “the pore queen” walked afoot—some say barefoot—from St. James to Tyburn in the dead of night. A state coach followed with attendants, and her father confessor. The whole story is probably apocryphal, but the print is interesting as one of the earliest representations of Tyburn tree. The pilgrimage took place in 1628, but the print is of a later date.

Other prisoners at this time were certain Irishmen suspected to be rebels who had apparently been captured on the high seas, and eventually committed to Newgate. When formally examined before the Parliament, the servants, seamen, and soldiers were remitted; only the master of the ship, the captain, lieutenants, and ancients were detained, “and still continue in prison.” The court was to examine them further; but as this did not come off, the Parliament would, it was thought, censure them. These, found to be ten in number, five of them friars, four soldiers, and one a pilgrim, were at length examined “before a committee in the court of wards, who demanded of them their intents in coming over to Ireland, and to what effect: four of which very peremptorily denied, and said they came over with occasions of merchandize, but one of them betrayed the rest, and affirmed that they were friars, and came over into England to save souls for heaven.” The other five were carried down unto

Henrietta Maria doing penance at Tyburn.

Westminster before the same committee. The master of the ship, being called first, “did show a commission unto them for his going; they then asked him whether he would take the oath of allegiance, which he was willing to take. When asked as to the oath of supremacy, he replied that he was an ignorant man, and did not understand what it meant.” Three of the others could not speak a word of English, whereupon the master did interpret what they spake. “It seems by the exposition of the master of the ship that they have been in service under the Prince of Orange half a year; they were taken captives at Flanders; they served in France two years, and a half-year in Spain, and now come into their own country.”

Neglect of the stringent ordinances passed to protect life during the constant visitations of that fearful scourge the plague brought down the one universal penalty, committal to Newgate, upon offenders. Here is a long story about Stephen Smith, a fishmonger, whose door was by the sufferance of the warder broken open, and William Fenn, servant to Smith, who had already been indicted for offences committed during the several infections of that house, entered the house and brought a quantity of salted fish to the door for sale. Yet all the time Susan Wheelyer, a maid-servant of Smith’s, was shut up in the house infected with the plague. Smith had unlawfully abandoned his house. Fenn was apprehended and shut up with the late infected servant under a better guard. “I have committed the warder,” says Sir William Slingsby, who makes the report, “and commanded the fish to be carried in again, and the doors locked and guarded. … These proceedings I suspect to be done by the private directions of Smith.” The orders of the council on the above were prompt and severe. Stephen Smith was at once committed to Newgate, “there to be kept under strong bolts until further orders,” while William Fenn was sent to the pest-house, and a weight of iron placed on his heels to keep him safe and quiet there. It was ordered further, that the warders for their great neglect be put in the stocks before Smith’s house.

Newgate, during the last great plague epidemic, received all offenders against the sanitary rules. These were enforced by the Middlesex justices, who were directed to be most careful for the relief of the citizens and for the prevention of the spreading of infection. Diligent circumspection was to be used to prevent the removal of goods or persons from London or Westminster to other towns and villages, or up and down the Thames; also to put pressure upon those belonging to infected families who refused to shut themselves up. Refusal to obey or neglect of these orders was to be visited with committal to Newgate and indictment at the next sessions.

Offences against morality and religion were met with the same penalty of imprisonment. Incontinence and loose living were high misdemeanours. In an extract from the register of the High Court of Commission we find that Nicholas Slater of Royden, Essex, a married man, had run off with Blanche Cowper, another man’s wife. Defendants lived together in various places. “Slater, like a vagabond, without license had wandered up and down the kingdom professing physic and surgery, and carried Blanche about with him from place to place.” Slater was committed close prisoner to Newgate, there to remain during pleasure, and Blanche to Bridewell. There was added penance in Ware and Stepney, while Slater was fined £1000 and Blanche £100 to His Majesty. The last part of the sentence points to Charles’s shifts to raise money. This was in 1638. Another story of the same kind, but with a different issue, is of the same date. George Harrison in Newgate petitions the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lords of the High Commission Court for enlargement. A certain John Cock had, it appears, discovered the incontinent life of John Thierry and Ursula Baythorpe. The latter offered Cock £27 to be silent, which he was willing to accept, and went with the petitioner Harrison to a tavern, the place appointed for the handing over of the money. But they fell into a trap, and were arrested at the tavern; thence they were carried to the Compter and committed to Newgate. Afterwards at a sessions they were indicted, and, on the testimonies of the merchant and the said Ursula’s sister and her husband, were whipped three times to the pillory, where they stood eleven hours. They were not suffered to come down till they had asked Thierry’s and Ursula’s forgiveness before all the spectators, and so were three times whipped back again. “By the extremity of which execution petitioner lost his speech and almost his understanding, and Cock was carried home dead in the cart. By which cruelty and disgrace petitioner, who was formerly well respected, is now utterly undone.” Thierry must have had good friends at court. But the informer seems to have been right in his denunciation, for both the accused were subsequently “detected to the court,” and it was proved that the said poor men had only suffered for “meddling with the truth.” Petitioner now prays that the merchant (Thierry) may be ordered to give him and his poor children relief and restitution for their sufferings.

A quaint pamphlet entitled ‘Strange News from Newgate,’ dated 1647, states that on the 10th January, “being the blessed sabbath, at Botolph’s Church near Bishopgate, in sermon time, there arose a great disturbance by one Evan Price, a tailor, who stood up and declared himself to be Christ, which words much amazed the people, and divers timorous spirits into a great fear. … Whereupon he was immediately apprehended and carried before the Right Honourable the Lord Mayor, where he was examined seriously and at length, although no doubt a religious lunatic.” He was asked whether he had worked miracles, whether he was married, … “with divers other arguments objected against him, which he was not able to answer, but remained obstinate in his devilish and satanical opinion.” But after some time spent upon his examination, “as he still remained in his hell-bred opinion, not hearkening to any advice or counsel whatsoever,” it was ordered that he should be committed to Newgate, which was accordingly performed. “Five days later he was arraigned at the Old Bailey, and coming to the bar, was examined by the judges, but seemed resolute not to make any confession.” The pamphlet ends abruptly, and does not give the result of his trial.

It must have been consequent on some conflict with the ecclesiastical authority that Edward Powell, alias Anderson, was sent from Ely as a prisoner to Newgate. The story rests on a report from Bishop Wren of Ely to the council, dated 5th June 1638. Powell had been apprehended upon a riot committed by an assemblage which went by the name of Anderson’s Camp, but was not imprisoned for his share therein, but for his misdemeanours and foul speeches at the time of arrest. He was accused of being an abettor of the riot, although not present at it. When he had been at Newmarket the previous Lent, Powell paid the town-crier twopence to proclaim a gathering of the people to go to the king with a petition about their fens; “for the losing of the fens would be the losing of their livelihood.” Upon this Powell was summoned before Mr. Justice Goodrick, but denied the charge. Next day Mr. Goodrick, going into the market-place, found a crowd there with cudgels in their hands, and Powell with them. Powell, interrogated, asked whether the king’s market was not open to all, and rejoined his company. As the result of these disturbances, Powell was arraigned and sentenced to a fine of £200, and to be imprisoned, and “now lies in execution for the same. Since his removal from the prison at Ely to Newgate, the poor people are very quiet and in good order.” Powell from his captivity addresses his “loving friends and neighbours in the city of Ely, and others,” in letters which were seized. In these he expresses a hope of deliverance when the king comes to London, and that he has refused to give up his friends’ names, whereby they might be fined and imprisoned, although daily urged to do so by fair offers and large promises, and also by threatening language, terrible speech, and protestation of perpetual imprisonment. He then asks these friends to make a collection for him and his family, and gives a dark picture of his prison—“this loathsome gaol, in which we are accompanied with noisome stinks, cold, lousy to dying, and almost all other miseries.”

There is nothing especially remarkable in the purely criminal cases of this period; offences have a strong family likeness to those of our own day. Culprits are “cast” for “taking a chest of plate out of a house;” for “taking £100 from a gentleman,” and so forth. Now and again appears a case of abduction, a common crime in those and later days. Sarah Cox prays the king’s pardon for Roger Fulwood, who was convicted of felony for forcibly marrying her against her will. But she begs at the same time her protection for person and estate from any claims in regard to the pretended marriage. Knights of the road have already begun to operate; they have already the brevet rank of captain, and even lads of tender years are beguiled into adopting the profession of highway robber. Counterfeiting the king’s or other great seals was an offence not unknown. A Captain Farrar is lodged in Newgate (1639), accused of counterfeiting His Majesty’s signature and privy signet. His method of procedure was simple. Having received a document bearing His Majesty’s privy seal for the payment of a sum of £190, he removed the seal and affixed it to a paper purporting to be a license from the king to levy and transport two hundred men beyond seas. This he published as a royal license. When arraigned he admitted that the charge was true, but pleaded that he had done the same according to the king’s commands. He was reprieved until further orders.

The condition of the prisoners within Newgate continued very deplorable. This is apparent from the occasional references to their treatment. They were heavily ironed, lodged in loathsome dungeons, and all but starved to death. Poor Stephen Smith, the fishmonger,[57] who had contravened the precautionary rules against the plague, petitions the council that he has been very heavily laden with such intolerable bolts and shackles that he is lamed, and being a weak and aged man, is like to perish in the gaol. “Having always lived in good reputation and been a liberal benefactor where he has long dwelt, he prays enlargement on security.” The prison is so constantly over-crowded that the prisoners have “an infectious malignant fever which sends many to their long home. The magistrates who think them unfit to breathe their native air when living bury them as brethren when dead.” All kinds of robbery and oppression were practised within the precincts of the gaol. Inside, apart from personal discomfort, the inmates do much as they please. “There are seditious preachings by fifth monarchy men at Newgate,” say the records, “and prayers for all righteous blood.” Some time previous, when the Puritans were nominally the weakest, they also held their services in the prison. Samuel Eaton, a prisoner committed to Newgate as a dangerous schismatic, is charged with having conventicles in the gaol, some to the number of seventy persons. He was, moreover, permitted by the keeper to preach openly. The keeper was petitioned by one of the inmates to remove Eaton and send him to some other part of the prison, but he replied disdainfully, threatening to remove the petitioner to a worse place. He, the keeper himself, attended the conventicles, “calling it a very fair and goodly company, and staying there some season.” Besides this, he gave license to Eaton to go abroad, to preach, contrary to the charge of the High Commission (1638). Another complaint made by the petitioner is that the keeper caused petitioner’s sister to be removed out of the prison contrary to the opinion of a doctor, and that she died the very next day. Her chamber after her removal was assigned to Eaton, it being the most convenient place in the prison for holding his conventicles.

This keeper may be condemned as a fanatical partizan at worst. But he had predecessors who were active oppressors, eager to squeeze the uttermost farthing out of their involuntary lodgers. The bar kept within the prison must have been a cause of continued extortion, although those who pandered to the cupidity of the bar-keepers occasionally got into trouble. Sir Francis Mitchell, we read, was sent on foot and bareheaded to the Tower on account of his patent for ale-houses. “He is a justice of Middlesex, and had a salary of £40 a year from Newgate prison on condition of sending all his prisoners there,” … no doubt to drink the liquor supplied to the prison bar.

But still worse was the conduct of the under-strappers. An instruction to the Lord Mayor and sheriffs in the State Papers (Dec. 1649) directs them to examine the miscarriages of the under officers of Newgate who were favourers of the felons and robbers there committed, and to remove such as appear faulty. The nefarious practices of the Newgate officers were nothing new. They are set forth with much quaintness of diction and many curious details in a pamphlet of the period, entitled the ‘Black Dogge of Newgate.’ There was a tavern entitled the ‘Dogge Tavern in Newgate,’ as appears by the State Papers, where the place is indicted by an informer for improper practices. The author of the pamphlet pretends that the dog has got out of prison and leapt into a sign-board. “ ‘What the devil’s here?’ quoth a mad fellow going by, seeing the black cur ringed about the nose with a golden hoop, having two saucer-like eyes, and an iron chain about his neck. The public-house must be a well-customed house where such a porter keeps the door and calls in company.” The writer enters it and describes the scene. He finds “English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Dutch, and French in several rooms; some drinking the neat wine of Orleans, some the Gascony, some the Bordeaux. There wanted neither sherry sack nor charnico, paligo nor Peter Seeme, amber-coloured canary or liquorish Ipocras, brown beloved Bastard, fat Alicant, or any quick-spirited liquor that might draw their will into a circle. …” Not desiring to mix with such company, the writer sat himself and called for his “whole pint” alone. Presently he was joined by a “poor thin-gut fellow with a face as red as the gilded knobs of an alderman’s horse-bridle, who as it seemed had newly come out of limbo.” The two treated each other, and then exchanged opinions as to the sign of the tavern, wondering how it came first to be called the Black Dog of Newgate; and the writer maintained that he had read in an old chronicle “that it was a walking spirit in the likeness of a black dog, gliding up and down the streets a little before the time of execution, and in the night while the sessions continued.” From this archæological exercise they pass on to discuss the prison and its officers. This part of the pamphlet sheds a strong light upon the evil-doings of the turnkeys, who appear to have been guilty of the grossest extortion, taking advantage of their position as officers of the law to levy black-mail alike on criminals and their victims. Of these swindling turnkeys or bailiffs, whom the writer designates “coney-catchers,” he tells many discreditable tales, one or two of which may be worth transcribing.

The term coney-catching had long been in use to define a species of fraud akin to our modern “confidence trick,” or, as the French call it, the vol à l’Americain. Shakespeare, in the ‘Merry Wives of Windsor,’ makes Falstaff call Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol “coney-catching rascals.” The fraud was then of but recent introduction. It is detailed at length by Robert Greene in his ‘Notable Discovery of Cozenage,’ published in 1591. He characterizes it as a new art. Three parties were needed to practise it, called respectively the setter, the verser, and the barnacle; their game, or victim, was the coney. The first was the decoy, the second was a confederate who plied the coney with drink, the third came in by accident should the efforts of the others to beguile the coney into “a deceit at cards have failed.” In the end the countryman was completely despoiled. Later on there was a new nomenclature: the setter became the beater, the tavern to which the rogues adjourned was the “bush,” and the quarry was the bird. The verser was the retriever, the barnacle was the pot-hunter, and the game was called bat-fowling. Greene’s exposure was supposed to have deprived the coney-catchers of a “collop of their living.” But they still prospered at their nefarious practices, according to the author of the ‘Black Dogge,’ to whom I will now return.

This was their plan of procedure. Two coney-catchers enter a tavern together, and there find a gentleman drinking wine. They note his appearance, his weapons, his good cloak and his neat apparel, and are clear that he has a good store of money; so they make up to him. The three become friendly, and the gentleman stands treat. After two or three pottles of wine are disposed of one of the rogues says to their entertainer, “I pray you heark in your ear. Thus it is; my fellow hath a warrant to take you, therefore in kindness I pray you draw your purse and give him an angel to spend in drink, and I will undertake we will not see you at this time.” The stranger, however, would not be imposed upon, and said they were coney-catching knaves, and that they should not wrong him in any respect. “Whereupon the two sent for a constable, and charged the other with felony. The constable, recognizing the two as officials, took the stranger into custody and deprived him of his weapons. Then the two told the constable they would be answerable for his prisoner, and took charge of him. Now mark what followed. As these two knaves were bringing the party charged with felony to Newgate, one of them offered yet xx shillings to set him free, of which, when the party had considered, knowing though he was clear of that he was charged, yet if he lay in prison till the Sessions it would be greater charges. When he was on Newgate stairs ready to go into the gaol, he was content to leave his cloak, what money he had in his purse, and his weapons, which were in the constable’s hand, in pawn for the xx shillings, which the coney-catchers took, and discharged the prisoner without any more to do.”

A little later the same victim is again encountered, with a companion, in a tavern without Bishopgate, where he “had spoke for supper.” In came the swindling turnkeys, whereat the other set on the best face he could, and bade them welcome. The coney-catchers accepted the invitation, and ate and drank merrily. Supper being ended, the reckoning was called for, the shot paid, and, all things discharged, the coneys would fain have been gone. “But one of the knaves said nay: … thus it is, such a man was robbed within this week, and hath got out a warrant for you by name. He hath lost £10; now, if you will restore the money, and bestow xx shillings on us two to drink for our pains, we will undertake to satisfy the party and be your discharge. If not, we have a warrant, and you must answer it at Newgate. This back reckoning is something sharp, but there is no remedy; either pay so much money, or else must a constable be sent for, and so to Newgate as round as a hoop.”

“To be short, this was the conclusion: the coney put down £10, every penny whereof was to be paid to the man in the moon, for I dare take it upon my death neither of these coneys did offend any such man in manner these knaves had charged them.”

A favourite hunting-ground for these swindlers was at Westminster Hall during term time. Their method was to send confederates in among the thickest of the crowd, where the cut-purses were likely to be busiest, and there “listen if any purse were cut that day.” The coney-catchers themselves were posted, one by the water stairs, the other at the gate, where they could not fail to intercept the cut-purse who had committed the theft. Presently they recognize him, accost and stop him. The cut-purse, anxious to curry favour, offers to stand both wine and a breakfast, but the coney-catcher will not tarry. He declares with an oath that he is really sorry to have met the cut-purse that day, “for there is a mischief done, and he fears some one will smoke for it.” At this time the cut-purse is afraid, but for that time he scapeth their fingers. After this the swindler makes it his business to seek out the victim of the robbery, and on discovering him, promises that if he will only be guided by him he will help him to most of his money again. The honest fellow, a countryman, delighted, offers “at first word” one half to get other half back, the whole amount being ten pounds. “Then away goeth the coney-catcher to a justice,” from whom he obtains a warrant to take up all suspected persons. The warrant obtained, the coney-catcher is as “pleasant as a pie,” and with his countryman spend some time drinking a pottle of wine, after which the turnkey takes leave of his client, who goes to his lodging, and “the coney-catcher about his faculty.” Now, woe to the cut-purses we may meet, for they must to Newgate on his warrant; but although he apprehends twelve or sixteen, the real culprit is certainly not among them. “The honest company of cut-purses being all in Newgate, H. (the coney-catcher) goes presently and certifies the justice what a set of notable thieves he has taken, and desiring the justice to examine them about the theft, warning him that they will confess nothing, which indeed the justice findeth true.” They are remanded to Newgate, and en route beg H. to stand their friend, “assuring him of their innocency; yet rather than be in prison one offereth ten shillings, some more, some less, as they are of ability, with promise of more if H.’s good words gain them their release.”

“Now the coney-catcher hath the matter as he would wish it, and taking their money, first he goeth presently to the justice and certifieth him that these which he had apprehended did none of them cut the purse, and for that he hath gotten knowledge who did, he desireth that they may be bailed.” The justice, glad to hear the culprit is known, yields ready assent, and the captive cut-purses are set free.

H.’s next business is to hunt up the real thief, and meeting him, “spareth not to tell him how sore the justice is against him, and how earnestly the countryman will pursue the law; and further, he sweareth that some of those that were in Newgate told the justice plainly that he cut the purse. This peal ringeth nothing well in the cut-purse’s ears, who can find no favour but to Newgate.” So he entreats the coney-catcher to stand his friend, who promises at length to do any good he can, at the same time cautioning the cut-purse to confess nothing, “what proof soever come against him,” assuring him further, that the man who lost the money, although sore bent against, “yet he will partly be ruled by him, H.” But the arrest is made; the thief is conveyed to Newgate, and there, by way of welcome, a good pair of bolts and shackles are clapped upon his legs. Then H. sends for the countryman, telling him the good news that the thief is taken and in limbo; and together they go before the justice, to whom H. “signifieth how the case standeth, railing mightily against the cut-purse,” whose guilt can easily be proved, and begging his worship to summon the thief. The cut-purse is sent for, and “having taken out his lesson,” doggedly refuses to confess, upon which the justice returneth him to Newgate, there to abide till the next sessions. The countryman is bound over to give evidence, but he, “dwelling far from London, and it being long to next Law Day, allegeth he cannot be in the city at that time, for he is a poor man, and hath great occasion of business.”

On leaving the justice H. returns to Newgate, and assures the cut-purse that he has laboured hard “with him who had his purse cut to take his money again, and not to give evidence against him; that if he may have his money again he will presently go out of town.” The cut-purse, taking H.’s hand (as witness) that no man shall give evidence against him at the sessions, doth presently send abroad to his friends for the money; which as soon as it cometh he delivereth to H., and withal a large overplus, because he will be thus sure of H.’s favour.

“This done, H. goes to the countryman and tells him he got no more but six or seven pounds, of which, if he will accept, and proceed no further against the party, he hath it to pay him; marry he will not be known to the countryman, but that he had that money of some friend of the cut-purse’s, who upon the former condition is willing it should be paid, if not, to have his money again.

“The countryman, having haste out of the city, is glad to take it, out of which sum, if it be seven pounds, H. must have half; so that the poor man, of ten pounds hath but three pounds ten shillings, whereas the coney-catcher by this account hath got at one hand and another very near forty marks. The money shared, the countryman takes horse and away he rides. Again H.’s mouth is stopt, and the next sessions the cut-purse is quit by proclamation, no man being there to give evidence against him.”

Plain symptoms of the approaching struggle between the king and the commons are to be met with in the prison records. Immediately after the meeting of the Long Parliament, orders were issued for the enlargement of many victims of Star Chamber oppression. Among them was the celebrated Prynne, author of the ‘Histriomatrix,’[58] who had lost his ears in the pillory; Burton a clergyman, and Bastwick a physician, who had suffered the same penalties, all came out of prison triumphant, wearing ivy and rosemary in their hats. Now Strafford was impeached and presently beheaded; Laud also was condemned. The active interference of Parliament in all affairs of State extended to the arrest of persons suspected of treasonable practices. A curious document issues from Newgate in 1642, where several supposed rebels and others have been imprisoned. It is a petition[59] which was presented to Parliament by Colonel Goret, who had commanded some of them in France. The petition sets forth that Daniel Dalley, master of a small barque, of “Kinsaile in Ireland,” had been freighted, about the 10th November, 1641, out by two gentlemen, merchants of Kingsale, with beef, tallow, and hides for “St. Mallowes in France.” There these commodities had been “vended,” and the same merchants laid out their money in wine and fruits to freight the vessel home again. “All being done, and they ready to set sail, the governor (of St. Mallowes) sent a command to Daniel Dalley the master, that he should take nine gentlemen with him, which should pay for their passage.” “By reason of the troubles,”[60] the master refused; but Dalley was obliged to take them on board, under threat of committal to gaol, and by the governor’s warrant and command. He then set sail, and two days after he had gone to sea a storm rose at south and S. S. W., which drove them into Saltcombe in the west country, “where the passengers went ashore and took lodging till it would please God to send fair weather.” However, notice of their landing came to Captain Foskew, “one that had command of a fort of his majesty’s there,” who summoned them before him and examined them. Finding they could not give a good account of their designs, he committed them, with the merchants and the ship’s company, until he communicated with Parliament. In reply the Parliament sent for them to London, and lodged them in Newgate. There they lay from day to day expecting to be called up by Parliament, but this being so long delayed, they petitioned for enlargement.

On the Parliament side it appeared that information had been given the House of Commons that certain mariners and commanders were proceeding from France to Ireland to take part in the rebellion, they having a commission about them for the purpose. Also that one Captain Foskew had taken and stayed the said mariners and sea captains. “The honourable assembly,” therefore, as well out of their pious and grave consideration for the better satisfaction of the kingdom, as for the prevention of such dangers as might follow from their landing in Ireland, made an order to bring the prisoners to London for examination. This was done with all proper precaution. Each sheriff saw to their safe conduct in his own county, “not suffering them to go together, but the commanders to be kept away from the rest.” By virtue of the Speaker’s (Lenthall) warrant, they were delivered by the sheriff of Devon to the next sheriff, and so from county to county, until they came to Middlesex, where they were received by the sheriffs of Middlesex, and committed to Newgate, the county gaol, “where they were with much care imprisoned and strictly kept, some of them being placed in the master’s, others in the common side.”

The petition already mentioned set forth that the said captains, “being all strangers and destitute of acquaintance, except with a few persons of this town. They declared that they were his majesty’s true and loyal subjects, most of them born within the king’s realm of Ireland, all strictly obliged and most ready to defend his rights and privileges to the utmost of their power. Being ‘necessitated in their native country,’ they repaired three years previously to France, where they served in martial affairs under Colonel Goret, till they were disbanded, and resolved to return home. They were, however, detained at Saltcombe, in the county of Devon, where they were imprisoned and their goods seized. Since then they had lain in Newgate, ‘where they are liable to remain in great misery, to their loss of time, and utter destruction and ruin.’ They begged, therefore, that they might be ‘forthwith convented before the honourable assembly to answer their charge,’ and having proved their loyalty, might be restored to their former liberty and fortunes.” The answer to this petition is not recorded, except that the prisoners hoped daily to be sent for, a committee of the House having been appointed to examine them. Meantime they carried themselves civilly in the gaol, and with patience looked for the time when they should be called for their answer. They were conscious of innocence; they denied “all intentions of assisting the rebels in Ireland, or any act which might tend to their disloyalty,” the true cause of their return home being a want of employment in France.

There are other cases of imprisonment more or less arbitrary in these troubled times. Another petition may be quoted, that of Richard Overton, “a prisoner in the most contemptible gaol of Newgate,” under an order of the House of Lords. Overton tells us how he was brought before that House “in a warlike manner, under pretence of a criminal fact, and called upon to answer interrogations concerning himself which he conceived to be illegal and contrary to the national rights, freedoms, and properties of the free commoners of England, confirmed to them by Magna Charta, the Petition of Right, and the Act for the Abolishment of the Star Chamber.” Overton was therefore emboldened to refuse subjection to the said House. He was adjudged guilty of contempt, and committed to Newgate, where he was seemingly doomed to lie until their lordships’ pleasure shall be further signified, which “may be perpetual if they please, and may have their wills, for your petitioner humbly conceiveth that he is made a prisoner to their wills, not to the law, except their wills may be a law.” On this account he appealed to the Commons “as the most sovereign Court of Judicature in the land,” claiming from them “repossession of his just liberty and freedom, or else that he may undergo the penalty prescribed by the law if he be found a transgressor.” Whether Overton was supported by the Commons against the Lords does not appear, but within three years the Lower House abolished the House of Peers.

Here is yet another petition from a better known inmate of Newgate, the obstinately independent Colonel Lilburne, commonly called “Freeborn John.” Lilburne was always at loggerheads with the government of the city. In 1637, when following the trade of bookseller, he was convicted by the Star Chamber for publishing seditious libels, and sentenced to the pillory, imprisonment, and a fine of £5000. In 1645 he falls foul of the Parliament, and writes a new treatise, calling in question their power. For this, although he had already done good service to the Parliamentary cause and had earned the grade of Lieutenant-Colonel in the field, he is first questioned, then sent to Newgate. He dates from thence, in 1646, a letter to Mr. Wollaston, the keeper of Newgate, or his deputy. He states that he has seen a warrant commanding the keeper to produce him before the House of Lords, but that the warrant expresses no reason why he should “dance attendance before them,” nor does he know any reason why he should, or any law that compels him thereto. The Lords had already endeavoured illegally to try him, a commoner, before their bar, for which, under hand and seal, he protested to their faces against them as violent and illegal encroachers upon his rights and liberties, and appealed to the proper tribunal, the Commons, for which appeal he was arbitrarily committed to gaol. Lilburne goes on to say—

“Sir, I am a freeman of England, and therefore I am not to be used as a slave or vassal by the Lords, which they have already done, and would further do; I also am a man of peace and quietness, and desire not to molest any, if I be not forced thereunto, therefore I desire you, as you tender my good and your own, take this for an answer, that I cannot, without turning traitor to my liberty, dance attendance to their lordships’ bar, being bound in conscience, duty to God, myself, thine, and my country, to oppose their encroachments to the death, which, by the strength of God, I am resolved to do. Sir, you may, or cause to be exercised upon me some force or violence to pull and drag me out of my chamber, which I am resolved to maintain as long as I can, before I will be compelled to go before them; and therefore I desire you, in a friendly way, to be wise and considerate before you do that which, it may be, you can never undo.

“Sir, I am your true and fair-conditioned prisoner, if you will be so to me,

“John Lilburne.

“From my cock-loft in the press-yard of Newgate, 23rd June, 1646.”

Lilburne was eventually banished by the Rump Parliament; but in 1653 he returned to England, and threw himself upon the tender mercies of the Protector. Cromwell would do nothing, and left him to the law. Lilburne was then arrested, and committed to Newgate. At the next sessions he was arraigned, but refused to plead unless furnished with a copy of his indictment. He managed to put off his trial by various expedients till the next sessions, when he was acquitted by the jury. In Thurloe’s State papers it is stated that “John Lilburne was five times at his trial at the Sessions House, where he most courageously defended himself from Mr. Stale, the recorder’s, violent assaults with his old buckler, Magna Charta, so that they have let him alone.” “Freeborn John” was so popular with malcontents of all shades of opinion, that the authorities, from Oliver Cromwell downward, were really afraid of him. Oliver professed to be enraged against him, and anxious for his punishment, yet he privately paid him a pension equal to the pay of a Lieutenant-Colonel, and, as Thurloe says, “thought the fellow so considerable, that during the time of his trial he kept three regiments continually under arms at St. James’.” The jury which acquitted Lilburne were summoned to answer for their conduct before the Council of State. Yet there is little doubt that the court was overawed by the mob. For Thurloe says there were six or seven hundred men at the trial, with swords, pistols, bills, daggers, and other instruments, that, in case they had not cleared him, they would have employed in his defence. The joy and acclamation was so great after he was acquitted, that the shout was heard an English mile.

The mob had been turbulent enough to give cause for alarm on a previous occasion. Four or five years previously the puritanical zeal of the Lords had produced a stringent ordinance against tippling and gaming on the Lord’s Day. This occasioned a great tumult, which originated in Moorfields, and agitated the metropolis for a couple of days. It is said that, but for the vigorous action of Fairfax, the Government would have been overthrown. The people mastered a part of the trainbands, seized their drums and colours, beat up for recruits, then forming into something like military order, they surprised Newgate and Ludgate in the night, and seized the keys. The rioters divided into two parties: one marched upon Whitehall, but were discomfited en route; the other ranged the city, possessing themselves of ordnance, arms, and ammunition. Prompt measures were, however, taken at a council of war, and Fairfax, entering the city at the head of two regiments, put several to the sword, took many prisoners, and dispersed the rest.

The transfer of power to the Commonwealth is significantly recorded in the annals of Newgate. A whole batch of warrants are to be found in the State papers about 1649, ordering the committal of persons charged with being in arms against the Parliament—the offenders are mostly military officers. Thus the keeper of Newgate, Richard Dicke by name, is commanded to receive Lieutenant-Colonel Clarke, Major Wright, and Captain Wescott; also Lieutenant Gage, Robert Wood, pilot, and Robert Parker, taken in a man of war, all charged with levying war. Again, the Commonwealth directs W. Roberts to be sent to Newgate for being an agent of the proclaimed King of Scotland. Later on, Colonel Clarke, already mentioned, was released on his signing the test, and finding securities for good behaviour. Captain Matthew Harrison is committed for bearing arms against the Parliament, and “drinking a health to Charles, the late king’s son, by name King Charles II.” The recorder is directed to examine Colonel Jones concerning Captain Harrison, and to see that he be proceeded against according to law. A declaration is made before the Council of State as to Charles Pullen, “lately a prisoner in Newgate,” committed there for being found in the Hart frigate. Pullen had escaped from prison, and was liable to the penalty of death if recaptured; but the council remit the penalty in order to exchange Pullen for Ensign Wright, a prisoner at Jersey. In Nov. 1650 John Jolfe is committed to Newgate for carrying the Roebuck out of the Commonwealth. Royalist sympathizers find but scant comfort. The keeper of Newgate is ordered to receive and imprison one Pate, and hold him in safe custody, for aiding Lieutenant-General Middleton to escape from the Tower; and a similar warrant is made out against Mitchell for being accessory to the escape of Colonel Edward Massey from the same place.

All this time prisoners of great mark were at times confined in Newgate. That noted royalist, Judge Jenkins, was among the number. His crime was publishing seditious books, and sentencing to death people who had assisted against the Parliament. He was indeed attainted of high treason under an ordinance which started in the House of Commons, and was ultimately passed, and sent to the House of Lords. A committee was sent from “the Commons’ House to Newgate, which was to interview Judge Jenkins, and make the following offer to him—viz. that if he would own the power of the Parliament to be lawful, they would not only take off the sequestrations from his estates, amounting to £500 per annum, but they would also settle a pension on him of £1000 a year.” His reply was to the following effect: “Far be it from me to own rebellion, although it was lawful and successful.” As the judge refused to come to terms with them, he remained in Newgate till the Restoration.

People of still higher rank found themselves in gaol. The brother of the Portugal ambassador, Don Pantaleon Sa, is sent, with others, to Newgate for a murder committed by them near the Exchange. It was a bad case. They had quarrelled with an English officer, Gerard, who, hearing the Portuguese discoursing in French upon English affairs, told them they did not represent certain passages aright. “One of the foreigners gave him the lie, and all three fell upon him, and stabbed him with a dagger; but Colonel Gerard being rescued out of their hands by one Mr. Anthuser, they retired home, and within one hour returned with twenty more, armed with breastplate and head-pieces; but after two or three turns, not finding Mr. Anthuser, they returned home that night.”[61] Don Pantaleon made his escape from prison a few days later, but he was retaken. Strenuous efforts were then made to obtain his release. His trial was postponed on the petition of “the Portugal merchants.” The Portugal ambassador himself had an audience of Cromwell, the Lord Protector. But the law took its course. Don Pantaleon pleaded his relationship, and that he had a commission to act as ambassador in his brother’s absence; this was disallowed, and after much argument the prisoners pleaded guilty, and desired “to be tried by God and the country.” A jury was called, half-denizens, half-aliens, six of each, who, after a full hearing, found the ambassador’s brother and four more guilty of murder and felony. Lord Chief Justice Rolles then sentenced them to be hanged, and fixed the day of execution; “but by the desire of the prisoners it was respited two days.” This was the 6th July, 1654. On the 8th, Don Pantaleon Sa was reprieved, or more exactly, his sentence was commuted to beheading. On the 10th he tried to escape, without success, and on the same day he was conveyed from Newgate to Tower Hill in a coach and six horses in mourning, with divers of his brother’s retinue with him. There he laid his head on the block, and “it was chopt off at two blows.” The rest although condemned were all reprieved, except one, an English boy concerned in the murder, who was hanged at Tyburn.[62]

Other distinguished inmates, a few years later, were Charles Lord Buckhurst, Edward Sackville, and Sir Henry Bellayse, K.B., who, being prisoners in Newgate, petitioned the Lord Chief Justice, March 10th, to be admitted to bail, one of them being ill of the small-pox. They were charged seemingly with murder. Their petition sets forth that “while returning from Waltham to London, on the 8th February, they aided some persons, who complained that they had been robbed and wounded in pursuit of the thieves, and in attacking the robbers wounded one who has since died.” Sir Thomas Towris, Baronet, petitions the king (Charles II.) “not to suffer him to lie in that infamous place, where he has not an hour of health, nor the necessaries of life. He states that he has been four months in the Tower, and five weeks in Newgate, charged with counterfeiting His Majesty’s hand, by the malice of an infamous person who, when Registrar Accountant at Worcester House, sold false debentures.” Sir Thomas “wished to lay his case before His Majesty at his first coming from Oxford, but was deceived, and the way to bounty stopped.”