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Read Ebook: Half-hours with the Highwaymen - Vol 2 Picturesque Biographies and Traditions of the Knights of the Road by Harper Charles G Charles George Hardy Paul Illustrator
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Ebook has 1117 lines and 87068 words, and 23 pages
PAUL LEWIS 316
THE WESTONS ESCAPING FROM NEWGATE 337
"GALLOPING DICK" 354
JERRY ABERSHAW ON PUTNEY HEATH 365
SNOOKS ADDRESSING THE CROWD AT HIS EXECUTION 381
HUFFUM WHITE ESCAPING FROM THE HULKS 384
Nevison's Leg-irons, in York Museum 23
Jonathan Wild in the Condemned Cell 136
Satirical Invitation-card to Execution of Jonathan Wild 139
Turpin's Baptismal Register, Hempstead 174
Bold Dick Turpin 197
Tom King 206
Dick Turpin 207
Tom King 209
Tom King 211
Dick Turpin 215
Sir Ralph Rookwood and Simon Sharpscent 219
Turpin's Cell in York Castle 222
Ralph Ostler 225
Turpin's Waist-girdle, Wrist-shackles, and Leg-irons 226
Maid of the Inn 229
Highwaymen carousing 229
Innkeeper 231
Turpin's Stone 237
Portmanteau, formerly belonging to Turpin, discovered at Clerkenwell 240
William Parsons 247
James Maclaine 272
Jack Rann 345
Snooks's Grave 383
NEVISON: "SWIFT NICKS"
John or "William" Nevison, by some accounts, was born at Pontefract, in 1639, of "honest and reasonably-estated parents." Sometimes we find him styled Nevison, at other times he is "alias Clerk" in the proclamations issued, offering rewards for his arrest. Occasionally, in the chap-books, we find John Nevison and William Nevison treated as two separate and distinct persons, no doubt because the recorded adventures of this truly eminent man were so widely distributed over the country, that it was difficult to believe them the doings of one person. But there seems to be no reasonable doubt that one and the same man was the hero of all these doings, as also of the famous Ride to York. Of course it is now by far too late to snatch from Turpin the false glory bestowed upon him. A hundred romances, a century of popular plays, have for ever in the popular mind identified him with the Ride to York, and with all manner of achievements and graces that were never his. Lies are brazen and immortal; truth is modest; and the Great Turpin Myth is too fully established to be thoroughly scotched.
Buying a new suit of clothes and changing his name, he soon found employment with a brewer. In that situation he remained nearly three years, and then left suddenly for the Continent, incidentally with ?200 belonging to the brewer. Holland was the country he honoured with his presence, and there he found a fellow-mind in the person of a young Dutch woman who, robbing her father of all the money and jewels she could lay hands upon, eloped with him. They were soon arrested, but Nevison broke prison, and with some difficulty, made his way into Flanders, and enlisted in the troops stationed there under command of the Duke of York. It is not to be supposed that such a restless temperament as his would allow him long to remain subject to restrictions and the word of command, and accordingly he deserted, made across to England, and, purchasing a horse and arms, and "resolving for the Road," blossomed out as a full-blown highwayman. As his original biographer prettily puts it, he embarked upon "a pleasant life at the hazard of his neck, rather than toil out a long remainder of unhappy days in want and poverty, which he was always averse to." Who, for that matter, is not? Let us sigh for the days that were, the days that are no more, when such adventures as the highwaymen sought were to be found on every highway. A short life, so long as it was a merry, was sufficient for these fine fellows, who desired nothing so little as a gnarled and crabbed age, and nothing so much as a life filled with excitement, wine, and the smiles of the fair. Those smiles were apt to be purchased, and generally purchased dear, but in that respect the highwaymen were never disposed to be critical.
Nevison's success, immediate and complete, proclaimed his fitness for the career himself had with due thought and deliberation chosen. At first he kept his own counsel and haunted the roads alone. Sometimes he went by the name of Johnson.
At this early stage he met one evening on the high road two farmers, who told him it was dangerous to go forward, themselves having only a few minutes before been robbed of forty pounds by three highwaymen, scarce more than half a mile off.
"Turn back with me," he said, "and show me the way they went, and, my life to a farthing if I do not make them return your money."
They accordingly rode back with him until they had come within sight of the three robbers, when Nevison, ordering the two farmers to stand behind, rode up and spoke to the foremost of the three.
"Sir," said he, "by your garb and the colour of your horse, you should be one of those I look after, and, if so, my business is to tell you that you borrowed of two friends of mine forty pounds, which they desired me to demand of you, and which, before we part, you must restore."
Two of the men then made haste to ride off.
"How?" quoth the remaining highwayman. "Forty pounds; d--n me, is the fellow mad?"
"So mad," replied Nevison, "that your life shall answer me, if you do not give me better satisfaction."
With that Nevison drew his pistol and suddenly clapped it to the man's chest; at the same time seizing his horse's reins, in such a manner that he could not draw either sword or pistols.
"My life is at your mercy," he confessed.
"No," said Nevison, "'tis not that I seek, but the money you have robbed those two men of. You must refund it."
With the best grace he could, the highwayman parted with what he had, saying his companions had the rest.
Nevison then, making him dismount, and taking his pistols, desired the countrymen to secure him, while he pursued the others. In the gathering twilight, as he galloped up, they, thinking it was their friend, drew rein.
"Jack," said one to him, "why did you stop to argue with that fellow?"
"No, gentlemen," said Nevison, "you are mistaken in your man; though, by token of his horse that I ride and his arms I carry, he hath sent me to you, to ransom his life. The ransom, sirs, is nothing less than your shares of the prize of the day, which if you presently surrender, you may go about your business. If not, I must have a little dispute with you, at sword and pistol."
One of them then let fly at him, but his aim missing, Nevison's bullet in reply took him in the right shoulder. He then called for quarter and came to a parley, which ended in the two surrendering not only their share of the two travellers' money, but a total amount of a hundred and fifty guineas. Nevison thereupon returned to the farmers and, handing them their money, went his way with the balance of one hundred and ten guineas.
This, it will at once be conceded, was by no means professional conduct; and was indeed, we may say, a serious breach of the highway law, by which thieves should at any rate stand by one another, shoulder to shoulder against the world.
Nevison, however, like a true philosopher and a false comrade, improved any occasion to his own advantage, without scruple. You figure him thus, rather of a saturnine humour, with an ugly grin on his face, instead of a frank smile; but probably you would be quite wrong in so doing. At any rate, the ladies appear to have loved him, for we learn that, "in all his pranks, he was very favourable to the female sex, who generally gave him the character of a civil, obliging robber." He was also charitable to the poor, and, being a true Royalist, he never attempted anything against those of that party.
After many adventures, our William, or John, as the case may be, one day secured no less a sum than ?450 by a fortunate meeting on the road with a rich grazier who had just sold, and been paid for, some cattle. He resolved to let the road lie fallow, as it were, for a while, and to seek, in a temporary retirement in his native place, that repose which comes doubly welcome after a period of strenuous professional endeavour.
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