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Hardened Villainy Displayed. Chapter 1. The Quiet Woman
The rain, which arrived on Wednesday evening, carried on a biting easterly and persisted throughout the following day. By Thursday at suppertime, news of the cancellation of the Gloucester Diligence had been received without complaint. George Tolley, Landlord of the Quiet Woman, listened as the rain lashed against the inn’s windows. In the hearth,… Continue reading
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‘Preserved from the Jaws of Death’ : The Deliverance of Elizabeth and William Fleming
At the beginning of November 1755, four months after General Edward Braddock’s disastrous defeat on the Monongahela, Shawnee and Lenape (Delaware) warriors led by Shingas launched a series of devastating attacks on the Great Cove area of the Province of Pennsylvania. On November 1, a party of about 100 Lenape and Shawnee warriors launched attacks… Continue reading
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Illustrious Thieves: Highway Robbery in Early Modern Oxfordshire
In a previous post, we covered the story of the Dunsdon brothers. Today, we are looking at some other Highwaymen who haunted Oxfordshire’s roads during the Early Modern Period. Claude Duval and James Hind are the two most famous highwaymen associated with Oxfordshire. Duval was born in Normandy in 1643. He moved to Paris… Continue reading
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A Dark and Lonesome Passage to Eternity
Edward Bonney, a 38-year-old alleged counterfeiter from Montrose, Iowa, arrived in Chicago on the steamship Champion early on Thursday, 25 September 1845. Bonney was accompanied by two other men, identified by the local newspaper, The Chicago Democrat, as ’two of the five murderers of Col. Davenport, Wm. F. Birch, alias Haines, and John Long, alias… Continue reading
19th Century, 4th of July, Aaron Long, Banditti of the Prairie, Counterfeiting, Crime, Crime and Punishment, Detective, Edward Bonney, George Davenport, Granville Young, Hangings, history, Illinois, Iowa, John Long, Justice, Murder, Newspapers, outlaws, Public Execution, Rock Island, United States History -
Hardened Villainy Displayed
Prologue The night was dark, no hint of moonlight penetrated the thick banks of cloud. The wind blowing from the east brought fast-moving showers that would soon soak anyone foolish enough to be out of doors on such an evening. Better to be inside; in bed, or a tavern, with a welcoming fire and a… Continue reading
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Jack Mayes
The San Francisco Examiner 4 May 1915 On Thursday, 24 June 1915, Mrs. Jessie L. Mayes, a widowed mother of four, left a wicker suitcase in E.J. Shefter’s drugstore on Second and Alder Streets, Portland, Oregon. A short while later, a teenage boy arrived and announced that he had been sent to retrieve the suitcase. … Continue reading
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‘To be Master of The Devil’: Richard Faulkner
The Isle of Ely Summer Assizes, held at Wisbech on Friday, July 10, 1807, only had one prisoner to try, but he was ‘so shockingly depraved and hardened’ that his story bears retelling. Richard Faulkner was 15 when, on February 15 1807, in an act of revenge, he killed George Burnham at Whittlesea (now spelt… Continue reading
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The 1915 Vancouver Bridge Fires
By Matthews, James Skitt, Major (1878-1970) – Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1612556 Shortly before 4 a.m. on Thursday, 29 April 1915, a watchman working for the Pacific Box Company noticed smoke rising from the Connaught Bridge, spanning False Creek, Vancouver. The Connaught Bridge, a four-lane, 1,247 metres (4,091 ft) long medium-level steel bridge, was opened to traffic… Continue reading
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‘The Very Flames of Hell’ The Great Thunderstorm of 1638
By Original artist unknown, fl 17th century. Contemporary woodcut, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4986301 On the afternoon of Sunday, 21 October 1638, George Lyde, the Anglican minister of the church of St. Pancras, Widecombe in the Moor, Devon, preached before a congregation of 300 worshipers when: ‘a strange darkenesse,’ fell, ‘increasing more and more, so that the… Continue reading
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Hellish Fiends, and Brutish Men 