Broadsides; Chapbooks; Street literature -- Great Britain
The young woman, Roberts, who was convicted of robbing Mr Austin, of
Red Lion-street, Clerkenwell, with whom she lived as cook, of property
to the amount of £400 and upwards, and Patrick Riley, her sweetheart,
was convicted of the same offence. The conduct of this unhappy creature
has been such, during her confinement, as to excite the respect, pity,
and commisseration of those who visited her. She has been extremely
attentive to her religious duties, and the principal thing that
engrossed her attention relative to this world was to exculpate Riley,
and hear that he was converted from what she deemed Papistical errors.
On the evening of Sunday she was amazingly cheerful, and said, as her
punishment was just, she would rather undergo it than return into a
world of temptation.
The conduct of White was very different, the bare contemplation of
the awful moment of execution unmanned him. He totally disregarded
religious exercises, and sat day after day brooding over his past
life, and occasionally starting upon his feet, bitterly inveighing
against his sentence. Immediately after his trial, and for a long
time subsequent, the unfortunate young man persisted in his entire
innocence, and strove to convince others of it, by that sort of
sophistical reasoning of which his defence consisted. He has asked over
and over again what could have been his motive to commit so flagrant a
crime, when his circumstances were not embarrassed, and his prospects
flattering?
At length, however, he confessed his guilt, but in excuse pleaded
that he was of unsound mind at the time. Finding, at length, that in
all probability the door of mercy would be closed against him, he
had recourse to many ingenious measures to effect his escape; and it
appears quite clear, that he must have some powerful auxiliaries, both
among his fellow prisoners and outside of the prison.
When the warrant of death arrived, which included his name, the
wretched man at first raved like a maniac, his fondly cherished hope
being cut off, but when he regained composure, his thoughts and
conversation were again engaged upon an attempt to escape. A few days
before that fixed for his execution, he said, “I know that I am a
sinner, but God is merciful, and I hope to go to Heaven. I know, too,
that I must suffer, but I never allow myself to think of the day.”
THE EXECUTION.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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