The accounts of the life of this man have become of late so widely circulated, and the particulars respecting the murder of which he was the perpetrator so generally known, that any notice of him in this work would appear almost supererogatory, were it not that a charge of oversight and omission could, without injustice, be reasonably advanced against it, were we to slight over or leave unmentioned a name so notorious. We shall, therefore, give a summary of his history, commencing with an account of his family and early life, furnished by himself at the request of the two gentlemen who, at his own particular desire, attended him at his condemnation. “I was born at Ramsgill, a little village in Netherdale, in 1704. My maternal relations had been substantial and reputable in that dale, for a great many generations: my father was of Nottinghamshire, a gardener, of great abilities in botany, and an excellent draughtsman. He served the right reverend bishop of London, Dr. Compton, with great approbation; which occasioned his being recommended to Newby, in this county, to Sir Edward Blackett, whom he served in the capacity of gardener, with much credit to himself, and satisfaction to that family, for above thirty years. Upon the decease of that baronet, he went, and was retained in the service of Sir John Ingilby, of Ripley, Bart., where he died; respected when living, and lamented when dead. My father’s ancestors were of great antiquity and consideration in the county, and originally British. Their surname is local, for they were formerly lords of the town of Haram, or Aram, on the southern banks of the Tees, and opposite to Sockburn, in Bishopric; and appear in the records of St. Mary’s, at York, among many charitable names, early and considerable benefactors to that abbey. They, many centuries ago, removed from these parts, and were settled under the fee of the lords Mowbray, in Nottinghamshire, at Haram or Aram Park, in the neighborhood of Newark upon Trent; where they were possessed of no less than three knights’ fees in the reign of Edward the Third. Their lands, I find not whether by purchase or marriage, came into the hands of the present lord Lexington. While the name existed in the county, some of them were several times high sheriffs for the county; and one was professor of divinity, if I remember right, at Oxford, and died at York. The last of the chief of this family was Thomas Aram, Esq. of Gray’s inn, and one of the commissioners of the salt office, under queen Anne. He married one of the co-heiresses of Sir John Coningsby, of North Mimms, in Hertfordshire. His seat, which was his own estate, was at the Wild, near Shenley, in Hertfordshire, where I saw him, and where he died without issue.