Volume V
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for Fourteen Years for cheating a Young Lady and shifts of swindlers,' this youth, had he not been checked in early career, might have proved as dangerous to society as the greatest adept in this species of robbery. 1 Swindling had of late years become so common a practice in the metropolis that writers for diurnal papers frequently amused themselves in re- lating adroit performances of this nature in burlesque, pun and hyperbole. One At Middlesex Sessions Richard Turner, a very young man, was tried for fraudulently obtaining from Miss Strat- ford, the daughter of a respectable gentleman in Hatton of these scribbling wits thus made merry with a silly tradesman on being fiddled out of his money : "SWINDLING SET TO MUSIC.-A country-looking man lately called at a haberdasher's shop with a fiddle under his arm, and after purchasing and paying for some trifling articles, which he pretended to want, asked to be allowed to leave his purchase and his fiddle till lie did some other business through the town. He had scarcely gone out when in comes an accomplice (as it turned out), who, observing the fiddle, takes it up and tries it, and is quite charmed with it. 'This is the most charming fiddle I have ever met with ; is it for sale ? -- I'd give fifty guineas for that fiddle.' He was told it was not for sale, but belonged to a countryman who had just left it there till he should make some other calls. 'When he comes back for it, try and buy it from him -- make the best bargain with him you can for yourself; but whatever you buy it at, I promise to give you fifty guineas for it, and I will call again by and by.' By and by back comes the countryman for his fiddle. ' Will you part with that fiddle ? ' says the haberdasher ; 'I have taken a fancy for it.' The man answered he had no intention of parting with his fiddle, for lie knew it to be a very good one, and did not know if he could get such another. ' I'll give you fifty shillings for it,' said the haberdasher. ' No, no.' 'Five guineas for it,' said the haberdasher. ' I'll not take twenty,' said the countryman. In short, after a great deal of chapmanship, the haberdasher got the fiddle at forty guineas ; and a happy man was he, thinking he had made ten guineas by the bargain. But he has been allowed to keep the fiddle, to solace himself for the loss of his money. The fifty-guinea merchant never returned." "On the 13th of October, 1809, a most infamous act of swindling was practised on eight poor infirm widows in the Almshouses, near the New Grove Road, Mile End Road, by a well-dressed man, about five feet two inches high, stoutish made, hair tied, and light green coat. He went to one of the poor pensioners' houses and thus addressed them : ' You are all widows --a lady has left you eight pounds ' ; he then took their names down, and inquired who would go with him, saying the minister and gentlemen were waiting for them, that they must bring twenty-three shillings in silver to give change, or they could not be paid. One of the poor women borrowed the money at a neighbouring public-house, and a young woman went with him to Stepney Church. He told her to wait at the porch while he went and spoke to the clerk, which she saw him do, and supposed all was right ; but he told the clerk he wanted to put up the banns of marriage, and the clerk desired him to come when the service was over. He came out, told the girl all was right, and she must go with him. He then asked the unsuspect- ing girl for the twenty-three shillings and decamped with the money. The girl went back to the clerk, where she was soon informed of her mistake, to the no small grief of the poor disappointed pensioners." Garden, the sum of two pounds, in the following artful manner. His father being a postman at Clapham, he got access to letters sent by post. He opened one letter sent by a young lady named Burford, a teacher in a school at Clapham, directed to Mr Stratford in the common course of correspondence; he suppressed the same and wrote out a copy, interpolated with paragraphs of his own invention, particularly one in which Miss B. was made to say that the bearer was the son of the gardener, and begged Miss Strat- ford to send by him two pounds, to pay for articles which she had purchased in Bond Street. The prisoner carried the letter, and received from Miss Stratford the money and some articles of dress, which he, instead of bringing to Miss Burford at Clapham, gave to a common prostitute, whom he kept company with in Lambeth. It also appeared that a letter written by Miss Burford to a Miss Cooper in Shrewsbuxy had been opened in the same manner by the prisoner, and a surreptitious one sent in its stead, desiring an answer to be returned to Miss White, St George's Fields. This circumstance came to Miss Burford's know- ledge; and an explanation having taken place between her and Miss Stratford, a Bow Street officer was sent to Miss White's lodgings, in Felix Street, Lambeth, who said he had a letter from Miss Burford. The prisoner appeared to receive it, was immediately taken, and confessed the whole fraud. He was found guilty, and sentenced to fourteen years' transportation. |