Twenty Years' Recollections of an Irish Police Magistrate. Frank Thorpe Porter
where Martin was severely wounded, and had consequently become an inmate of the Hotel des Invalides. There Colonel Vesey again saw the man, whose escape from an ignominious death had often occasioned perplexing conjectures to his prosecutor. The old sergeant evinced great pleasure at the Colonel's visit, attended him through the establishment, and having conducted him into one of the arbors, which the veterans of the Invalides have, from the very commencement of the institution, cultivated with peculiar care and taste, he offered the Colonel a seat under an agreeable shade, and requested him to listen to a narration of the escape which had been effected from Old Kilmainham. "I need not now, sir," he added, "ask any condition from you, for the man who arranged the affair is dead. No one can now be injured by the disclosure. I have bitterly mourned the disgraceful act that subjected me to capital punishment, which I only escaped by flying for ever from my native country, and which also led to the loss of my poor brother, whom I persuaded to join in it and some other similar deeds. God knows my heart. I would willingly make restitution of your property, but I shall never possess the means. It was a great consolation that I was able to do you a little service after Fontenoy, and I felt a certain happiness in receiving your forgiveness when we parted at Lille."
"My good friend," said the Colonel, "as to the affair at Castleknock, I would wish you never to mention it again. I have, however, a great curiosity to know how you managed to avoid the fate which, to say the truth, I thought you had undergone."
"We took the money, sir," said Martin, "and placed it in a strong canvas bag. We hid it in neither house, garden, nor field, but in a deep part of the river Liffey, below the Salmon Leap. There was a stout cord from the bag to a heavy weight, so that it might be easily caught by a drag. Well, I was convicted and sentenced, and there were four others condemned at the same Commission, and we were all to be executed on the same day. One was a forger, and three were housebreakers. We each occupied a separate cell in the condemned yard. It was a horrible place, for I well recollect that on each side of the yard a full length figure of Death was painted,[1] holding in his skeleton hands a scythe and hour-glass; so that wherever our eyes turned, we were reminded of our hapless condition and coming sufferings. The gaoler came in two or three times daily, whilst our cells were open, and I soon remarked that he took very little notice of the others, but spoke pretty often to me. On the fifth or sixth day after my sentence, I was in my cell, counting my days, and trying to count my hours; making pictures in my despairing mind of the cart and the crowd, and cringing as if I already felt the slippery noose of the soaped halter closing round the creeping flesh of my neck; thinking of the happy days of innocent childhood, and feeling some consolation in my misery that my brother had not been condemned; that I left no wife or family, and that both my parents were dead, and spared the shame and sorrow of their son's public execution. This was the state of my mind when the gaoler entered the cell. He closed the door, and addressed some kind expressions to me, hoping that I was resigned to the great change that was impending, and enquiring if he could do anything for my comfort or consolation. In a stout but low tone I replied, that I would rather get rid of the business without being hanged at all. He closed the door, and sat down on the block-stool, and we remained silent for a few minutes; but there were looks passing between us; we were reading each other's hearts. At length he said—'Have you the money?'
"'It is safe, every guinea of it,' I replied, 'but useless to me and to every one else, if I am to stay here for the few remaining days of my life. Moreover, I could not give it all, for there would be very little use in going out of the prison if I had not the means of going far and going fast; but I have fifteen hundred pounds for a friend, who would be a real friend.'
"'Mr. Vesey is gone,' said the gaoler, 'we are perfectly secure from any observation or interference on his part; I am running a great risk, but I shall try the chance. I am, I admit, in great want of money. Give me fifteen hundred pounds, and I will allow your brother to pass through my rooms to the top of the prison, and to bring a rope ladder with him. He can descend into the yard, and there he will find a key in the door of your cell; this can be done at twelve to-morrow night; and you may be far away before nine the following morning. Your brother will be here to see you by-and-by, you can arrange with him, but there is no time to be lost.'
"'My brother,' I replied, 'shall have nothing to do with the business, except to bring the money, I shall not cross the wall, I must go out by the door, I must be let out, or stay until I am disposed of along with the rest.'
"'It is impossible,' said the gaoler.
"'It is not impossible,' I replied, 'but very easy, if you can get a little assistance. I must be sick, very sick; fever, gaol fever, is to be my complaint; I must die, and be sent out in a coffin.'
"'No,' said he, 'there must be a real corpse. I think it can be managed, but I cannot have more than a thousand pounds for myself, the remainder of the money must be divided between two other persons, on whose co-operation I feel certain that I can fully rely.'
"We agreed upon the plan, and for several days I was really sick, made so by artificial means—spirits, laudanum, tobacco, and other things were used in various ways. Half of the stipulated sum was brought by my brother, and paid to the gaoler in the condemned cell. The other men were removed to another part of the building. At length I died, you understand; and on that night a corpse was introduced into my cell by the gaoler himself. It was of my size, and was procured from the neighbouring burial ground of the Hospital fields, vulgarly termed Bully's Acre; but unlike the generality of such disinterments, it was to go back there again, and to be buried in my name. I was informed that there would be an inquest on me; but as I had died of putrid, spotted fever of the most infectious description, it was not likely that the coroner or the jury would view my body, unless at the greatest possible distance. I assisted the gaoler to arrange the supposed corpse of myself, placing the face to the wall, and then I was quietly let out upon the high road, after having paid the balance of the fifteen hundred pounds. My brother who had brought the money, was in waiting, but we soon separated. He thought it would prevent suspicion being raised if he attended the funeral of my substitute; and I set out on foot, taking the road to Wicklow, and stopping in the morning to have a little rest and refreshment at Loughlinstown. About the time of my funeral, I was passing Coolagad, near Delgany, and was alarmed by a pack of hounds crossing the road close to where I was walking. There were some riders following them whom I knew, but they were too much engaged in the sport to think about, or even to look at me. I proceeded by Wicklow and Arklow to Wexford, and there I got a passage to Jersey. From that island I was taken by a smuggler to St. Malo, on the supposition that I was extremely anxious to join the Irish Brigade. My life was now safe from the hangman, but I had much trouble and suffering to encounter. I was suspected of being a spy, although I could not speak a word of French; and the possession of some of your guineas was a great crime in the eyes of those who wished to get them for themselves. At Chartres I met a fellow-countryman, who was in Berwick's regiment, and at his instance I enlisted to get rid of the annoyance I was suffering, and to avoid the poverty which I saw approaching, and which was certain to overtake a stranger, whose only resource was military service. I took, on enlisting, the name of Vaughan, which was that of my mother's family. I have again to express my deep sorrow for the wrongful act I committed, and I hope you will never regret that I was not hanged."
Colonel Vesey parted with Martin Keogh, alias Vaughan, in the kindest manner, and was soon after enabled to proceed to England. His military career was terminated by a wound at the capture of Quebec, in 1761, which incapacitated him for further service: he died at Bath in 1776. The Count de St. Woostan accompanied the gallant but much calumniated Lally-Tollendahl to India. He possessed his confidence, shared in his dangers and subsequent persecutions, but eventually, freed from every imputation, restored to the rank and emoluments of colonel, he died at Amboise, in 1782. His name was Alen, and he belonged to a family which, located at St. Woolstans, near Celbridge, in the county of Kildare, occupied high position in Ireland previous to the reign of Elizabeth, and from a collateral branch of which the ducal Howards of Norfolk derive the additional name of Fitzalen.
Martin Vaughan married, in 1758, a blanchisseuse de fin, who had a comfortable dwelling and profitable business in the Rue de Bellechase, Paris. His name disappears from the register of the Invalides, in 1769. His