Narrative of a London Sneak, or Common Thief.
The following narrative was given us by a convicted thief, who has for years wandered over the streets of London as a ballad singer, and has resided in the low lodging-houses scattered over its lowest districts. He was a poor wretched creature, degraded in condition, of feeble intellect, and worthless character, we picked up in a low lodging house in Drury Lane. He was shabbily dressed in a pair of old corduroy trousers, old brown coat, black shabby vest, faded grey neckerchief, an old dark cap and peak, and unwashed shirt. For a few shillings he was very ready to tell us the sad story of his miserable life.
“I was born at Abingdon, near Oxford, where my father was a bricklayer, and kept the N——n public-house. He died when I was fourteen years of age; I was sent to school and was taught to read, but not to write. At this time I was a steady, well-conducted boy. At fourteen years of age I went to work with my uncle, a basket-maker and rag merchant in Abingdon, and lived with my mother. I wrought there for three years, making baskets and cutting willows for them. I left my uncle then, as he had not got any more work for me to do, and was living idle with my mother. At this time I went with a Cheap John to the fairs, and travelled with him the whole of that season. He was a Lancashire man, between fifty and sixty years of age, and had a woman who travelled the country with him, but I do not think they were married. He was a tall, dark-complexioned man, and was a ‘duffer,’ very unprincipled in his dealings. He sold cutlery, books, stationery, and hardware.
“When we were going from one fair to another, we would stop on the road and make a fire, and steal fowls and potatoes, or any green-stuff that was in season. We sometimes travelled along with gipsies, occasionally to the number of fifty or sixty in a gang. The gipsies are a curious sort of people, and would not let you connect with any of them unless they saw you were to remain among them.
“I assisted Cheap John in the markets when selling his goods, and handed them to the purchasers.
“The first thing I ever pilfered was a pair of boots and a handkerchief from a drunken man who lay asleep at a fair in Reading, in Berks. He was lying at the back of a booth and no one near him. This was about dusk in September. I pawned the boots at Windsor on the day of a fair for 3s., and sold the handkerchief for 1s.
“I was about seventeen years of age when I went with Cheap John, and remained with him about thirteen weeks, when I left, on account of a row I had with him. I liked this employment very well, got 2s. in the pound for my trouble, and sometimes had from 1l. to 25s. a week. But the fairs were only occasional, and the money I earned was very precarious.
“I left Cheap John at Windsor, and came to Slough with a horse-dealer, where I left him. He gave me 2s. for assisting him. I then came up to London, where I have lived ever since in the lodging-houses in the different localities. I remember on coming to this great city I was much astonished at its wonders, and every street appeared to me like a fair. On coming to London I had no money, and had not any friend to assist me. I went to Kensington workhouse, and got a night’s lodging, and lived for about a fortnight at different workhouses in London. They used to give the lodgers a piece of bread at night, and another in the morning, and a night’s lodging on straw and boards.
“I then went out singing ballads in the streets of London, and could get at an average from 2s. to 2s. 6d. a night, but when the evenings were wet, I could not get anything. In the winter I sang in the daytime, and in summer I went out in the evening. I have wandered in this way over many of the streets and thoroughfares of London. I sing in Marylebone, Somers Town, Camden Town, Paddington, Whitecross Street, City, Hammersmith, Commercial Road, and Whitechapel, and live at different lodgings, and make them my home as I move along. I sing different kinds of songs, sentimental and comic; my favourites are ‘Gentle Annie,’ ‘She’s reckoned a good hand at it,’ ‘The Dandy Husband,’ ‘The Week’s Matrimony,’ ‘The Old Woman’s Sayings,’ and ‘John Bull and the Taxes.’ I often sing ‘The Dark-eyed Sailor,’ and ‘The Female Cabin Boy.’ For many years now I have lived by singing in the public street, sometimes by myself, at other times with a mate. I occasionally beg in Regent Street and Bond Street on the ‘fly,’ that is, follow people passing along, and sometimes in Oxford Street and Holborn. Sometimes I get a little job to do from people at various kinds of handiwork, such as turning the wheel to polish steel, and irons, &c., and do other kinds of job work. When hard up I pick pockets of handkerchiefs, by myself or with one or two mates. [In the course of our interview we saw he was very clumsy at picking pockets.] I sometimes go out with the young dark-complexioned lad you saw down stairs, who is very clever at pocket picking, and has been often convicted before the criminal courts.
“I have spent many years living in the low lodging-houses of London. The worst I ever saw was in Keat Street, Whitechapel, about nine years ago, before they were reformed and changed. Numbers were then crowded into the different rooms, and the floors were littered with naked people of all ages, and of both sexes, men and women, and boys and girls sleeping alongside indiscriminately. It was very common to see young boys and girls sleeping together. The conversations that passed between them, and the scenes that were transacted, were enough to contaminate the morals of the young.
“In the morning they used to go to their different haunts over the city, some begging, and others thieving.
“On Sunday evenings the only books read were such as ‘Jack Sheppard,’ ‘Dick Turpin,’ and the ‘Newgate Calendar’ they got out of the neighbouring libraries by depositing 1s. These were read with much interest; the lodgers would sooner have these than any other books. I never saw any of them go to church on Sundays. Sometimes one or two would go to the ragged-school, such as the one in Field Lane near Smithfield.
“It often happened a man left his wife, and she came to the lodging-house and got a livelihood by begging. Some days she would glean 2s. or 3s., and at other times would not get a halfpenny.
“The thieves were seldom in the lodging-house, except to meals and at bedtime. They lived on better fare than the beggars. The pickpocket lives better than the sneaking thief, and the pickpocket is thought more of in the lodging-houses and prisons than the beggar.
“The lowest pickpockets often lived in these low lodging-houses, some of them young lads, and others middle-aged men. The young pickpockets, if clever, soon leave the lodging-houses and take a room in some locality, as at Somers Town, Marylebone, the Burgh, Whitechapel, or Westminster. The pickpockets in lodging-houses, for the most part, are stockbuzzers, i.e., stealers of handkerchiefs.
“I have often seen the boys picking each others’ pockets for diversion in the lodging-houses, many of them from ten to eleven years of age.
“There are a great number of sneaks in the lodging-houses. Two of them go out together to the streets, one of them keeps a look-out while the other steals some article, shoes, vest, or coat, &c., from the shop or stall. I sometimes go out with a mate and take a pair of boots at a shop-door and sell them to the pawnbroker, or to a labouring man passing in the street.
“Sometimes I have known the lodgers make up a packet of sawdust and put in a little piece of tobacco to cover an opening, leaving only the tobacco to be seen looking through, and sell it to persons passing by in the street as a packet of tobacco.
“When I am hard up I have gone out and stolen a loaf at a baker’s shop, or chandler’s shop, and taken it to my lodging. I have often stolen handkerchiefs, silk and cambric, from gentlemen’s pockets.
“I once stole a silver snuff-box from a man’s coat-pocket, and on one occasion took a pocket-book with a lot of papers and postage stamps. I burnt the papers and sold the stamps for about 1s. 6d.
“I never had clothes respectable enough to try purses and watches, and did not have nerve for it. I have seen young thieves encouraged by people who kept the lodging-houses, such as at Keat Street, Whitechapel, and at the Mint. They would ask the boys if they had anything, and wish them to sell it to them, which was generally done at an under-price. In these lodging-houses some lived very well, and others were starving. Some had steaks and pickles, and plenty of drink, porter and ale, eggs and bacon, and cigars to smoke. Some of the poorest go out and get a pennyworth of bread, halfpennyworth of tea, halfpennyworth of butter, and halfpennyworth of sugar, and perhaps not have a halfpenny left to pay for their lodging at night. When they do get money they often go out and spend it in drink, and perhaps the next night are starving again.
“I have been tried for stealing a quart pot and a handkerchief, at Bagnigge Wells police station, and was taken to Vine Street police station for stealing 2s. 6d. from a drunken woman respectably dressed. I took it out of her hand, and was seen by a policeman, who ran after me and overtook me, but the woman refused to prosecute me, and I was discharged. I was also brought before Marylebone police-court for begging.
“In my present lodging I am pretty comfortable. We spend our evenings telling tales and conversing to each other on our wanderings, and playing at games, such as ‘hunt the slipper.’ I have often been in great want, and have been driven to steal to get a livelihood.”