There was a place of resort for the vicious, called the Cave, at Highgate, which was indicted, and the indictment opposed by the proprietors, in a trial before Lord Chief Justice Parker, December 1714; but the defendants lost the cause, and the Cave was suppressed, to the satisfaction, as a paragraph expresses it in the Flying Post, of those "who are enemies to such a nursery of profaneness and debauchery."
A shocking instance of depravity occurred in March 1718. A Quaker potter, of the name of Oades, who resided in Gravel-lane, Southwark, had four sons, whom he admitted into partnership with him, and at the same time suffered them to carry on business on their own account.
This method of proceeding naturally led to jealousies and envy on both sides, which increased to a degree of rancour, that the father and sons appear to have acted towards each other as if no connection subsisted between them. The immediate cause of the horrid event that renders the tale odious, was the arrest of Oades by his sons, for the violation of the peace, which they had bound him in a penalty to observe, and the consequent expulsion of their mother from her dwelling. This act attracted the notice of the populace, who seldom fail to adopt the right side of a question of justice, and as usual they began to execute summary vengeance on the house. The sons, an attorney, and another person, secured themselves within it, whence they read the Riot Act, and fired immediately after; a bullet entered the head of a woman, who fell dead; the assault then became more furious, and persons were sent for Mr. Lade, a Justice; that gentleman bailed the father, and commanded the sons to submit in vain: he therefore found it necessary to send for a guard of Soldiers, who arrived and commenced a regular siege, but the fortress was not stormed till two o'clock in the morning, when a courageous fellow scaled a palisade on the back part of the house, and admitted his party, who rushed in, and secured the garrison. The son of Oades, who shot the woman, was tried for the murder,
found guilty, but pardoned on his father's intercession, provided he banished himself.
The villain who occasioned the ensuing advertisement mixed cruelty with his fraud. "Whereas a person who went by the name of Dr. Cock, did about two months since come to Mrs. Robinson, in Putney, being indisposed; he pretended to come from an acquaintance of hers from London to give her advice; accordingly he applied a plaster to her stomach, by which she has received a great deal of injury. He had for his fee ten shillings, and demanded six shillings for his plaster; it is supposed he took a handkerchief with him and a shirt. It appearing that nobody sent him, whoever can give notice of him, &c."
The next Sharper upon public record worthy notice was Jones, a footman, who had contrived to attract the favours of the lady of Esquire Dormer, of Rousam, Oxfordshire, a gentleman worth 3500l. per annum; which being discovered by the injured husband, an action was commenced for Crim. Con. against the party-coloured enamorato, and pursued to conviction; but, just as sir Thomas Cross, the foreman of the Jury, was about to pronounce the tremendous sound of 5000l. damages, or, in other words, imprisonment for life, master Jones rushed through the Hall, flew to a boat, was rowed across the Thames, and took sanctuary in the Mint, before the Lord Chief Justice's Tip-staff could prevent him.
An escape accomplished by a still greater villain in 1716, was far more extraordinary: a highwayman, named Goodman, had been apprehended with great exertion and difficulty, and brought to trial at the Old Bailey, where the Jury pronounced him guilty; but, at the instant their verdict was given, he sprang over the enclosure, and eluded every endeavour to arrest his progress.
Such was the daring folly of this man, that he frequently appeared in public, and presuming on his supposed security, actually went to Mackerel's Quaker Coffee-house in Bartlett's-buildings, for the purpose of procuring the arrest of a Carrier, to whom he had intrusted 16l. to be conveyed to his wife in the country, and who, supposing Goodman would be hanged, had converted it to his own use: there he met an Attorney by appointment, and stationed four desperadoes at the door armed with pistols, in order to repel any attempt at seizing him. The Attorney, aware of his precaution, listened to the case of the Carrier, and studiously avoided betraying him; but the instant Goodman departed, he declared who his client was, upon which several persons watched the wretch to his place of concealment, where they attacked him, and he them, with the utmost resolution; after a severe conflict, in which the assailants were compelled to bruise him dreadfully, he was secured; but, throwing himself down in the streets, they were at last compelled
to bind and carry him in a cart to prison: he was hanged not long after[104:A].
The Mistress of Child's Coffee-house was defrauded of a considerable sum, in September 1716, by an artful stratagem. She received a note by the Penny-post, which appeared to come from Dr. Mead, who frequented her house; saying, that a parcel would be sent there for him from Bristol, containing choice drugs, and begging her to pay the sum of 6l. 11s. to the bearer of it. The reader will probably anticipate the denouement; the bundle was brought, the money paid; the Doctor declared his ignorance of the transaction, the parcel was opened, and the contents found to be —— rags[104:A].