collected outside the Mansion House carrying a gibbet on which hung a boot and a petticoat. The mayor interfered and a fray began. Weapons were used, some of the lord mayor's servants were wounded, and one of the prisoners was rescued by the mob. Sometimes the disturbance had its origin in trade jealousies.
An especially turbulent class were the footmen, chair-men, and body-servants of the aristocracy. The Footmen's Riot at Drury Lane Theatre, which occurred in 1737, was a serious affair. It had long been the custom to admit the parti-coloured tribe, as the licensed lackeys are called in contemporary accounts, to the upper gallery of that theatre gratis, out of compliment to their masters on whom they were in attendance. Then, when established among "the gods," they comported themselves with extraordinary license; they impudently insulted the rest of the audience, who, unlike themselves, had paid for admission, and "assuming the prerogative of critics, hissed or applauded with the most offensive clamour." Finding the privilege of free entrance thus scandalously abused, Mr. Fleetwood, the manager, suspended the free list. This gave great offence to the footmen, who proceeded to take the law into their own hands. "They conceived," as it was stated in Fog's Weekly Journal, "that they had an indefeasible hereditary right to the said gallery, and that this expulsion was a high infringement of their liberties." Accordingly, one Saturday
night a great number of them—quite three hundred, it was said—assembled at Drury Lane doors, armed with staves and truncheons, and "well fortified with three-threads and two-penny."[323:1] The night selected was one when the performance was patronized by royalty, and the Prince and Princess of Wales, with other members of the royal family, were in the theatre. The rioters attacked the stage door and forced it open, "bearing down all the box-keepers, candle-snuffers, supernumeraries, and pippin women that stood in the way." In this onslaught some five and twenty respectable people were desperately wounded. Fortunately Colonel de Veil, an active Westminster justice, happened to be in the house, and at once interposed. He ordered the Riot Act to be read, but "so great was the confusion," says the account, "that they might as well have read Cæsar's 'Commentaries.'" Colonel de Veil then got the assistance of some of the guards, and with them seized several of the principal rioters, whom he committed to Newgate.
These prisoners were looked upon as martyrs to the great cause, and while in gaol were liberally supplied with all luxuries by the subscription of their brethren. They were, however, brought to trial, convicted of riot, and sentenced to imprisonment. This did not quite end the disturbance. Anonymous letters poured into the theatre, threatening
Fleetwood and vowing vengeance. The following is a specimen:
"Sir:—We are willing to admonish you before we attempt our design; and provide you use us civil and admit us into your gallery, which is our property according to formalities, and if you think proper to come to a composition this way you'll hear no further; and if not, our intention is to combine in a body, incognito, and reduce the playhouse to the ground. Valuing no detection, we are
Indemnified."
The manager carried these letters to the Lord Chamberlain and appealed to him for protection. A detachment of the guards, fifty strong, was ordered to do duty at the theatre nightly, and "thus deterred the saucy knaves from carrying their threats into execution. From this time," says the "Newgate Calendar," "the gallery has been purged of such vermin."
The footmen and male servants generally of this age were an idle, dissolute race. From among them the ranks of the highwaymen were commonly recruited, and it was very usual for the gentleman's gentleman, who had long flaunted in his master's apparel, and imitated his master's vices, to turn gentleman on the road to obtain funds for the faro-table and riotous living. A large proportion of the most famous highwaymen of the eighteenth
century had been in service at some time or other. Hawkins, James Maclane, John Rann, William Page, had all worn the livery coat. John Hawkins had been butler in a gentleman's family, but lost his place when the plate chest was robbed, and suspicion fell upon him because he was flush of money. Hawkins, without a character, was unable to get a fresh place, and he took at once to the road. His operations, which were directed chiefly against persons of quality, were conducted in and about London. He stopped and robbed the Earl of Burlington, Lord Bruce, and the Earl of Westmoreland, the latter in Lincoln's Inn Fields. When he got valuable jewels he carried them over to Holland and disposed of them for cash, which he squandered at once in a "hell," for he was a rash and inveterate gambler.