Highway robbery

“ Travellers could hardly trust themselves to go about unarmed, and even the mail-coaches, in which (besides the driver and guard) some passengers generally journeyed, had to carry weapons of defence placed in the hands of the guard. Many instances of highway robbery by highwaymen who made a profession of robbery might be given ”

“ Again, it is recorded that "even the toll-house keepers in London were so liable to be robbed, that they had to be furnished with arms, and enjoined to keep no money in their houses after eight o'clock at night. The boldness with which street robberies still continued to be committed was evinced so late as 1777, when the Neapolitan ambassador was robbed in his coach in Grosvenor Square by four footpads armed with pistols."
But highway robbery had long been practised, even by individuals in the higher stations ”

“ Richard Brown, of Little Pannel, driving a horse and cart, was attacked by two footpads near Gore Cross Farm. One seized the horse, while the other gave him two tremendous blows on the head with a bludgeon, which almost deprived him of his senses. Recovering, he knocked the fellow down with his fist. Then the two jumped into the cart and robbed him of ten shillings, running away when he called for help, and leaving him with his purse containing £14 in notes and gold.
With this incident the story of highway robbery on Salisbury Plain comes to an end, and a very good thing too. ”

“ Robbery was as common as lying. To-day human life is as safe in Bosnia as in Illinois. Travel is safer there because there has never been a train robbery in that country. During the last ten years, out of a total population of nearly [276] 2,000,000, the homicides have averaged six a year, and in 1900 there were only two. There has been no case of highway robbery since 1895. Which of the states in the American Union can show a better record? ”

“ Even to the present day, as has been shown in a preceding chapter, highway robbery still exists, although the profession of highwayman no longer commands the respect of reputable society as was the case during the time of Robin Hood, and Claude Duval of England, and of the Robber Barons of Germany. ”

“ There are comparatively very few men in charge of these immensely valuable consignments, which often consist of as many as two hundred and fifty sledges—one man to about seven horses as a rule—and these at night take it in turns to keep watch; for on the Great Post Road a peculiar form of highway robbery exists: bales of tea are frequently cut loose and stolen in the dark hours by thieves, who lurk around to take advantage of a driver dozing on his sledge. ”

“ To curry favour with those you are robbing, sometimes at the expense of your own comrades, as I have known fellows do, why, it is the greatest——"
"So it is," interposed the postilion.
The newspapers of those times afford deeply [Pg 106] interesting reading. Very few of them but contain some startling item of highway robbery, or news of the capture or trial of the highwaymen who dared even to ply their trade within sight of the streets. It seems so very long ago, and it all has an extraordinary air of unreality. ”

“ Highwaymen continued numerous at the dawn of the nineteenth century, as may be judged from the executions at Fisherton Gaol, or on the scenes of their misdeeds, that continued to afford a spectacle for the mob. For highway robbery alone one man was hanged in 1806, one in 1816, two in 1817, and two in 1824; while three were sentenced to fifteen years’ transportation in 1839 for a similar offence near Imber, in the very centre of the Plain. ”

“ But even in summer, and in the more populous regions, where the villages are tolerably close together, highway robbery is equally rare, and the absence of this crime seems to me attributable rather to the character of the people themselves, to whom the practice seems repugnant and unnatural. ”

“ But the charge of highway robbery, which bore a singular resemblance to the final catastrophe in Queensland, he resisted to the utmost, and showed that his experience in the Supreme Court at Dunedin had not been lost on him. At half-past six one evening in a suburb of Melbourne an elderly gentleman found himself confronted by a bearded man, wearing a long overcoat and a boxer hat and flourishing a revolver, who told him abruptly to "turn out his pockets." The old man did ashe was told. The robber then asked for his watch and chain, saying "Business must be done." ”

“ Well, I didn't see any diamond rings on his hands when I looked at his body, and I particularly noticed his hands, to see if there were signs of any struggle. No sir—it's just a plain case of what used to be called highway robbery and murder. ”

“ The principal highways over which the diligence lines pass are constantly patroled by the armed rural guard or the Federal troops; and yet highway robbery is so common that it is rarely even noticed in the newspapers. ”

“ Rarely, at one time, did the mails or the stages escape the highwayman’s unwelcome attentions, for, during a lengthy period, the wide, unenclosed waste lands in the neighbourhood of London were the nocturnal resorts of all who desired to better their fortunes at the expense of whoever happened to be travelling upon these lonely roads after nightfall. All the ruined gamesters and unconventional or reckless ne’er-do-wells who could manage to buy, hire, or steal a horse, took to the exciting occupation of highway robbery. ”

“ Algernon Sutherland crossed his legs in a symmetrical manner, and passed his hands through his flowing locks.
“Umph!” he ejaculated. “I hardly know how to answer your question. In the country dwell a race of men called farmers, who utterly disbelieve in banks, those nefarious institutions which have extinguished highway robbery—​the high art of our profession—​in order that they may pillage percentage from the million, and, by breaking now and then, utterly ruin the fatherless and the widows. ”

“ Why, one of our American gangs that hold up a train, and get an express safe full of greenbacks, and shoots up a mess of railroad hands and passengers with Winchesters and automatic pistols, and blows up cars with dynamite and gets away and has to have a bookkeeper and a cashier to keep their bank accounts straight, could give those old Claude Duvals and Sixteen-String Jacks cards and spades.
But civilization, dad says, has done much for the highway robbery business, and he says we in America have arrived at absolute perfection. ”

“ Many of the stories in these pages are concerned with the doings of highwaymen in the districts near London, but the neighbourhood of almost every town was infested in degree, and there are few local histories, and fewer of the older newspaper files, that do not afford curious reading in the highway robbery sort, intermingled with advertisements offering rewards for the apprehension of horse- and sheep-stealers and fugitive husbands who have left their wives and families chargeable upon the parish. ”

“ The robber jumped back into the car, where Hoskin could see two others, and the car dashed on to the north.
(2)
The latest thing in highway robbery is to have a $7,000 limousine and a handsome chauffeur, and then to watch for victims strolling through fashionable neighborhoods. Henry Hoskin, who lives at 132 Welcome Place, was a victim at 1 o’clock this morning.
“I was just passing Harold McCormick’s mansion at the Lake Shore Drive and Bellevue Place,” he said, [Pg 99] “when it happened to me. The finest looking limousine I ever saw slowed up right in front of the McCormick house. ”

“ Special legislation could not cope with this crime, and to hinder it the Lords of the Treasury petitioned Queen Mary (in the absence of William III) to grant no pardon to any sentenced for clipping unless before their conviction they discovered their accomplices.
Highway robbery had greatly increased. The roads were infested with banditti. Innkeepers harboured and assisted the highwaymen, sympathizing with them, and frequently sharing in the plunder. ”

“ We have not had a man committed for a highway robbery lately; I speak of persons on horseback. Formerly there were two, three, or four highwaymen, some on Hounslow Heath, some on Wimbledon Common, some on Finchley Common, some on the Romford Road. ”

“ It is true that bounty robbery allows of infinite subdivisions, and in this respect does not yield in perfection to highway robbery, but on the other hand it often leads to results which are so odd and foolish, that the natives of the Kingdom of A—— may laugh at it with great reason. ”

“ A traveller on the highway, contrary to the provisions of the statute, yet peaceably and quietly pursuing his course, might be assaulted and robbed by a highwayman. It would be difficult in such case to perceive how the highwayman could connect the unlawful act of the traveller with his assault and robbery so as to justify or excuse them, or how it could be said, that the former had any natural or legitimate tendency to cause or produce the latter. ”

“ As guardians of the law became more active in pursuit, offenders were driven to combine forces and form associations for greater strength and more concerted action. Receivers of the stolen goods were established with secure hiding places and lines of safe retreat. Leaders were also appointed to direct operations, to ascertain the most likely victims and plan attacks without incurring suspicion or subsequent detection. In this way, outrages multiplied and developed on a large scale far beyond mere highway robbery. ”

“ There's no such thing as a dashing gentlemanlike robbery committed now-a-days on the king's highway. A man may roll from one end of England to the other in a drowsy coach or jingling post-chaise without any other adventure than that of being occasionally overturned, sleeping in damp sheets, or having an ill-cooked dinner.
"We hear no more of public coaches being stopped and robbed by a well-mounted gang of resolute fellows with pistols in their hands and crapes over their faces. ”

“ If an axle or wheel broke, if a waggon upset in crossing a dangerous ford, the bales thrown on the path or stranded on the banks of the stream could be claimed by the proprietor of the land. Worse than all were the perils from the robber-knights—men who insisted on their right to make private war even when that took the form of highway robbery, and who largely subsisted on the gains which came, as they said, from making their “horses bite off the purses of travellers.” ”

“ At this overcrowded period, when the ordinary course of business failed, the highwaymen were even known to practise upon one another, like the Stock Exchange brokers of to-day, who, when the public hold aloof, sharpen their wits and fill their pockets by professional dealings.
In 1758 the monotony of highway robbery147 was broken by a burglary at the “Bull and Mouth” coach-office, at 3 o’clock one morning, when 47 parcels, chiefly containing plate and watches, were stolen. The booty was valued at £500. ”

“ They began before the kindergarten age with burglary and till-tapping. "Highwaymen" at six sounds rather formidable, but there was no other name for it. Two lads of that age had held up a third and robbed him in the street; at seven and eight there were seven housebreakers and two common thieves; at ten I had a burglar, one boy and four girl thieves, two charged with assault and one with forgery; at eleven four burglars, two thieves with a record, two charged with assault, a highway robber, an habitual liar, and a suicide ”

“ One evening, a party of my companions carried me along with them, and, opening the door of a certain house, conveyed from thence some trunks, which a faithful dog perceiving, he gave the alarm. The people of the house attacked the robbers, who threw down their burdens to defend themselves: meanwhile, I skulked into a corner all trembling. The watch made their appearance, and seeing three trunks in the street, two men dangerously wounded, and myself standing at a small distance, they seized me as one concerned in the robbery. ”

“ At supper we had more talk about highway-robbers, but we were assured that there was less danger now, because between Canterbury and London the road is more frequented, and therefore robbers, who are by nature a timorous folk, hesitate to attack a coach. ”

“ Frank reiterated. "After taking two cars from almost the same place, you'd imagine the thieves would be scared to come back."
"They have plenty of nerve, that's certain."
"It isn't as if the police haven't been busy. They've watched this road ever since the first car was lost, and the other autos were stolen just the same. They've kept an eye on both ends of the highway and there wasn't a sign of any of them."
"It's strange that they haven't turned up somewhere. Lots of times a stolen car will be recovered when the thief tries to get rid of it. The engine numbers alone often trip them up. ”

“ On the night previous to your intended departure, a thief enters your house, takes possession of all you have, and makes off, and you never hear of it more. Or suppose you are already on your journey, and after many days of fatiguing travel, find yourself near the place of your destination; when you are met by the highwayman, who, with a pistol at your breast, robs you of your last farthing.—Now I suppose this would be a case, where theft and robbery would stand out in their worst features. ”