London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 4

by Henry Mayhew

The Frenchman, meanwhile, returned with the liquor, and went downstairs to the kitchen, where he made merry with his fair lady and her companions. When they were seated regaling themselves over this liquor the door-bell rang. One of the girls went to the door and found no person there. This was a signal agreed on between the thieves. One of the young men still pretending to feel unwell proposed to go home with his companion, promising to call on a future occasion, when they would be able to spend a more comfortable evening than they had done on account of his illness.

One of the servants, on going upstairs after their departure, found the plate stolen. Information was given to the police, when these agreeable young men and their unknown friend were found to belong to a gang of most expert thieves. They were tried at Westminster Sessions for this offence, and sentenced to three years’ penal servitude.

About eighteen months ago, two desperate burglars attempted to enter a fashionable dwelling-house at Westbourne Park, Paddington, belonging to a merchant in the City. One of them was a tall, raw-boned, muscular man, of about twenty-five years of age, dressed in a blue frock coat, dark cord trousers, black vest and beaver hat. The other was a man of thirty years of age, short and stout, nearly similarly attired. The first had the appearance of a blacksmith, with a determined countenance; the other had a more pleasing aspect, yet resolute. They were armed with a long chisel and heavy crowbar.

They got over several walls, and came up along the back to this dwelling-house in the centre of these villas, situated on the edge of the Great Western Railway. On reaching the garden they went direct to the window of the dining-room on the ground-floor.

As there had been several burglaries committed in the neighbourhood of those villas about this time, an experienced and able detective officer was sent out to watch.

While the detective, a tall, powerful, resolute man, was sitting alone in the dusk under a tree in an adjoining garden, and another criminal officer was stationed a short distance off, at about two o’clock in the morning the former officer heard the shutters crash in the windows of an adjoining house nearly in front of where he stood. The burglars had approached so softly he did not hear their footsteps, and was not aware of their presence till then. On hearing this noise he drew close to the house, and was seen by one of the thieves—the shortest one called Jack. The detective officer immediately sprung his rattle, rushed on this man and seized him. His companion on this ran from the end of the house and struck the officer across the back with a heavy crowbar. By a sudden movement of his body the latter partially avoided the force of the blow. Had it struck him on the head it would have killed him on the spot; and being a strong muscular man he knocked the shorter man down with a heavy walking-stick he had in his hand, and at the same time rushed on his taller companion, seized him by the throat, and endeavoured to wrench the iron bar from his grasp.

The other burglar had meantime made his escape into an adjoining garden, and was captured, after a desperate struggle, by the other criminal officer, who had come up.

During the scuffle between the officers and burglars the proprietor of the house, in a panic, threw up his bedroom window looking into the garden at the back of the house, and, without giving any call, fired off a pistol. He did this to alarm the neighbourhood, not being aware that the officers were so near him, and supposing that the burglars were in his house.

The other burglar was secured after a determined struggle, and both were with difficulty conveyed to the Marylebone police station by five strong officers. They were next day taken before the magistrates, and charged with attempting to enter this house, and with assaulting the officers in the execution of their duty. They were sentenced to three months each in Clerkenwell prison, with hard labour for the former offence, and with a similar punishment for the latter.

About two years ago a burglary was committed in Charles Street, Gloucester Terrace, Paddington, opposite the Cleveland Arms, by two men and a woman. One of the men was about forty-six years of age, an old desperate burglar, who had been twice transported, and was then on ticket-of-leave. Shortly before, he had been apprehended in St. George’s burying-ground, at the rear of some houses in the Bayswater road, with a screw-driver, jemmy, and dark lantern, when he was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment as a rogue and vagabond.