Eighteenth Century Waifs

Here his father offered him terms, that if he would give him £3,000 to clear off his debts, and pay him a small annuity, he would give him up the estate, and completely exonerate him of all blame in his capture and detention. To these terms Fitzgerald assented, and set off with his father through bye, and unfrequented roads to Dublin. But no sooner had the old man got into his old lodging, than he refused to ratify his bargain, and set his son at defiance.

Fitzgerald, although there was a reward out of £300 for his apprehension, took no pains to conceal himself, and, consequently, had not been long in Dublin, before Town-Major Hall heard of his whereabouts, and, taking twelve soldiers of the Castle guard with him, arrested Fitzgerald, and safely lodged him in the Castle, where he was confined in the officer’s room; and there he abode till the general election, when, through the influence of his powerful friends, he was released. During his incarceration he wrote an appeal to the public on his case, although some say the author was one Timothy Brecknock, a somewhat unscrupulous lawyer whom Fitzgerald employed.

The first use he made of his newly-acquired liberty was to revenge himself on a man who he fancied had done him some grievous injury, a somewhat eccentric gentleman named Dick Martin, and he determined to insult him in the most public manner. He met him at the theatre, struck him with his cane, calling him the bully of the Altamonts, and walked away. Of course, in those days a gentleman so insulted could but do one thing, and that was to send a challenge – and Martin did send Fitzgerald one by the hand of a cousin of the latter, a Mr. Lyster. While he was explaining the object of his visit, Fitzgerald rang the bell, and requested his footman to bring him his cudgel ‘with the green ribbon.’ This being brought, he walked up to his cousin, and ferociously asked how he dared to deliver such a message to him: then, not waiting for a reply, he belaboured him most unmercifully, with such violence indeed, as to break a diamond ring from off his finger. When he considered him sufficiently punished, he made him pick up his ring and present it to him – but he did not keep it, he wrapped it up in paper, and returned it, telling his cousin not to go about swearing that he had robbed him of it.

Martin could get no satisfaction out of Fitzgerald in Dublin, the object of the latter being to let his adversary have the reputation of being an insulted man. But, afterwards, they met at Castlebar, and a meeting was arranged. Martin was hit, and his bullet struck Fitzgerald, but glanced off: according to some it hit a button; according to others, Fitzgerald was plastroné, or armoured.

His behaviour was more like that of a lunatic than of a sane man. Take the following example, for instance. He had a house and grounds near Dublin, and his neighbours all fought shy of him – nay, one of them, a retired officer, Captain Boulton, would neither accept his invitations nor invite him to his mansion. This conduct galled Fitzgerald, and he devised a novel method of avenging himself of the insult. He would shoot on the captain’s grounds without leave. So he went down with his man and dogs and began killing the game in fine style. This soon brought out the steward, who began to remonstrate with the trespasser. Fitzgerald’s answer was a bullet, which whizzed close to the head of the poor steward, who turned, and ran for his life, Fitzgerald after him with a second gun, with the certain determination of shooting him. Luckily the man got safely into the mansion. Baffled of his victim, Fitzgerald began abusing Captain Boulton, calling on him to come out, and give him satisfaction for his man’s behaviour. But the captain, not seeing the force of the argument, refrained, and Fitzgerald fired his gun at the dining-room window. As this, however, did not bring out the captain, he fired at the windows as fast as his man could load, and only left off when he had smashed every one of them.

Another time he waged war against all the dogs in Castlebar, shooting them whenever he got a chance; but the people did not stand it tamely; they rose, visited his kennels, and shot his dogs.

His father died; but his brother, his father’s mistress, and MacDonnell, took advantage of every circumstance in their power to maliciously vex him. Law-suits were stirred up against him, and had to be met with the assistance of Timothy Brecknock, who was Fitzgerald’s legal adviser, and the followers of both parties were not particular in exchanging a shot or two, one with the other.

At length MacDonnell kidnapped one of Fitzgerald’s servants, and kept him prisoner for twenty days. Then the man escaped, and Fitzgerald applied for, and obtained warrants against, MacDonnell and two other men, named Hipson and Gallagher. To execute these warrants personally must have been a congenial task to Fitzgerald, and he set out for that purpose, followed by a large body of men. On their approach, MacDonnell fled to the neighbouring village of Ballivary, and his friends did the best they could to defend themselves, firing on his party and wounding six or seven of them. They then went after MacDonnell, and, after more firing, succeeded in apprehending MacDonnell, Hipson, and Gallagher. These unfortunate men begged to be taken before the nearest magistrate; but Fitzgerald had them bound, and taken to his house, where they remained all night.

Early the next morning they were sent, guarded by a man of his, one Andrew Craig, and about eighteen or twenty more, all well armed, to be examined by the magistrates. Before their departure Fitzgerald gave the guard strict instructions to kill the prisoners should they attempt to escape. When they had gone about three-quarters of a mile a shot was fired, and one of the escort was laid low. But very little was wanted to rouse their wild blood, and it was at once considered that a rescue was intended. Remembering the instructions given them by Fitzgerald, they fired on their prisoners, killing Hipson, who fell into a ditch, dragging Gallagher with him, wounded with three bullets in his arm. MacDonnell, by the same volley, had both his arms broken, but he was soon afterwards despatched. Gallagher was then discovered, and they were about to kill him, only Fitzgerald ordered him to be taken to his house.

News was sent to Castlebar of what had taken place, and Fitzgerald calmly awaited the result. Fully aware of the dangerous character they had to deal with, the authorities sent a large body, both of regular troops, and volunteers, to Turlough, and these were accompanied by an immense mob of people. What happened is best related in the following graphic account:

‘Brecknock was for remaining, as with the calmness of conscious innocence, and boldly demanding a warrant against Gallagher and others. This opinion, however, did not agree with Fitzgerald’s own, who justly dreaded the fury of the volunteers and the populace, with whom MacDonnell had been so popular. Neither did it coincide with that of the Rev. Mr. Henry, the Presbyterian clergyman of Turlough, who had been latterly a resident in the house, and was now wringing his hands in wild alarm for what had occurred. This gentleman’s horse was at the door, and he strongly urged George Robert to mount, and ride for his life out of the country altogether, till the powerful intercession he could command might be made for him. In compliance with this advice, which entirely coincided with his own opinion, it is stated that he made several attempts to mount; but that, splendid horseman as he was, whether through nervous excitement, guilty terror, or the restiveness of the animal, he was unable to attain the saddle, and, in consequence, obliged to fly into the house again, as the military were announced to be approaching near. It is also generally asserted that the Rev. Mr. Ellison, who headed the soldiers, sent them on to Gurth-na-fullagh, without halting them at Turlough, where he himself stopped.

‘Were this circumstance even true, however, Fitzgerald gained but a short respite by it, as the volunteers, with many of the populace, came furiously up immediately after; and, some of them being placed about the house, the remainder entered to search and pillage it. Brecknock and Fulton were immediately captured, but, after ransacking every corner and crevice more than once without finding him, the volunteers were beginning to think that Fitzgerald must have effected his escape before their arrival, when one of them, forcing open a clothes-chest in a lower apartment, discovered him among a heap of bed-clothes in his place of concealment.

‘“What do you want, you ruffian?” he said, on finding himself detected.

‘“To dhrag ye, like a dog’s head, to a bonfire,” replied another volunteer, named Morran, a powerful man, who seized him at the same time by the breast, and drew him forth by main force.

‘A pistol was now presented at him by a third to take summary vengeance; but a comrade snapped it from his hands, asking if there was not murder enough already.

‘“What mercy did himself or his murdherers show to those every way their betthers?”

‘“Well, let them pay for that on the gallows, but let us be no murdherers; let us give him up to the law.”

‘He was, accordingly, hauled out to the front of the house, where, perceiving Mr. Ellison, he exclaimed,

‘“Ellison, will you allow me to be handled thus by such rabble?”

‘Mr. Ellison’s response to this saved him from further molestation for a time, and exertions were then made to withdraw the pillagers from the wholesale plundering they were practising within. One fellow had girded his loins with linen almost as fine as Holland – so fine that he made some hundred yards fit round his body without being much observable. Another, among other valuables, made himself master of the duellist’s diamond-buttoned coat; while a third contrived to appropriate to himself all the jewels, valued at a very high amount. In short, so entire were the spoliation and destruction that, before sunset, not a single pane of glass was left in the windows.

‘The remainder of those implicated in the murders were speedily apprehended, except Craig, who escaped for the time, but was taken soon after near Dublin.

‘We must now pause to sustain our character as an accurate chronicler to relate an act as unprecedented, as lawless, and as terrible as the most terrible of Fitzgerald’s own. He was alone, on the night of his capture, in the room assigned to him in the gaol. It was not a felon’s apartment, but was guarded on the outside by two armed soldiers, lest he should make any desperate attempt to escape. It was some hours after nightfall that Clarke, the then sub-sheriff, removed one of those sentinels to another portion of the prison, where he stated he required his presence. They had scarcely disappeared, when the remaining soldier, McBeth (according to his own account), was knocked down, and his musket taken from him, while the door was burst open, and a number of men, all armed with pistols, sword-canes, and the sentinel’s musket, commenced a furious and deadly attack on Fitzgerald, who, though totally unarmed, made a most extraordinary defence. Several shots were discharged rapidly at him, one of which lodged in his thigh, while another broke a ring on the finger of one of his hands, which he put up to change the direction of the ball.

He was then secured by John Gallagher, one of the assailants, and a powerful man, and, whilst struggling in his grip, thrust at with blades and bayonets, one of the former of which broke in the fleshy part of his arm. The latter, too, in forcing out two of his teeth, had its point broken, and was thereby prevented from passing through his throat. After having freed himself, by great exertions, from Gallagher’s grasp, he was next assaulted with musket-stock, pistol-butts, and the candlestick, which had been seized by one of the assailants, who gave the candle to a boy to hold. By one of the blows inflicted by these weapons he was prostrated under the table, and, while lying there, defending himself with unimpaired powers against other deadly-aimed blows, he exclaimed,

‘Cowardly rascals, you may now desist; you have done for me, which was, of course, your object.’

The candle had by this time been quenched in the struggling, and the gaol and streets thoroughly alarmed, so that the assailants, fearing to injure one another, and deeming that their intended victim was really dispatched, retreated from the prison, leaving Fitzgerald, though wounded, once more in security.

In consequence of this outrage, his trial was postponed for two months, and the government ordered his assailants to be prosecuted, but on trial they were acquitted. Fitzgerald himself was tried the same day (June 8, 1786), the chief witnesses against him being his own man, Andrew Craig, and Andrew Gallagher, the latter of whom deposed that when he, Hipson, and MacDonnell, were confined in Fitzgerald’s house, there was a pane broken in the window, and ‘At day he saw a number of men regularly drawn up, to the number of twenty or thirty. He saw Andrew Craig and James Foy settling them. Mr. Fitzgerald and Mr. Brecknock came to the flag of the hall-door; through the broken pane he heard them conversing; they spoke in French for some time, and afterwards in English, but he could not hear what they said, but the names of himself, MacDonnell, and Hipson were severally mentioned. He heard at that time nothing more than their names. Mr. Fitzgerald called over James Foy and Andrew Craig, who were settling the guard, and ordered them to move a little higher, about ten or twelve yards above the house. There was some other conversation which he did not hear. As soon as the guard were settled, Mr. Fitzgerald gave them – Foy and Craig – orders “If they saw any rescue, or colour of a rescue, be sure they shot the prisoners, and take care of them.”

‘When these orders were given, Mr. Fitzgerald said to Mr. Brecknock,

‘“Ha! we shall soon get rid of them now.”

‘Mr. Brecknock replied: “Oh, then we shall be easy indeed.”

‘After the guard was settled, Mr. Fitzgerald called back Andrew Craig, and when Craig came within ten yards of him, he, Mr. Fitzgerald, said,

‘“Andrew, be sure you kill them. Do not let one of the villains escape.”

‘Andrew answered: “Oh, never fear, please your honour.”’

At his trial he had a bitter enemy both in the judge, Yelverton, and the prosecuting counsel, Fitzgibbon. Nor could he reckon the high sheriff, Denis Browne, among his friends, so that it was scarcely possible that it should have but one issue, and the jury returned a verdict of guilty against both him and Brecknock, and the judge sentenced them to immediate execution. Fitzgerald begged for a little delay, so that he might settle his worldly affairs; it was denied him, and, at six in the evening, he walked forth to his doom. Brecknock had already suffered. Fitzgerald dreaded the scene of the scaffold and the journey thither along the high road, in a cart, and asked, as a last favour from the sheriff, to be allowed to walk and go by a by-way. It was granted, and he went to his doom preceded by the hangman, who wore a large mask. He walked very fast, and was dressed in a ragged coat of the Castletown hunt, a dirty flannel waistcoat and drawers, both of which were without buttons, brown worsted or yarn stockings, a pair of coarse shoes without buckles, and an old round hat, tied round with a pack-thread band.

When he jumped off the ladder the rope broke, although he was but a slightly-built man and a light weight, and he had to wait until another, and a stronger, one was procured. After forty minutes’ hanging his body was cut down, and was waked by the light of a few candles in a barn at Turlough; it was interred, the next morning, in the family tomb, situated in a ruined chapel adjoining a round tower, but his remains were disturbed some years afterwards at the burial of his brother in the same tomb. He was thirty-eight years of age.

His daughter had a portion of £10,000 left her by him, and she was a very gentle and interesting girl. She mostly resided with her uncle at Castletown, and was unaware, for a long time, of her father’s fate. But it so happened that, being one day alone in the library, and looking over the upper shelves, she lit upon a copy of his trial. She read it, and from that time never lifted up her head, nor smiled – she could not bear her position as the daughter of a felon, and she gradually pined away, and died at an early age.

EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY AMAZONS

Pugnacity is not confined to the male sex, as everyone well knows, and none better than the police-force, but in these latter and, presumably, degenerate days, the efforts, in this direction, of the softer sex are confined to social exhibitions, there being, as far as is known, no woman serving in Her Majesty’s force either by land or by sea. Indeed, with the present medical examination, it would be impossible; and so it would have been in the old days, only then all was fish that came to the net. His, or Her Majesty, as the case might be, never had enough men, and ‘food for powder’ was ever acceptable, and its quality never closely scrutinised. It is incredible, were it not true, that these women, whose stories I am about to relate, were not discovered to be such – they were wounded, they were flogged, and yet there was no suspicion as to their sex.

We get the particulars of the life of the first of that century’s Amazons in a book of one hundred and eighty-one pages, published (second edition) in 1744, entitled, ‘The British Heroine: or, an Abridgment of the Life and Adventures of Mrs. Christian Davis, commonly called Mother Ross.’ She was born in Dublin, A.D. 1667, and was the daughter of a maltster and brewer, named Cavanagh, who occupied a small farm about two miles from Dublin. Here Miss Christian resided with her mother, and, although her education was not neglected, for she learned to read and sew, yet the charms of physical exertion were more attractive, and she took greater delight in using the flail, or following the plough, than in sedentary occupations. She was a regular tomboy, bestriding bare-backed horses and, without saddle or bridle, scampering about, taking hedges and ditches whenever they came in her way.

After the abdication of James II. her father sold all his standing corn, &c., and with the produce, and the money he had by him, he raised a troop of horse and joined the king’s army. He was wounded at the battle of Aghrim, and soon afterwards died of fever. His wife had very prudently negotiated a pardon for him, but, as soon as he was dead, the government confiscated all his goods; yet still the mother and daughter managed to get along somehow or other.

She grew up to be a buxom and sprightly lass, when it was her misfortune to meet with her cousin, the Reverend Thomas Howell, a Fellow of Dublin University, who first seduced and then abandoned her. Her grief at this told upon her health, and her mother sent her for a change of air to Dublin, there to stop with an aunt, who kept a public-house. With her she lived for four years, when her aunt died and left her all she had, including the business. She afterwards married a servant of her aunt’s, one Richard Welch, and lived very happily with him for four years, when her husband one day went out, with fifty pounds in his pocket, to pay his brewer, and never returned.

For nearly twelve months she heard no tidings of him, but one day came a letter, in which he told her he had met a friend, and with him had too much drink, went on board ship, and had more drink; and when he recovered from the effects of his debauch, found himself classed as a recruit for his Majesty’s army, sailing for Helvoetsluys. The receipt of this letter completely upset his wife, but only for a short time, when she took the extraordinary resolution of entering the army as a recruit, in order that she might be sent to Flanders, and there might possibly meet with her husband. She let her house, left her furniture in charge of her neighbours, sent one child to her mother’s, and put the other out to nurse. She then cut her hair short, put on a suit of her husband’s clothes, hat and wig, and buckled on a silver-hilted sword. There was a law then in existence by which it was an offence to carry out of the kingdom any sum exceeding five pounds, but this she evaded by quilting fifty guineas in the waistband of her breeches.

She then enlisted in a foot regiment under the name of Christopher Welch, and was soon shipped, with other recruits, and sent to Holland. She was, with the others, put through some sort of drill, but much time could not then be wasted on drill, and then they were sent to the grand army, and incorporated in different regiments. Almost directly after joining, she was wounded by a musket-ball in the leg, at the battle of Landen, and had to quit the field. This wound laid her up for two months, and when she rejoined her regiment they were ordered into winter quarters. Here she, in common with the other British soldiers, helped the Dutch to repair their dykes.

In the following campaign she had the ill-luck to be taken prisoner by the French, and was sent to St. Germains en Laye, where Mary of Modena, the wife of James II. paid particular attention to the wants of the English prisoners, having them separated from the Dutch, and allowing each man five farthings for tobacco, a pound of bread, and a pint of wine daily. She was imprisoned for nine days, when an exchange of prisoners took place, and she was released.

Once more the troops went into winter quarters, and Mrs. Welch must needs ape the gallantry of her comrades. She made fierce love to the daughter of a rich burgher, and succeeded so well that the girl would fain have married her. Now it so happened that a sergeant of the same regiment loved the same girl, but with other than honourable intentions, and one day he endeavoured to gain her compliance by force. The girl resisted and in the scuffle got nearly all the clothes torn off her back. When Mrs. Welch heard of this affair she ‘went for’ that sergeant, and the result was a duel with swords. Mrs. Welch received two wounds in her right arm, but she nearly killed the sergeant, and afterwards, dreading his animosity when he should have recovered, she exchanged into a dragoon regiment (Lord John Hayes) and was present at the taking of Namur.

When the troops again went into winter quarters a curious adventure befell her, which goes to prove how completely masculine was her appearance. She resisted the advances of a woman, who thereby was so angered that she swore she would be revenged, and accordingly, when a child was born to her, she swore that the trooper, Christopher Welch, was its father. This, of course, could have been easily disproved, but then good-bye to her hopes of meeting with her husband; so, after mature deliberation, she accepted the paternity of the child, who, however, did not trouble her for long, as it died in a month.

After the peace of Ryswick in 1697, the army was partially disbanded, and Mrs. Welch returned home to Dublin. She found her mother, children, and friends all well, but finding that she was unrecognized, owing to her dress and the hardships of campaigning, she did not make herself known, but re-enlisted in 1701 in her old regiment of dragoons, on the breaking out of the War of Succession. She went through the campaigns of 1702 and 1703, and was present at many of the engagements therein, receiving a wound in the hip, at Donawert, and, although attended by three surgeons, her sex was not discovered. She never forgot her quest, but all her inquiries after her husband were in vain. Yet she unexpectedly came upon him, after the battle of Hochstadt in 1704, caressing and toying with a Dutch camp-follower. A little time afterwards she discovered herself to him. Having seen what she had, she would not return to her husband as his wife, but passed as a long-lost brother, and they met frequently.

At the battle of Ramilies, in 1705, a piece of a shell struck the back of her head, and fractured her skull, for which she underwent the operation of trepanning, and then it was, whilst unconscious, that her sex was discovered, and her husband came forward and claimed her as his wife. Her pay went on until she was cured, when the officers of the regiment, who, naturally, were interested in this very romantic affair, made up a new wardrobe for her, and she was re-married to her husband with great solemnity, and many and valuable were her marriage-presents. She could not be idle, so she turned sutler, and, by the indulgence of the officers, she was allowed to pitch her tent in the front, whilst all the others were sent to the rear, but she was virtually unsexed by the rough ways of the camp, although a child was born to her amongst the din and confusion of the campaign.