Volume III
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JOHN BERRY, STEPHEN M'DANIEL, JAMES EGAN, JAMES SALMON AND -----------BLEE A new Species of Murderers, who conspired against the Lives of many Innocent Men Egan as a shoemaker, in Drury Lane; and Salmon was a leather-breeches maker, in Drury Lane. These villains conspired together in accusing innocent people of crimes which took away life, for the reward so offered. Various were the diabolical plans they laid for this purpose. At one time they enticed two victims to join them in committing a highway robbery upon one of their own gang, a third was to purchase the stolen goods, and the other was to apprehend the intended victims, permitting his accomplice who had been concerned in the robbery to escape, and then to join the party robbed and the receiver in the prosecution. But if, through the information of the other two, the thief-taker, who proposed and assisted in the robbery, was apprehended, then, in order to preserve him, the prosecution was not supported. These villains exhibited an accusation of robbery against two young men named Newman and March. Upon their trial they related the manner in which they had been seduced; but the evidence of the thief-takers was so strong that they were convicted, and suffered death. A poor man named Tyler was met by one of the gang, who said he would make him a present of a horse for which he had no further occasion. The unfortunate man joyfully received the horse from his apparently generous benefactor, by whom he was advised to take the beast to an inn in Smith- field, there to be taken care of till he should determine in what manner to dispose of him. Before he could reach Smithfield he was seized by Egan, who took him before the sitting alderman ; and it being sworn that he had stolen the horse, he was committed to Newgate, and soon after- wards hanged. In the year 1753 they charged an innocent man named Woodland with felony; and he was committed, and sentenced to suffer death ; but he was so fortunate as to receive a pardon, on condition of transportation. The villains, however, claimed, and actually received, the reward, in consequence of their having prosecuted him to conviction. Joshua Kidden was the next who fell a sacrifice to their abominable artifices. It would be tedious to recount the particulars relating to the many people who suffered death through the false evidence of these atrocious villains, and especially as the several cases bear much similarity to each other. We shall now proceed to a narrative of the fact of which they were convicted. The money obtained by the conviction of Kidden being nearly expended, they employed themselves in concerting new schemes of villainy for recruiting their finances. It was determined to employ a man named Blee, a fellow of abandoned principles, who had for some time acted as an assistant to Berry in attending in the fields about Islington till he could decoy two idle boys to consent to join him in a robbery. They all held a meeting in an arbour belonging to a public-house, the sign of Sir John Oldcastle, in the neigh- bourhood of Islington, where they appointed the time for committing the robbery, and that it should be near Dept- ford, on account of the inhabitants of Greenwich having advertised twenty pounds for the apprehending any high- wayman or footpad, in addition to the reward allowed by Parliament. Their wicked plan being settled, they separated, lest they should be suspected of holding an improper corre- spondence, for they were particularly careful not to be seen together where there was a probability of their persons being known. The time for holding the assizes having arrived, Mr Cox, having a warrant for apprehending Berry, Salmon, M'Daniel and Egan, went to Maidstone, having Blee in custody. Mr Cox waited till the conclusion of the trial, but had no sooner heard the foreman of the jury pronounce the prisoners guilty than he caused the four iniquitous accomplices to be taken into custody. They obstinately persisted in declaring themselves innocent; and even when confronted with Blee denied having the least knowledge of him. But on the following day they severally requested to be admitted evidences for the Crown. In this none of them was indulged, the evidence of Blee being deemed sufficient for their conviction. They were removed to London, in order for trial, as being accessories before the fact. The jury were not able to determine whether the prisoners came within the descrip- tion of the statutes 4th and 5th of Philip and Mary, or 3rd and 4th of William and Mary, and therefore referred the case to the decision of the twelve judges. The special verdict being brought to a hearing before the judges in the hall of Serjeants Inn, counsel was heard on both sides, and it was unanimously determined that offences charged against the prisoners did not come within the meaning of the statutes above mentioned ; but orders were given for indicting them for a conspiracy. An indictment being found against them, they were again put to the bar at the Old Bailey, and the evidence exhibited against them on their former trial being recapitulated, the jury pronounced them guilty, and they were sentenced to be punished in the following manner: Berry and M'Daniel to stand in the pillory, once at the end of Hatton Garden, in Holborn, and once at the end of King Street, in Cheapside; Salmon and Egan to stand once in the middle of West Smithfield, and the second time at the end of Fetter Lane, in Fleet Street; and all to be imprisoned in Newgate for the space of seven years; and upon the expiration of that time not to be discharged without finding sureties to be bound in the penalties of a thousand pounds each for their good behaviour for the seven following years. On the 5th of March, 1756, M'Daniel and Berry were set in the pillory at the end of Hatton Garden, and were so severely treated by the populace that their lives were sup- posed to be in danger. Egan and Salmon were taken to Smithfield on Monday, the 8th of the same month, amidst a surprising concourse of people, who no sooner saw the offenders exposed in the pillory than they pelted them with stones, brickbats, potatoes, dead dogs and cats, and other things. The constables now interposed; but, being soon overpowered, the offenders were left wholly to the mercy of an enraged mob. The blows they received occasioned their heads to swell to an enormous size; and by people hanging to the skirts of their clothes they were nearly strangled. They had been in the pillory about half-an-hour when a stone struck Egan on the head, and he immediately expired. The sheriffs fearing that should the survivors be again exposed to the vengeance of an enraged people they would share the fate of their companion in iniquity, the remainder of the sentence of pillory was on that account remitted ; but the length of their sentence of imprisonment, added to the great amount of the sureties for their good behaviour after the expiration thereof, might have been considered tanta- mount to imprisonment for life-a fate well suited to such mischievous, hard-hearted and unrelenting villains. They, however, soon died in Newgate. |