tales of old Kingswood forest
Dick boy and the silver tankard
During the war against Napoleon, in the first few years of the nineteenth century, the conditions endured by the people of rural England gradually became worse.
Every available scrap of land was being ploughed up for wheat' growing and the barest heath was grasped at by the neighbouring land'owners. It was at this time that the many hawthorn'studded commons lying round Kingswood were enclosed by the lords of near'by manors. This meant increasing poverty for the villagers, as well as for those of Oldland and Hanham, who could no longer cut fire-wood, or graze a few geese or sheep on what should have been common land. Resentment smouldered fiercely and many private orchards and gardens were plundered by way of retaliation.
stealing apples
For example, in March 1804, copies of the following notice were distributed locally by the village constable. TWENTY POUNDS REWARD Whereas some evii' disposed person or persons on Saturday night, the 17th instant, did maliciously pull up or otherwise destroy a great number of Fruit Trees and steal the apples in the garden at Hanham Hall, the property of Mr. Samuel Whittuck, besides doing other very material mischief, a reward of £20 is hereby offered to any person or persons who will give such information as shall bring the offenders to conviction. Hanham, March 19th, 1804. Samuel Whittuck.
Kingswood hot-bed of crime
After the loss of their commons, petty theft or highway robbery became almost the only way by which Kingswood colliers could add to their starvation wages, in spite of the harsh penalties which might be incurred. It is to be remembered that in the year 1800 a man could still be condemned to execution for such minor offences aspicking a pocket or stealing goods over the value of 6/- from a shop. Undeterred by these heavy sentences, hungry men turned to petty larency or house-breaking mainly to obtain the necessities of life.
Two examples, amongst many others in contemporary newspapers, or legal records, will serve as illustration:—In 1795 ' Two well-known characters of the Parish of St. George, under cover of legal authority, entered the house of a poor woman with intent to take away her bed. Her neighbours seized the offenders and conveying them to one of the deepest pits of the neighbourhood, there left them where they have been for three days without other food than bread and water.'
In May, 1800:— ' Thos. Hill, returning from Bristol market to Bath was robbed of £1.7s. by two men in smock frocks, this being all the money the poor man had. Not satisfied, the villains stripped him of his coat and waistcoat.' In acts of law-breaking and violence such as these, the offence was greatly heightened should the culprit resist arrest. Carrying or pointing a gun was punished by transportation; shooting at a constable incurred a sentence of execution with little, if any, chance of a reprieve.
' Dick Boy ' could readily be recognised by his very large ears
It was this act of desperate defiance in the year 1800 which brought Richard Haynes, alias ' Dick Boy,' to the gallows on St. Michael's Hill. Local tradition gives Oldland Common in Gloucestershire as his birthplace, or the nearby village of Hanham, and it is here that many stories have gathered round his name, one to the effect that he could readily be recognised by his very large ears; another that he invariably slept with his boots on in order to make a hasty escape. In sober truth, Dick's real character was not that of a romantic highwayman, but of a common thief and ne'er do well. The story, told in Braine's ' History of Kingswood Forest,' of his having wounded his father, mistaking him in the darkness for a rich traveller, may have been founded on fact, but no mention was made of it at his trial.
On March 3rd, 1800, Dick appeared at Bristol Assizes before the Recorder, Mr. Vicary Gibbs, on the charge of having stolen a silver tankard. Whilst resisting arrest, he had also fired a pistol at Constable Driver, and at a second unnamed constable. The place where this happened is not given, nor are there any details of Haynes' previous life and character. It is merely stated that he belonged to the Parish of Bitton and that he had formerly been a collier. At the same Assizes, four other men were also condemned tc death for theft, two for stealing salt from a trow at the Quay, and two more for stealing butter from a sloop at the Back. A woman, Phoebe Pitt, was sentenced to execution at the same time for stealing a diamond ring. These last five persons were later all reprieved, but for another criminal. Henry Lane, ' who issued Bank of England notes knowing them to have been forged,' the sentence remained. Later on, Lane, too, received ' a respite during His Majesty's pleasure.'
awaiting death in Newgate gaol
Only one prisoner now remained, and for two weary months Haynes was left waiting for death in the ' Pit ' of Newgate Gaol, the prison which stood near the bottom of what is now Narrow Wine Street. The river Froom then flowed down Broadmead and between the water and the prison there only stood one building, that of an evil' smelling glue factory. The Pit was the underground dungeon of the prison, eighteen steps below ground level; it was reserved for condemned criminals and for convicts awaiting transportation. Here, in a room only 17 feet square, reeking of filth, seventeen prisoners slept every night, with no bedding except a foul canvas mattress stuffed with straw. ' Some benevolent gentlemen of the city occasionally sent a few rugs.' The floor of this cell at river level was always damp, and for ventilation there was only one tiny window, the chimney being permanently boarded up and the door at the top of the stairs closed night and day.
In the rest of the gaol, as well as in the Pit, everyone was idle, all types of criminals, both men and women, being herded together during the day, ' filthy, mutinous and made desperate by suffering and hunger.' The only food provided daily was a 3d. loaf weighing just under 1Ib., and for this even the poorest had to pay the jailer, Mr. Humphries, 10d. per week, while the better-off prisoners paid as much as 2/6d. A collecting-box outside the prison gates silently begged for donations from the charitable who at irregular intervals sent gifts of potatoes, beef, herrings, vegetables and coal for the almost starving inmates.
In spite of this, men who entered the prison as healthy human beings, in a few months became emaciated and dejected. An accused man might wear heavy leg'irons for nearly a year whilst awaiting his trial at the annual assize. In 1815 J. S. Harford, the philanthropist of Blaise Castle, who was also a reformer of Kingswood, himself saw 'the irons put upon a little boy 10 years old, brought in for stealing 2 lbs. of sugar.' Weakened by conditions such as these, many prisoners died of gaol fever, some from small'pox and some apparently from sheer starvation. At the end of two months in the Pit, in these terrible surroundings, the day for Dick Boy's execution arrived.
Execution up the steep slope of St. Michael's Hill
On the preceding night he was attended from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. by Mr. James Bundy, ' a gentleman belonging to the late Mr. Wesley's Society ' and also by Mr. Walcam, the prison Chaplain, who both tried ' to comfort his soul.' When morning came his cell door opened, and, guarded by soldiers, he was marched off to the open cart standing outside the prison gate. From. this point he was driven through the streets of Bristol, which were lined with jeering and yelling crowds, and up the steep slope of St. Michael's Hill. Mr. Bundy, the compassionate Wesleyan, went with him in the cart ' and as they passed through the streets they sang hymns together and prayed.'
It was a cold, showery April day, so that, while Dick stood waiting on the scaffold with the rope round his neck, the prison chaplain only made a short speech to the eagerly expectant crowd, who on these occasions were always dressed in their best clothes. It is probable that a pamphlet describing Hayne's life and last confession was being sold to the multitude during their long wait before-hand. Some spectators had been waiting even before the dawn broke over the Downs. ' After Mr. Walcam's speech ended, and the cap had been drawn over the face of the criminal, the chaplain gave him the last embrace which he receievd with the utmost tenderness.'
An entry in the ' Bristol Journal ' for April 26th, 1800 records that ' At the fatal tree Haynes behaved with the utmost penitence. He made no address to the surrounding multitude, as he seemed too absorbed in thought.' The execution having taken place, the body ' after hanging for the usual time' was conveyed in a hearse and deposited in the crypt of St. Michael's Church, later being buried in the churchyard there. Executions such as this took place on St. Michael's Hill during the next twenty years, until, in 1820, Newgate Gaol was replaced by one newly built on the New Cut, the entrance gate of which still stands near Gaol Ferry.
From that date, the condemned prisoners were hanged on a gallows erected over the entrance gate of the gaol itself. Here, Just before an execution, official notices had to be posted, by order of the prison Governor, to warn the crowds, sometimes numbering as many as 20,000 spectators, to beware of the possible collapse of the bridges and banks under so great a weight. This gaol, with its tread'wheel for raising water, was replaced, in its turn, by the one at Horfield in 1883, so that soon the story of the old gallows on St. Michael's Hill, and Dick Boy's public execution there, faded from men's minds, or became only a faint memory of a more barbarous age.
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