Time flew fast, and the day of her trial approached. She was to depart for Bury, where the assizes were held, early on the morning of the 9th of August; and, on the preceding day, she wrote the following letter to her mistress:—
"Ipswich Gaol, August 8th, 1797.
“Honoured Madam,
“By the time you read this, which I expect will be at your happy breakfast-table to-morrow morning, your poor servant will be at Bury, awaiting the awful moment of her condemnation. I could not leave this place, however, without pouring out my heart to you, my dear and honoured lady; thanking you for your great kindness and Christian charity to my poor soul. I have confessed my guilt to God and man, and I go to my trial with the same determination to plead guilty before both.
“Honoured madam, I am told that the judge will call upon me to know if I have anybody in court to speak to my character. Now, though I cannot hope, and indeed would not urge you to be present in court, considering the state you are now in,[9] yet you have spoken well of me in private, and I know you would never fear to speak publicly that which you have said of me in private. Perhaps a line from you would do that which I want. You well know, my dear madam, that it is not from any hope of its obtaining a pardon for me that I ask it; but it is from the hope that one, whom I shall never see again, may by some means catch a sight of it; and may think better of me than the world at large, who know nothing of me, can do. Pardon this weakness.
“Think not that I have any hope of mercy or pardon here. You have taught me how to hope for both hereafter. You have shown me much mercy and pity here, and the Lord reward you and my dear master for your unmerited compassion to your wretched servant! You have fortified my mind with the riches of consolation in that religion which I hope will be poured with tenfold increase into your own heart, and give you that peace you are so anxious I should possess. It grieves me to see my fellow-prisoners so unprepared for the fate which awaits them. Oh, that they had such friends as I have had! Oh, that they had been partakers of the same consolation as myself! And now, dearest lady, I have only to request your mention of me in your prayers. Bless you, my dear madam! God bless you and your dear children, and may they live to be a blessing to your old age! Give my kind thanks to all those friends who may ever inquire about me. And now, dearest lady, pardon the errors of this letter, as you have done all the graver faults of your ever grateful and now happier servant,
"Margaret Catchpole.
“To Mrs. Cobbold, St. Margaret’s Green, Ipswich.”
Margaret, with several other prisoners, departed for Bury assizes in the prisoners’ van, which started at six o’clock on the 9th of August, 1797, under the care of Mr. Ripshaw, the gaoler, and arrived at that place about eleven o’clock in the forenoon.
The town was in a bustle, and the prisoners were received into the borough gaol that day an hour or so previously to their trial—a day of anxiety to many, but by too many spent in revelry and folly. The various witnesses crowded into the town. The inns were filled on the 8th. Expectation was alive and active; and the bustle of preparing for business created a stir throughout that town, which at other times is the most silent, the coldest, and the dullest place in England.