The Chronicles of Newgate (Vol. 1&2). Griffiths Arthur
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