“Jack was now so eminent, that there was not a blackguard in St. Giles’s but thought it an honour, as well as an advantage, to be admitted to his company.”
Later he made his headquarters in the Hampstead district, and committed a robbery in the Hampstead Road.
His clever escapes, when in prison for his many offences, stimulated the interest and admiration of the people. Confined in St. Giles’s Round House, he made a hole in the roof, from which he flung a cartload of stones on the people in the street below. Later, Bess Lyon was committed to the St. Anne’s Round House. Sheppard went to see her, and was promptly shut up there as an accomplice. He wrenched the bars from the window, and tying the blanket and sheet together, first let her down, and then followed himself.
Joseph Blake, alias Blueskin, and his brother Tom Sheppard decided to hire a stable at the Horse Ferry at Westminster, and there store their stolen goods until they could dispose of them. They took a man named Field, who had been indicted for felony and burglary (and found receiving a safer business), to see these goods, hoping he would buy them, but he only betrayed them to Jonathan Wild. Jack Sheppard, in his Narrative, says that Field broke into the stable, and stole some cloth he had himself stolen from Mr. Kneebone. Sheppard and Blueskin were arrested, and condemned to death. Sheppard managed to again escape, by breaking off a spike at the hatch where the prisoners came to speak with their friends. In the evening two acquaintances came to see him, and as he thrust his head and shoulders through the opening they managed to pull him out.
After this he went to Northampton to some relations, who did not give him a warm welcome. Committing more robberies, he then retired to Finchley. There he was again found, and brought to Newgate. He was put in the “Castle,” the strongest part; but his last escape had made such a commotion that crowds came to see him in gaol. However, the prison-breaker was so closely watched that they could not bring him an implement of any kind, but there were few who went away without giving him money.
On the 15th October 1724, immediately after his keeper had brought him dinner, Sheppard began to prepare for his flight. This he effected by making a hole in the chimney, and having wrenched the chain between his fetters, he was able with the broken links to pull an iron bar away. Making another hole in the chimney, he gained access by its means to the Red Room over the “Castle,” which had not been opened for seven years. Sheppard, however, pulled off the lock, and entered the Chapel. There fresh difficulties beset him. The doors resisted his efforts, and St. Sepulchre’s bells struck eight before he reached the leads. Looking round for means of descent, he found the house adjoining Newgate was the most suitable, but the leap was too dangerous, so he returned to the “Castle” and fetched a blanket, fixed it to the wall, and sliding down dropped to the leads as the clock struck nine. The garret door was open, but people were moving in the house until midnight, when he went downstairs and so into the street.
Two days after, he personally left at the house of Mr. Applebee, in Blackfriars (a printer), a letter saying that as he had cheated him out of the account of his execution, which would be a loss to his journal, Applebee might make what use he liked of the letter Jack Sheppard was then leaving.
He continued committing burglaries in London, one of which was in the house of Mr. Rawlins, a pawnbroker in Drury Lane. Mr. Rawlins realised there was somebody in the house. Sheppard, hearing him move, made a great noise and scuffling, and shouted, “Fire at the first man that comes!” All the time his accomplices were imaginary, as he was alone. By this ruse he got away. Soon after he appeared in his old haunts and amongst his old comrades, dressed in the height of fashion. On 31st October he dined with two friends, one of them Bess Lyon, and sent for his mother, who begged him to be cautious. This was his last piece of bravado. He had been drinking heavily, and, continuing his visits to ale-houses, was given up by a bar-keeper and removed to Newgate.
Famous beyond all his contemporaries, his visitors were even more numerous than before. Many people of high degree crowded to see him in his fetters. Sheppard entertained them with stories of his exploits. Even to the end he had hoped that his friends would rescue him. When he left the prison for Tyburn on the 16th November 1724, an open penknife was concealed in his pocket. Apparently, he intended to cut the rope that bound his hands, on his way to the gallows, and then throw himself over into the crowd and escape. But the penknife was discovered as he was leaving Newgate. He was too closely guarded for a rescue to be possible. He died “with much difficulty, and with uncommon pity from all spectators.”
The British Journal of 21st November 1724 records that a bailiff in Long Acre having procured Sheppard’s body for the purpose of dissection, the friends of the young desperado caused a great riot in Long Acre, and Justices of the Peace being summoned, they sent to the Savoy (then a Royal Palace) with a request that a party of Footguards might be despatched. The chief promoters were seized, and the body handed to a gentleman who asked that he might be permitted to see to its proper burial. The mob had fought over the corpse at Tyburn, where a man was waiting with a hearse to take it decently to a grave already prepared in St. Sepulchre’s. But the bailiff above mentioned had reported that he was employed by surgeons, and pretended to rescue the body from them.