We have now completed, as far as the individuals arrested were concerned, our narration of the whole of the proceedings relative to the horrid conspiracy, which at one time threatened such awful consequences; but as many circumstances connected with the personal history of the conspirators have been brought to light in the course of the proceedings, which could not well be interwoven in the history of their crimes, we have added in an Appendix such particulars respecting the principal actors in this dreadful tragedy, as we have been able to collect, from a conviction that every circumstance connected with the lives of the ferocious criminals will be considered as interesting.
The infamous Spy and instigator, George Edwards, has also been frequently named as playing a very prominent part in this horrid drama, and, independent of the disclosures of his criminal conduct, incidentally made in the course of the judicial proceedings against the conspirators, the answers given by Thistlewood to the questions put to him by Mr. Alderman Wood, on the morning of the fatal first of May, imparted a certain degree of interest to every circumstance connected with that vile character, and a feeling of indignation, horror, and disgust, was excited in the public mind relative to this consummate villain, which had never been equalled but in the sensation caused by the first discovery of the plot itself.
Consonant with these feelings were the proceedings instituted by Mr. Alderman Wood, both in and out of Parliament, for the apprehension and bringing to trial of this worthless wretch on charges of diverse acts of high treason alleged to have been committed by him; and although we stop not to inquire whether the protection from the consequences of his crimes, experienced by this fellow, be justifiable, or otherwise, we shall certainly be rendering an acceptable service to society and to future generations, in tracing this serpent through all his intricate paths of villany, and cautioning the thoughtless and unsuspecting from becoming the dupes of similar villains, (if any such exist) in their intemperate moments of political animosity.
With this view we have collected all the particulars attainable of the conduct of this arch-fiend both in public or private, as an appropriate addition to the lives of his partners in crime, and, perhaps, in some respects, the victims of his villany.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] See Newgate Calendar, Vol. 3.
[3] See Newgate Calendar, Vol. 2.