The coroner's verdict, however, declared that the Osborns had been murdered, and Colley was tried at Hertford Assizes, before Sir William Lee, and having been found guilty of murder, was sent back to the scene of the crime under a large escort of one hundred and eight men, seven officers, and two trumpeters, and was hung on August 24th, 1751, at Gubblecote Cross, where his body swung in chains for many years.[10]
A Salford woolcomber named John Grinrod (or Grinret), poisoned his wife and two children in September, 1758, and in the following March was hanged and gibbeted for committing the crime. The gibbet stood on Pendleton Moor. It was a popular belief in the neighbourhood:—
"That the wretch in his chains, each night took the pains,
To come down from the gibbet—and walk."
As can be easily surmised, such a story frightened many of the simple country folk. It was told to a traveller staying at an hostelry[52] situated not far distant from where the murderer's remains hung in chains. He laughed to scorn the strange stories which alarmed the countryside, and laid a wager with the publican that he would visit at midnight the gibbet. The traveller said:—
"To the gibbet I'll go, and this I will do,
As sure as I stand in my shoes;
Some address I'll devise, and if Grinny replies,
My wager of course, I shall lose."
We are next told how, in the dark and dismal night, the traveller proceeded without dismay to the gibbet, and stood under it. Says Ainsworth, the Lancashire novelist and poet, from whom we are quoting:—
"Though dark as could be, yet he thought he could see
The skeleton hanging on high;
The gibbet it creaked; and the rusty chains squeaked;
And a screech-owl flew solemnly by.
"The heavy rain pattered, the hollow bones clattered,
The traveller's teeth chattered—with cold—not with fright;
The wind it blew hastily, piercingly, gustily;
Certainly not an agreeable night!
"'Ho! Grindrod, old fellow,' thus loudly did bellow,
The traveller mellow—'How are ye, my blade?'—
'I'm cold and I'm dreary; I'm wet and I'm weary;
But soon I'll be near ye!' the skeleton said.
"The grisly bones rattled, and with the chains battled,
The gibbet appallingly shook;
[53]On the ground something stirr'd, but no more the man heard,
To his heels, on the instant, he took.