The Chronicles of Crime. Camden Pelham
ceased.
About two o’clock on the following morning the remains of Wild were interred in St. Pancras churchyard; but a few nights afterwards the body was taken up (for the use of the surgeons, as it was supposed). At midnight a hearse and six was waiting at the end of Fig Lane, where the coffin was found the next day.
Wild had by the woman he married at Wolverhampton a son about nineteen years old, who came to London a short time before the execution of his father. He was a youth of so violent and ungovernable a disposition, that it was judged right to confine him during the time of the execution, lest he should excite the people to some tumult. He subsequently went to one of the West India colonies.
The adventures of Wild are of a nature to attract great attention, from the multiplicity and variety of the offences of which he was guilty. It has been hinted, that his career of crime having been suffered to continue so long was in some degree attributable to the services which he performed for the government, in arresting and gaining information against the disaffected, during the troubles which characterised the early part of the reign of George I.; but whatever may have been the cause of his being so long unmolested, whatever supineness on the part of the authorities, whether wilful or not, may have procured for him so continued a reign of uninterrupted wickedness, it cannot be doubted that the fact of his long safety tended so much to the demoralisation of society, as that many years passed before it would assume that tone, which the exertions of a felon like Wild were so calculated to destroy. The existing generation cannot but congratulate itself upon the excellence of the improvements which have been made in our laws, and the admirable effect which they have produced; as well as upon the exceedingly active vigilance of the existing police, by whom crime, instead of its being supported and fostered, is checked and prevented.
CATHERINE HAYES.
BURNT ALIVE FOR THE MURDER OF HER HUSBAND.
THE case of this atrocious criminal only finds a parallel in that of the monster of modern crime—Greenacre.
Catherine Hayes was the daughter of a poor man named Hall, who lived at Birmingham, and having remained with her parents until she was fifteen years of age, a dispute then arose, in consequence of which she set off for London. On her way she met with some officers, who, remarking that her person was engaging, persuaded her to accompany them to their quarters at Great Ombersley, in Worcestershire. Having remained with them some time, she strolled on into Warwickshire, and was there hired into the house of Mr. Hayes, a respectable farmer. An intimacy soon sprang up between her and the son of her master, which ended in a private marriage taking place at Worcester; and an attempt, on the part of the officers, to entrap young Hayes into enlisting, rendered it necessary to disclose the whole affair to the father. He felt that it would be useless now to oppose his son, in consequence of what had taken place, and he in consequence set him up in business as a carpenter. Mrs. Hayes, however, was of a restless disposition, and persuaded him to enlist, which he did; and his regiment being ordered to the Isle of Wight, his wife followed him. His father bought him off at an expense of 60l., and now gave him property to the amount of about 26l. per annum; but after the marriage had been solemnised about six years, Mrs. Hayes prevailed on her husband to come to London. On their arrival in the metropolis, Mr. Hayes took a house, part of which he let in lodgings, and opened a shop in the chandlery and coal trade, in which he was as successful as he could have wished, but exclusive of his profit by shop keeping, he acquired a great deal of money by lending small sums on pledges, for at this time the trade of pawnbroking was followed by any one at pleasure, and was subjected to no regulation.
Mr. Hayes soon found that the disposition of his wife was not of such a nature as to promise him much peace. The chief pleasure of her life consisted in creating and encouraging quarrels among her neighbours. Sometimes she would speak of her husband, to his acquaintance, in terms of great tenderness and respect; and at other times she would represent him to her female associates as a compound of everything that was contemptible in human nature. On a particular occasion, she told a woman that she should think it no more sin to murder him than to kill a dog. At length her husband thought it prudent to remove to Tottenham-court-road, where he carried on his former business, but he then again removed to Tyburn-road (now Oxford-street). He soon amassed what he considered a sufficient sum to enable him to retire from business, and he accordingly took lodgings near the same spot. A supposed son of Mrs. Hayes, by her former connexion, who went by the name of Billings, lived in the same house, and he and Mrs. Hayes were in the habit of feasting themselves at the expense of the husband of the latter. During his temporary absence from town, her proceedings were so extravagant, that the neighbours deemed it right to make her husband aware of the fact; and on his return he remonstrated with her on the subject, when a quarrel took place, which ended in a fight. It is supposed that at this time the design of murdering Mr. Hayes was formed by his wife, and it was not long before she obtained a seconder in her horrid project in the person of her reputed son. At this time a person named Thomas Wood came to town from Worcestershire, and seeking out Hayes, persuaded him to give him a lodging, as he was afraid of being impressed. After he had been in town only a few days, Mrs. Hayes informed him of the plot which existed, and endeavoured to persuade him to join her and her son. He was at first shocked at the notion of murdering his friend and benefactor, and rejected the proposals; but at length Mrs. Hayes, alleging that her husband was an atheist, and had already been guilty of murdering two of his own children, one of whom he had buried under an apple-tree, and the other under a pear-tree, and besides urging that 1500l., which would fall to her at his death, should be placed at the disposal of her accomplices, he consented. Shortly after this, Wood went out of town for a few days, but on his return he found Mrs. Hayes, and her son, and husband, drinking together, and apparently in good humour. He joined them at the desire of Hayes and the latter boasting that he was not drunk, although they had had a guinea’s worth of liquor among them, Billings proposed that he should try whether he could drink half a dozen bottles of mountain wine, without getting tipsy, and promised that if he did so, he would pay for the wine. The proposal was agreed to, and the three murderers went off to procure the liquor. On their way, it was agreed among them that this was the proper opportunity to carry their design into execution, and having procured the wine, for which Mrs. Hayes paid half a guinea, Mr. Hayes began to drink it, while his intended assassins regaled themselves with beer. When he had taken a considerable quantity of the wine, he danced about the room like a man distracted, and at length finished the whole quantity: but, not being yet in a state of absolute stupefaction, his wife sent for another bottle, which he also drank, and then fell senseless on the floor. Having lain some time in this condition, he got, with much difficulty, into another room, and threw himself on a bed. When he was asleep, his wife told her associates that this was the time to execute their plan, as there was no fear of any resistance on his part, and accordingly Billings went into the room with a hatchet, with which he struck Hayes so violently that he fractured his skull. At this time Hayes’s feet hung off the bed; and the torture arising from the blow made him stamp repeatedly on the floor, which, being heard by Wood, he also went into the room, and, taking the hatchet out of Billings’ hand, gave the poor man two more blows, which effectually despatched him. A woman, named Springate, who lodged in the room over that where the murder was committed, hearing the noise occasioned by Hayes’s stamping, imagined that the parties might have quarrelled in consequence of their intoxication; and going down stairs, she told Mrs. Hayes that the noise had awakened her husband, her child, and herself. Catherine, however, had a ready answer to this: she said some company had visited them, and were grown merry, but they were on the point of taking their leave; and Mrs. Springate returned to her room well satisfied. The murderers now consulted on the best manner of disposing of the body, so as most effectually to prevent detection. Mrs. Hayes proposed to cut off the head, because, if the body was found whole, it would be more likely to be known, and the villains agreeing to this proposition, she fetched a pail, lighted a candle, and all of them went into the room. The men then drew the body partly off the bed, and Billings supported the head, while Wood, with his pocket-knife, cut it off, and the infamous woman held the pail to receive it, being as careful as possible that the floor might not be stained with the blood. This being done, they emptied the blood out of the pail