The Chronicles of Crime or The New Newgate Calendar. v. 2/2: being a series of memoirs and anecdotes of notorious characters who have outraged the laws of Great Britain from the earliest period to 1841Pelham, Camden
History
The Chronicles of Crime or The New Newgate Calendar. v. 2/2: being a series of memoirs and anecdotes of notorious characters who have outraged the laws of Great Britain from the earliest period to 1841
Pelham, Camden
Crime -- Great Britain; Criminals -- Great Britain; Newgate (Prison : London, England)
over the back of the stair; but recollecting that Forest had yet to get
out, he prepared to give the man battle, lest he should attempt to seize
Forest; but the man said to him, "Run, Haggart, run; I won't touch you."
Forest then came out, and he took hold of his hand, and ran off at full
speed, pulling him along with him.
Although he had thus extraordinarily succeeded in escaping from jail, it
was not long before he was again secured for a new offence, committed in
company with his old companion M'Guire, whom he had met at Dumfries.
While the latter, however, was again convicted and received sentence of
transportation for fourteen years, the former again obtained his
liberation from prison, but under circumstances which eventually cost
him his life. He was detained in the jail of Dumfries, and a fellow
named Laurie, who was confined in the adjoining cell, suggested to him
the possibility of their making their escape, by knocking down the
jailor and taking the keys from him. Haggart, however, opposed a scheme,
which he deemed unnecessarily violent, for he had already made
arrangements, by which he hoped to secure his own safety; but another
prisoner, named M'Grory, who was under sentence of death, urging the
absolute necessity of violent means, he consented to seize and gag
Thomas Morrin, the head turnkey, and to take his keys from him, and then
to open the doors for all the prisoners to fly. Laurie, however, still
persisted that they should use violence, and he employed a debtor, who
was in the same jail, to procure him a large stone, with which he
expressed an intention of attacking the jailor; and it appears that
Haggart now agreed to his proposition. Hunter, the keeper of the jail,
having gone to the races, it was determined to seize the earliest
opportunity, and Simpson and Dunbar, two other prisoners, were made
acquainted with the plot. M'Grory's irons having been removed, Morrin
was called up on some pretended errand, and Haggart immediately burst
upon him. He struck him one blow with the stone, dashed him down stairs,
and without the loss of a moment, took the key of the outer door from
his pocket. Dunbar picked up the stone, but it appears that no more
blows were given, although Morrin received some other wounds in falling.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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