GEORGE WALDRON, alias BARRINGTON.
TRANSPORTED FOR PICKING POCKETS.
THIS notorious offender was born of decent parents in the year 1755, in the town of Maynooth, county Kildare, Ireland. His father, whose name was Waldron, was a working silversmith; and his mother followed the occupation of mantua-maker, and occasionally joined with it the profession of a midwife. Owing to a law-suit in which they were engaged with a relative, for the recovery of a legacy to which they conceived themselves entitled, their circumstances were by no means affluent. But although they were unable to procure for their son the advantages of a superior education, they had him instructed at an early age in reading and writing; and afterwards, through the bounty of a medical gentleman in the neighbourhood, he was taught the principles of arithmetic, and the elements of geography and English grammar.
When he had entered his sixteenth year, he had the good fortune to attract the notice of a dignitary of the Church of Ireland, through whose interest he was placed at a free grammar-school in the Irish capital, where his patron proposed he should fit himself for the University; and in order that he might be able to make an appearance equal to that of the youths with whom he was to associate, his generous protector supplied him with money and every other necessary that could render his situation at school not only comfortable, but respectable.
These advantages he enjoyed but a short time, for the impetuosity of his passions hurried him into an action by which he lost his patron’s favour for ever. When he had been about half a year at the grammar-school, he was involved in a quarrel with a lad much older and stronger than himself. Some blows passed, in which George suffered considerably; but in order to be revenged, he stabbed his antagonist with a penknife; and had he not been prevented, would probably have murdered him. For this atrocious offence the discipline of the house was inflicted with proper severity, which irritated the youth to such a degree, that he formed the resolution of abandoning not only the school, but also his family and friends. His plan of escape was no sooner formed than it was carried into execution; but before his departure he found means to steal ten or twelve guineas from the master, and a gold repeating-watch from his sister. With this booty he safely effected his escape from the school-house in the middle of a still night in the month of May 1771; and pursuing the great north road from Dublin all that night and the next day, he arrived late in the evening at Drogheda without interruption.
Having reached this town, where he thought that he should be safe from the chances of pursuit and discovery, by a species of forced march, without rest or refreshment, he entered a small public-house in order to procure the one and the other; but the following morning introduced to his notice a band of strolling players, whose acquaintance he immediately made. A friendship commenced under such unfavourable circumstances, it might be thought would scarcely last many days, but it was nevertheless maintained through choice and affection for several years; and it appears that whilst engaged as a member of the company, he picked up much information which was exceedingly useful to him in his subsequent career.
Price, the manager of the company, having lived some time in London, in the capacity of clerk to a pettifogging attorney, was intimately acquainted with the town, and all the arts of fraud, deception, or violence, which are practised in it by the most unprincipled classes to procure money. For indulging these vicious propensities, he subjected himself to the lash of the law, and was at this time an involuntary exile in Ireland till the expiration of the term for which he was to be transported; and this man soon became the confidant and counsellor of the young fugitive. By his advice he renounced his paternal name, assumed that of Barrington, and entered into the company; and in the course of four days he became so well initiated in the mysteries of his profession as to be able to perform the part of Jaffier in “Venice Preserved,” without the aid of a prompter, in a crowded barn in the neighbourhood of Drogheda with the most flattering demonstrations of applause.
His success, however, was by far too great to render it at all desirable that he should continue his performances so near the scene of his late depredations; and in obedience to the dictates of prudence, lest our hero might be called upon to make his last appearance on a “stage” fitted up with a drop, before his character as a player was fully established, it was resolved that the whole company should, without delay, move northwards with all speed, so as to get out of the way, with the anticipation of their being able to reach sixty or eighty miles from Dublin without any long bait. In order to carry this resolution into effect, however, it was recollected that some means must be found to feed the strollers, as the produce of their late performances was not so weighty as to require any great exertion on the part of the treasurer to squeeze it into his waistcoat pocket; and the gold repeater being remembered, it was immediately given up by our hero, pro bono publico, with a degree of liberality which procured for him a burst of applause from his companions in the search of histrionic fame. The watch being disposed off, its proceeds were equally divided, and the party set out on its march; but when they arrived at Londonderry, it was found that the Belvidera of the company had surrendered her heart to the new Jaffier. A reciprocal attachment was found to exist, and the connexion was only dissolved by the death of the lady. It appears that she was the daughter of a respectable tradesman at Coventry; and having eloped from her father’s house, at the age of sixteen years, with a lieutenant of marines, conducted by him to Dublin, and there, in less than three months, was infamously abandoned to all the horrors of penury and want. Reduced to this extremity, she readily embraced a proposal made to her by Price, to join his company, as her only resource; and being young and beautiful, it is not extraordinary that she should have excited a flame in the bosom of her new admirer. She was unfortunately drowned, in her eighteenth year, in crossing the Boyne, through the negligence of the ferryman.
To return, however, to the Company. The money which had been raised was found to be quite expended on their arrival at Londonderry, and some means, it was determined, must be found to recruit their bank. In this dilemma, Price insinuated to our adventurer that a young man of his address and appearance might easily introduce himself into the public places, to which the merchants and dealers of the town resorted, and that he might, without difficulty, find opportunities of picking their pockets, and escaping unseen and undiscovered. The idea pleased Barrington, and the fair coming on, offered a favourable juncture at which to commence his new profession. The design was carried into execution in the course of the ensuing day with very great success, their acquisitions amounting to about forty guineas in cash, and one hundred and fifty pounds in Bank notes. The circumstance, it may readily be supposed, excited no small alarm among the honest traders, on its becoming generally known that robberies to so large an amount had been effected; but the players remaining in the town, suspicion did not rest upon them, and the depredation was put down to the score of some of the ordinary scamps who then, as well as now, followed the fairs, in Ireland and England. It was resolved, however, that the company should quit Derry, and after having played a few nights with more applause than profit, they removed to Ballyshannon, where our hero may be said to have commenced the business of a professed pickpocket in the summer of the year 1771, in the 16th year of his age.
At Ballyshannon he passed the autumn and winter of 1771 with the company to which he belonged, playing two days in the week, and picking pockets whenever opportunity offered; and this business, though attended with some danger and certain infamy, he found so much more lucrative than that of the theatre, where his fame and his proficiency by no means kept pace with the expectations raised by his first appearance, that he determined to quit the stage.