The story of John Poulter is one of the saddest that here present themselves to be recorded. He was born at Newmarket, of poor parents, and was given a sufficient schooling for his station. At thirteen years of age he was taken into service in the stables of the Duke of Somerset, and remained there for six years, leaving with an excellent character for smartness and industry. He then went into the employ of Colonel Lumley, and was on three occasions sent to France, in charge of racehorses; always giving complete satisfaction. But this slight experience of foreign travel seems to have unsettled him, and he craved for adventures under alien skies. We next find him, accordingly, sailing on a Bristol merchant ship and voyaging to the West Indies, to the American Colonies, and to Newfoundland; seeing life in a humble but effective way.

Returning to England at last, and, sailor-like—or at any rate, like sailors of those times—falling at once into abandoned company, he met, at Lichfield on February 1749, a dissolute set of persons living disreputably upon their wits; among them a certain John Brown, alias Dawson, who, with an experience of the highway trade, easily persuaded the adventurous Poulter to join him and his associates.

Brown, Poulter, and company, fully armed, then set out to prey upon all and sundry; devoting themselves more particularly to thefts from houses. At Lichfield, while one diverted the attention of the landlord of the "George" inn, another rifled a chest and stole a sum of money and many valuable articles. At Chester, Poulter distinguished himself by stealing some black plush that he fancied might make him a fine stylish waistcoat; and sent off at once to a tailor, to call at the "Black Dog" inn, where he and the gang were lodging, that he might be measured, and enabled to appear forthwith as a person of elegance and distinction. We may here fitly pause a moment to admire, or to be astonished at, the child-like vanity and delight in fine clothes displayed by nearly all the highwaymen at that time. They could not resist seizing every and any opportunity that offered, of dressing themselves in the best that could be obtained.

Unfortunately, the manners of a highwayman were not exactly those of a gentleman. There was something overdone in the affected elegance of deportment, a certain exaggeration and a decided "loudness" that made reflective people suspicious. Thus, the tailor to whom Poulter sent for his stolen plush to be made up was not altogether satisfied with his strange customer, and when a pistol that Poulter carried in his pocket went off accidentally during the process of measurement, he was convinced that a person who carried loaded firearms in this manner was not only a dangerous, but also a suspicious, person. The bullet had harmlessly sped into the ceiling, but the tailor was unnerved by the incident, and Poulter, rather lamely apologetic, endeavoured to explain away this concealed armoury by accusing Brown of putting crackers in his pockets. As for the tailor, he hurried off to the Mayor with the story that a dangerous person, evidently a highwayman, had taken lodgings in the city, and was one of a queer gang, whose suspicious movements had already attracted attention. The Mayor sent some trusty emissaries to examine Poulter and his associates, but they had already taken the alarm, and had embarked at Parkgate for Ireland.

Poulter had already had enough of this criminal life, and, tired of adventure of all kinds, desired nothing better than to settle down to some business. He accordingly, in the name of Baxter, took a small alehouse in Dublin, and, entirely dissociating himself from his companions for a time, did a comfortable and fairly prosperous trade, averaging five barrels a week. Here he might have continued, and would have been glad to do so, only for a most unfortunate circumstance.

There were at that time a number of Irish rogues in London, obtaining a hazardous livelihood, chiefly by picking pockets, but not disdaining any form of villainy that might promise to be profitable. General Sinclair was robbed of a gold watch by one or other of this gang, as he was leaving a party at Leicester House, and William Harper and Thomas Tobin, two suspicious characters, were arrested for being concerned, and taken to the Gatehouse at Westminster, whence they were presently rescued by their gang, to the number of a couple of dozen; all of them making off to Ireland.

This affair would not appear to concern Poulter in any way, engaged as he was at Dublin in earning an honest livelihood; but it had a very tragical result on his fortunes. Among the fugitives was one James Field, who had known Poulter in London; and he, as ill-fortune would have it, chanced one day to walk down that Dublin Street where Poulter's inn was situated. By the accursed malevolence of fate, Poulter himself happened at that moment to be standing at the door of his house. Field immediately recognised him and stopped to enquire what his old confederate was doing. He drank there and wished him good day, but soon after brought all that escaped gang of scoundrels to the spot; and there, much to Poulter's dismay, they established themselves, day by day, making his inn, once so respectable and well-conducted, a byword for riotous drinking, and the haunt of characters that it would be flattery to describe as merely "suspicious." Field and others were actually taken into custody there. Decent trade deserted the inn, and, despairing of being rid of the scoundrels, whom he dared not forbid the house, lest they should turn upon and denounce him, he absconded across Ireland to Cork, where he at first contemplated taking another inn. He at last, however, settled upon Waterford, and took an inn there, remaining for six months, when he was induced to return to Dublin by his former brewer, who, sorry to have lost a good customer by Poulter's enforced flight, wanted him back.

He eventually settled two miles outside Dublin, at an inn called the "Shades of Clontarf," looking upon the sea; and became part innkeeper, part fisherman, and led a very happy, honest, and contented life, making, moreover, an average profit of £3 a week.

But here he was found towards the close of 1751 by Tobin, who foisted himself and a dissolute woman companion upon the unfortunate man. Poulter generously received them, but earnestly implored Tobin not to bring his evil associates into the neighbourhood. He wanted, he declared, to live an honest life, and to be done with the past. Tobin assured him he would not appear in the neighbourhood again; but in a few days he was back at Clontarf, with a select company of rascals, and from that time the unhappy Poulter knew no peace. His determination to lead a respectable life they took as a direct challenge to, and slur upon, themselves. There is nothing that so greatly enrages the habitual criminal as the reclamation of one of his own kind, and it is doubtless the influence of hardened evil-doers that prevents many a criminal, really disgusted with crime, from reforming. These wretches set themselves deliberately to ruin Poulter. They practically lived at his house, and, as had been done before, they soon changed the character of it from a decent alehouse to a thieves' boozing-ken, to which the police-officers came at once when they wanted to find some bad character, or to trace stolen property. Poulter was a mere cipher under his own roof.

But they were not content with wrecking his trade: they must needs blast that good character he had been so patiently acquiring. They did it by making him out a smuggler. Six pounds of tea and twelve yards of calico and muslin placed secretly in his boat, and information then lodged with the Revenue officers, was sufficient. Poulter's boat was seized and condemned, and Poulter himself, convinced that he would not be able to establish his innocence, fled from the scene and hurried aboard a vessel bound for Bristol, where he landed penniless. There, in Bristol streets, he met two early criminal acquaintances, Dick Branning and John Roberts, and as there seemed to be no likelihood of being allowed to live within the law, he agreed to take part with them and a number of confederates, whose headquarters were at Bath, in a campaign of highway and other robberies.

Their operations were of the most roving description. By way of Trowbridge, they made for Yorkshire, raiding the country as they went with all manner of rogueries. Nothing came amiss. At Halifax they netted twenty-five guineas from a clergyman by an eighteenth-century ancestor of the thimble-rigging fraud, called "pricking in the belt." At last they found themselves at Chester: place of evil omen for Poulter. There, at the house of a confederate, they heard on the evening of their arrival of a train of pack-horses laden with Manchester goods, due to pass that night. Watch had been kept upon them, said the confederate, and a man would point out to our friends which, among all the animals of the pack-horse train, was best worth robbing of his load. It would be best, he said, to do the work on the country road, and to take the horse into a field.

As it happened, they pitched upon the wrong horse, and got only a load of calamancoes, fabrics woven of wool with an admixture of silk, popular in those times; but the pack contained over a thousand yards, and they cut it off after some difficulty in the dark, and got away safely with it; although greatly alarmed by the horse's loud neighing when he found himself separated from his companions.

The robbers went off at once out of the neighbourhood, and that same night reached a village near Whitchurch, eighteen or twenty miles distant. There they obliterated all distinguishing marks on the goods, and divided them.

At Grantham, which Poulter and Tobin next favoured with a visit, they relieved a credulous farmer of fifteen guineas by the "pricking in the belt" device. At Nottingham several of the accomplices met, but they had bad luck, and Poulter went on the sneak and stole a silver tankard, without a lid, from the "Blackamoor's Head" inn: and that was all the scurvy town of Nottingham yielded them. They then made for Yorkshire, where they remained for a considerable period, and then left, only because their widespread thefts of all kinds made a continued stay dangerous. York, Durham, and the north, including Newcastle, comprised a tour then undertaken.

They then made their way to Bath, the general rendezvous of the gang, and thence in what Poulter calls "three sets," or gangs, moved independently and by easy stages into Devonshire: attending the cattle-fair at Sampford Peverell, with marked success to themselves, and grievous loss to the farmers and graziers there assembled. Thence they moved on to Torrington and Exeter, and so back again to Bath, where twelve of them met at Roberts's house.

Poulter and two confederates named Elgar and Allen then went into the north of England again, attending fairs, horse-races and cock-fighting matches on the sharping lay; winning about £30 or £40 at cards. Returning to Bath, and being looked upon with suspicion, living as they were with a number of riotous men in Roberts's house, they hit upon the dodge of passing for smugglers, and thus at once explaining their association and enlisting public sympathy. Every one, except the Revenue officers, was in those times well-affected towards smugglers.

They were not only at considerable pains, but at great expense also, to create this impression. "We used," says Poulter, in his confessions, "to give seven shillings a pound for tea, and sell it again for four shillings and sixpence, on purpose to make people believe we were smugglers."

While they were thus staying at Bath, they would go now and then to a fair, and try "the nob," or "pricking in the belt." If that did not succeed, they would buy a horse or two, give IOU's for the money and false addresses, and then sell the horses again. "This," says Poulter, "is called 'masoning.'"

This was followed by a raid into Dorset. A visit of the gang to Blandford races was highly successful. They attended numerously, and while some robbed the booths, others devoted their attention to the sportsmen, and yet others lightened the pockets of the crowds engrossed in watching the cock-fighting. They wound up a glorious day by dining in style at the "Rose and Crown," and there chanced upon the best luck of all those gorgeous hours: finding a portmanteau from which they took eighteen guineas, four broad pieces, and diamonds, jewels, and clothes to a great amount. Many of these articles were taken to London by Poulter, and sold there to Jews in Duke's Place, Aldgate, on behalf of self and partners. The proceeds were duly divided at Roberts's house at Bath.

The next activities of these busy rogues were at Corsham, near Bath. They then appeared at Farringdon in Berkshire, and there robbed the Coventry carrier. Newbury and Bristol then suffered from them. At last, they grew so notorious in the West of England that they judged it only prudent to alter their methods for a time, and to devote themselves exclusively to horse-stealing: an art they had not hitherto practised with any frequency.

An amusing incident was that in which Poulter robbed a man of £20. The foolish fellow, an utter stranger, had been rash enough to display his money to Roberts one night in a country alehouse. It had just been paid to him, he said. "And it will presently be taken from you," Roberts might truly have retorted. But he merely in a sly manner drew Poulter's attention, who later followed the man and presenting a metal tinder-box to his head, roared out, "Your money or your life." The tinder-box in the darkness looked so like a pistol that the money was meekly handed over.

Poulter then went off to Trowbridge, in company with a new recruit, Burke by name, an Irishman, who had been confidential ostler to Roberts, and was now advanced to full membership of this body of raiders. Meeting a post-chaise near Clarken Down, Burke proposed to attack it, but Poulter would agree only on condition that no violence were used. Poulter then led the attack, but in the darkness put his hand with accidental force through the window, and cut it severely. In doing so, his pistol went off, and Burke thinking it was the occupant of the chaise who had fired, replied with his own firearms. Fortunately, no one was hit.

The chaise was occupied by Dr. Hancock and his little girl. Poulter took up the child and kissed her, and then, setting her down, robbed the Doctor of one guinea and a half in gold, six shillings, a gold watch, and some clothes: a booty not worth all the trouble, and certainly not by a long way worth the further trouble the affair was presently to bring.

After seeing the post-chaise disappear in the darkness, Poulter and his companion made their way to a neighbouring inn, and coolly displayed their takings to the landlord and his wife, who appear to have been, if not actual confederates, at least better disposed to self-revealed robbers than honest innkeepers should be. The landlady gave the highwaymen a bag for the clothes, and the landlord, when they lamented the fact of all their powder and ball being fired off, obligingly removed the charge from his loaded fowling-piece, and melted down two pewter spoons for casting into bullets. The landlady, when Poulter and Burke asked her if these preparations for arming did not alarm her, said: "No, they are not the first pistols I have seen loaded by night in this kitchen." Evidently an inn that the solitary and unarmed traveller with money about him should avoid.

She added thoughtfully that, after this robbery, they had better travel as far away as they could, that night from the spot. She would send them any news.

They then left, and, taking a horse they chanced to see in an adjacent meadow, proceeded to Exeter, where they sold the stolen articles to a receiver.

It was not more than three weeks later when Poulter was arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the robbery of Dr. Hancock. He was thrown into Ilchester gaol, brought to trial, and condemned to death. He made a full confession and disclosed the names of no fewer than thirty-one of his associates, their places of meeting, and their methods. He was not only anxious to save his life by thus turning evidence against the gang, but he was genuinely wearied of the manner of life into which he had been hounded.

Many members of the gang, he said, lived to all appearances respectably. Their general meeting-place was Bath. He added that it was on every account desirable that the messenger to the police at Bath, entrusted with these disclosures, should keep all these things secret, except to the Mayor; but some one had gossiped, for within one hour of his arrival those revelations were the talk of the town, and the names of those implicated in them were freely mentioned. The next day they were even printed, in accounts of the disclosures hastily struck off and sold in the streets. The very natural result was that most of the persons named escaped before justice could lay hands upon them. A list of nineteen not taken, and twelve in various gaols all over the country, is printed in the Discoveries.

Dr. Hancock's property was found and returned to him. His conduct was one of the most astonishing features in this amazing case, and reflected considerable discredit upon him; for although he visited Poulter in Ilchester gaol, before the trial, and assured the prisoner that although he was obliged to be a prosecutor, he would bear lightly upon the facts, and would in the event of a conviction use his best efforts to obtain the Royal pardon, he treacherously used every effort to secure his being hanged. There seems to have been no motive for this double-dealing, except his own natural duplicity. His treachery was thorough, for he even used his influence with the judge to obtain a shortening of the period between sentence and execution.

The trial and the revelations made by Poulter excited keen and widespread public interest, and the lengthy pamphlet account of them, entitled "The Discoveries of John Poulter, otherwise Baxter, apprehended for robbing Dr. Hancock on Clarken Down, near Bath," had a large and long-continued sale. A copy of the fourteenth edition, issued in 1769, fourteen years later, is in the British Museum library.

He was respited for six weeks, in consideration of the further disclosures he was to make, or of any evidence he might be required to give, and in this time, so moving was his tale, and so useful was the information he had given, that the corporations of Bath, Bristol, Exeter, and Taunton, together with numerous private gentlemen of considerable influence, petitioned that he might be reprieved. It is probable that these efforts would have been successful; but Poulter was an unlucky man, and at this particular crisis in his affairs happened in some way to rouse the ill-will of the gaoler, who was never tired, in all those days of suspense, of assuring him that he would certainly be hanged, and serve him right!

It is not surprising that, under these circumstances, the unhappy Poulter endeavoured to escape. With, the aid of a fellow-prisoner, committed to gaol for debt, he forced an iron bar out of a window, and the two, squeezing through the opening, broke prison at nightfall of Sunday, February 17th, 1755. They intended to make for Wales. All that night they walked along the country roads, Poulter with irons on his legs as far as Glastonbury, where he succeeded in getting them removed. When day came, they hid in haystacks, resuming their flight when darkness was come again. They next found themselves at Wookey, near Wells, much to their dismay, having intended to bear more towards the north-west. Poulter was by this time in a terribly exhausted condition, and his legs and ankles were so sore and swollen from the effects of being chafed with the irons he had walked with for ten miles, that it was absolutely necessary he should rest. He did so at an alehouse until two o'clock in the afternoon, and was about to leave when a mason at work about the place entered, and recognised him. Calling his workmen to help, he secured Poulter, who was then taken back to Ilchester. Nine days of his respite were left, but a strong and murderous animus was displayed against this most unfortunate of men, and it was decided to hang him out of hand. The execution could not, however, take place earlier without a warrant from London, and the trouble and expense of sending an express messenger to the local Member of Parliament, then in town, demanding his instant execution, were incurred, in order to cut shorter his already numbered days. The messenger must have been phenomenally speedy, for he is said to have returned with the warrant within twenty-four hours; and Poulter was at once taken out of his cell and hanged, February 25th, 1755.