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to the regrettable frequency with which the name n day be seen in the significant neighbourhood of t Strassbourg and the Rue Chabrol, where behind the mignonette boxes and small bird cages the hirondell pursue their immemorial trade. To transport the Tudor days from France to England, and to trace the through all the mazes of East Anglian genealogy to freebooter of Hempstead, to the Turpin family of C nay, even to the blameless laureate, Alfred, no other Alfred Turpin, the exquisite fragrance of whose po that is most innocuous about Spring Blossoms scatters as of a vernal epigraph over these Memorie inutili (as C might call them) of his unworthy, though, alas! com much better known namesake.

Such were my original conceptions and intention still remain my ideals. Yet when I was, in the las 1901, asked by my editors to give an account of my ship and, in response to my overtures, it was intima stilted terms that my collections for a Turpin pedigr present state were "totally unfit for serial publication,' not till then was it borne in upon me with almost stunn that the only alternative which remained to disappo readers of the Essex Review, was for me to offer them without any further ado or palaver about revision, the prolusions to the Prolegomena with which I had in preface the materials for the first part of my Pr Sketch of "An Introduction to the History and A of the House of Turpin."

The birthplace of our favourite national freebocter not been keenly disputed, has at any rate been freque stated. Thus the Tyburn Chronicle and London Gaze assert that Richard Turpin was born at Thaxte Logan in his Pedlar's Pack, assures us that born at Hampstead. But research has only se confirm to Essex the honour of having given birth Enemy of Society. Richard was undoubtedly born at the then apparently known as "The Bell," alehouse at He in Essex. We give an illustration of the identical ho birthplace of Richard Turpin ! The least effect anticipa this paper is that it will stimulate some rich East Saxon

in a befitting manner at Hempstead a Turpin Memorial Museum, which shall enclose in its quadrangle the decaying torso. of the ever-to-be-celebrated Turpin oak. It was perhaps appropriate that the ancient seat of the illustrious family of Harvey, from which sprang the discoverer of the circulation of the blood, should have also been the native place of a man who did so much to stimulate the circulation of all whom he met, even in the most casual of encounters. Hempstead has not shown itself altogether insensible to the honour thus conferred upon it.

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It commemorates its illustrious citizen in the names of such landmarks as Turpin's Ring, Turpin's Corner, Turpin's Meadow, and Turpin's Oak, near Dawkin's Farm, one of the numerous reputed hiding places of the robber during his pursuit by bloodhounds.

The son of John and Mary Turpin*, Richard was baptised at Hempstead, near Saffron Walden, on 21st September, 1705.

*The frequency with which "Turpin Oaks" are strewn about England from Finchley (see HARPER'S North Road) to Knutsford, has often proved a knotty point to Turpinians. Another one is the maiden name of Turpin's mother. It has been confidently given as Paliner; but I feel sure that it was Nott. Her father [Richard?] Nott kept the "Rose and Crown," at Bull Beggar's Hole, Clay Hill, Enfield (see ROBINSON'S History of Enfield 1823, i. 58-9).

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Investigation has failed to reveal that this fine young instructed at any of the seats of instruction for which celebrated. He was not inoculated with grammar l Chelmsford, at Colchester, or at Felsted, that "ap educational pyramid of the Eastern Counties."

No, we must be content to believe that Richard wa educated. Among his preceptors, as we shall disco sequel, was a native of Hempstead, called James Smith most part, however, the youthful Dickon drank in wis tap-room and the yard of the " Bell," mixed late and freely in the society of his elders, the tapsters and o roadsters and Essex calves of his countryside. His spirit, we may be sure, early revolted against the stealing and beer mixing that were practised at h inn. There can be little doubt, in fact, that the limi of licensed victualling first provoked the noble ra drove the revolted Richard (if not into an extreme teetotalism, a consequence which we shrewdly suspec which we have exclusively negative evidence), remunerative trade of the butcher and grazier. apprenticed, we are told, to a butcher in Whitecha Turpin soon discovered a genius which aspired beyond act and fact of butchering, to the purveying of cattl large and comprehensive plan. Having been detected ing a herd of cattle from a farmer, named Giles, of Turpin took the wise step of joining a gang of smug deer stealers, and became the leader, as by natural inher some particularly brutal robberies in his native county. lonely farm-houses for attack, while the male occupa absent in the fields, Turpin and his merry men p addresses with blackened faces to the female inma seldom failed to realise a fair trading dividend. Dick's o gag the farmer's wife, and then proceed to roast her in the kitchen fire, until her gesticulations seemed to indic she had something of moment to reveal. If the sea inaugurated proved successful, the lady was stunned by on the head, and the robbers hastily decamped. The used were in close conformity with those described by V his chapter on "Les Riffaudeurs," "Ce sont des vol chauffent, ou plutôt brûlent les pieds des personnes,

contraindre à déclarer où est leur argent."* During this period of his activity Turpin and his gang are stated in one night to have robbed Chingford and Barking Churches of all the moveables left in the vestries; but these happily amounted to little, for the church plate was snugly in charge of the respective Churchwardens. One old woman at Loughton, Turpin threatened forcibly to enthrone upon the fire if she did not make immediate discovery of her gold. She refused to give the desired information, whereupon Richard executed his threat and she discovered no less than £400. Murder, arson and rape were frequently committed by this gang, we are told, in the hundreds of Essex.

After a few robberies of this kind in the home counties, a reward of 50 guineas was offered for the apprehension of the gang, and when this was augmented to 100, two of the ringleaders were arrested and hanged, whereby the remainder of the robbers were intimidated, and the country, says The Gentleman's Magazine, was in less fear.

Turpin now, we are told, took up his residence at Sewardstone, to which place his wife had retired, for Richard appears to have married upon his attainment of full age, one Hester Palmer, a young woman of decent family at East Ham in Essex; and at Sewardstone he lived unnoticed for six months. Utterly unversed though he was in the philosophy of crime, Turpin early became apprised through the working of his own quick wit of the desirability of "going the whole hog," and taking to the road. As to the operation of that force majeure by which the selfrespecting thief is driven to adopt the freemasonry of the highway, is it not put by George Borrow in an ever memorable passage into the mouth of an old Yorkshire ostler of the Swan Inn at Stafford? This ancient worthy would frequently tell of Jerry Abershaw and of his worthier compeer Galloping Dick.

I heard from him that both were capital customers at the Hounslow Inn, and that he had frequently drunk with them in the corn room. He said that no man could desire more jolly or entertaining companions over a glass of "summat," but that upon the road it was anything but desirable to meet them; there they were terrible, cursing and swearing and thrusting the muzzles of their pistols into people's mouths; and at this part of his locution the old man winked and said, in a somewhat lower voice, that upon the whole they were right in doing so, and that when a person had once made up his mind to become a highwayman, his best policy was to go the whole hog, fearing * Memoires 1829, Chap. lxxviii.

nothing, but making everybody afraid of him, that people never thought of resisting such a savage-faced foul-mouthed highwayman, and if he were taken were afraid to bear witness against him, lest he should get off and cut their throats sometime or other upon the road; whereas people would resist being robbed by a sneaking, pale-visaged rascal, and would swear boldly against him on the first opportunity, adding that Abershaw and Ferguson, two most awful fellows. had enjoyed a long career, whereas two disbanded officers of the Army, who wished to rob a coach like gentlemen, who begged the passengers' pardon and talked of hard necessity, had been set upon by the passengers themselves, amongst whom were three women, pulled from their horses. conducted to Maidstone, and hanged with as little pity as such contemptible fellows deserved.* " There is nothing like going the whole hog,' repeated the ostler, and if ever I had been a highwayınan, I would have done so; I should have thought myself all the more safe, and, moreover, shouldn't have despised myself. To curry favour with those you are robbing, sometimes at the expense of your own comrades, as I have known fellows do, why it is the greatest'

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"So it is," said Turpin, and forth with stole a horse and took to the road in the good old traditional style. One of the first exploits of this raw novice was an endeavour to hold up a notorious fellow highwayman on the Cambridge Road. It was at Stamford Hill, so history relates, that he presented the muzzle of his horse pistol at Thomas King, and bade him stand and deliver. What, dog eat dog!' retorted this jovial thief. 'Come, brother Turpin, if you don't know me, I know you, and should be very glad of your company.' In such unexpected fashion was inaugurated the three years' association of these Dioscuri of the North Road, who wasted no time in placing a mail robbery to their credit in the immediate neighbourhood of their first meeting-namely, on Stamford Hill.

Before proceeding, however, to give further details of Turpin's more noted achievements, it may be as well to clear the way by acknowledging the difficulties that beset the student in the chronology of this most fascinating subject. The one fact that stands out tolerably clear is this, that the greater part of Turpin's most important and most lasting work was accomplished between his assumption of family responsibilities in 1727, and his retirement to York Castle in October, 1738. It seems probable that his partnership with Tom King was initiated during the purse-taking season of 1733-4, though it may have been somewhat later. It is obvious, however, that the great coups upon the highway, which these worthies

*Romany Rye, chap. xxiv. How is this for a long sentence?

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