The petition was accompanied by a request to his Lordship that the bodies might be given up to the friends of the deceased, and stating, that the object was the humane one of raising the means of support for the wives and children by a public exhibition.
It is almost unnecessary to state that Lord Sidmouth did not hesitate to refuse the request, a compliance with which would be attended with great inconvenience at least. His lordship stated, in the mildest terms, the impossibility of granting it, contrary as such compliance would be to established usage.
At a late hour in the evening, the wives of the executed men were informed by the keeper of Newgate, that the bodies of their husbands were buried.
In the course of the afternoon a channel had been dug alongside of the subterraneous passage that leads to the cells, and, about seven in the evening, after the coffins had been filled with quick lime, they were strongly screwed up, placed in a line with each other, strewed over with earth, and finally covered with stones, and of course no trace of their end remains for any future public observation. On this circumstance being communicated to their unhappy wives, they were entirely overcome by the poignancy of their feelings.
On the following morning an individual petition was forwarded to the Privy-Council on the part of Mrs. Thistlewood, and was presented to his Majesty, for the body of her husband. A laconic answer was almost immediately returned, “That Thistlewood was buried.”
Transportation of the respited Traitors, Discharge of the suspected Persons, &c.
Very early in the morning of Tuesday, the 2d of May, the day following the execution of their partners in crime, five of the respited traitors, namely, Wilson, Harrison, Cooper, Strange, and Bradburn, were removed from Newgate in three post-chaises, and conveyed under a proper escort to Portsmouth, where they were put on board a convict-ship, which soon after sailed for New South Wales.
Gilchrist was still detained in Newgate, but it was expected his confinement would not be of long duration; the peculiar circumstances of his case having excited a feeling of mercy towards him.
On Saturday the 6th of May, the following persons, whose arrests on suspicion we have previously mentioned, were placed at the bar of the Old Bailey, previous to the adjournment of the court, viz. Thomas Preston, William Simmons, Abel Hall, Robert George, William Firth, and William Hazard. The prisoners being addressed by order of the court, and informed that, as no prosecutors appeared against them, they were discharged, bowed respectfully, and departed, with the exception of Preston, who made an attempt to address the Court, but was immediately silenced.