An Authentic History of the Cato-Street Conspiracy / With the trials at large of the conspirators, for high treason and murder, a description of their weapons and combustible machines, and every particular connected with the rise, progress, discovery, and termination of the horrid plot

by George Theodore Wilkinson

Brunt.—Then you are a bigger villain than I even took you to be.

The Court here interfered to prevent any further conversation between the parties.

Adams then continued his evidence.—When he came to that part where he mentioned the hand-grenades, he added—“I think it necessary here to state, as Mr. Brunt thinks proper to deny what I have said, that he was the very man that took the hand-grenades to Tidd’s house; for I followed him all the way, and I saw, with my own eyes, Tidd’s daughter put them in a box under the window.” [The witness uttered this with considerable emphasis and action.] In relating the arrangements which had been made for the murder of Ministers, and the subsequent proceedings which were intended, he added—“I think it right to state one circumstance, which escaped my memory before. Ings proposed, that after the heads of Lords Castlereagh and Sidmouth were taken off, they should be placed on a pole, and carried through the streets. Thistlewood improved the plan, and said that they should be carried on a pike behind the cannon in the streets, to excite terror. On this Bradburn observed, that, after they had used Lord Castlereagh’s head, they would enclose it in a box, and send it to Ireland.—Another circumstance which he also omitted before was, that, by an arrangement between Thistlewood and Cooke, it was agreed, that, if Cooke succeeded in taking the Mansion-house, he was to send an orderly to St. Sepulchre’s Church, where he was to be met by another orderly, despatched by Thistlewood from the west-end of the town; and they were to convey to the parties an account of the progress which each had made in their stations.”

Cross-examined by Mr. Curwood.—On my former examination I repented when I got home, and before that. When I perceived the error of my ways, I acknowledged it. Till I received that infernal publication, Paine’s Age of Reason, which Tidd gave me, I was very particular. I was not, however, so good a christian as I might have been. The principles which Brunt, the prisoner at the bar, endeavoured to instil into my mind perverted my understanding. Brunt wished to throw down the pillars of Christianity altogether. I find my conscience satisfied at the atonement I have made to my Maker. My satisfaction did not merely arise from getting my neck out of the halter. I never considered the assassinating of men, in cold blood, to be consistent with the principles of reason. On the 2d of January, the prisoner told me that it was intended to murder his Majesty’s Ministers. I was introduced to Thistlewood on the 12th: during the intermediate period of ten days, I had an opportunity of considering the plot. I did not discover it, owing to the insinuations of Brunt. In that time, I attended several meetings, and was a chairman at one of them. Whenever I hinted any dislike to the business, the parties were like madmen. I knew Edwards, and saw him making hand-grenades. I intended to put a stop to the business if possible; but, at the same time, I wished to save these people, and to avoid the trouble of the trials here.

Re-examined by Mr. Gurney.—My mind was perverted by Paine’s Age of Reason, and Carlisle’s publication.

Eleanor Walker, Mary Rogers, Joseph Hale, Thomas Sharp, Charles Bisset, Henry Gillam, Edward Simpson, and J. H. Morrison, gave precisely the same evidence as they had given on the former trials.

John Monument, the accomplice, was brought into Court in the custody of two wardens of the Tower. He was examined by the Solicitor-General, and gave precisely the same evidence as he had done on the two preceding trials, relative to his connexion with the conspirators.

Cross-examined by Mr. Curwood.—I have read Paine’s Age of Reason. It rather shook my faith; but it did not destroy it, because it was accompanied by the Bishop of Llandaff’s Apology for the Bible.

Thomas Monument, examined by the Solicitor-General.—His testimony to-day was precisely the same with that which he had given on the former day, and fully corroborated that of his brother. He was not cross-examined.

John Monument was then re-called, and re-examined by the Solicitor-General, as to the advice which had been given him by Thistlewood to say that Edwards had taken him to the meeting. He repeated his former testimony, and added, that Thistlewood told him to pass it round to the other prisoners, that it was Edwards who had betrayed them. Bradburn paid no attention to this advice.