Arrived at Beckenham, Pring made a plausible excuse to leave them awhile at his house, while he fetched his mare, in exchange for the very indifferent horse he had ridden. It would never do, he said, when on their highway business, for one of the company to be badly horsed. He left the house and rode hurriedly to Horsham, whence he returned with eight or nine mounted officers of excise. They arrived at midnight, and found his three guests sitting down to supper. The two Kemps were easily secured, and tied by the arms; but Mills would not so readily submit, and was slashed with a sword before he would give in. [Picture: The “Dog and Partridge,” Slindon Common] John Mills was a son of Richard Mills, and a brother of Richard Mills the younger, executed at Chichester for the murder of Chater and Galley, as already detailed, and he also had taken part in that business. Brought to trial at East Grinstead, he said he had indeed been a very wicked liver, but he bitterly complained of such of the witnesses against him as had been smugglers and had turned King’s evidence. They had, he declared, acted contrary from the solemn oaths and engagements they had made and sworn to among themselves, and he therefore wished they might all come to the same end, and be hanged like him and damned afterwards. He was found guilty and duly sentenced to death, and was hanged and afterwards hung in chains on a gibbet erected for the purpose on Slindon Common, near the “Dog and Partridge.” Curtis, an active partner in the same murder, fled the country, and was said to have enlisted in the Irish Brigade of the French Army. Robb was not taken, and Reynolds was acquitted of the murder. He and his wife were tried at the next Assizes, as accessories after the fact. The “Dog and Partridge” has long ceased to be an inn, but the house survives, a good deal altered, as a cottage. In the garden may be seen a very capacious cellar, excavated out of the soil and sandstone, and very much larger than a small country inn could have ever required for ordinary business purposes. It is known as the “Smugglers’ Cellar.” At the same sessions at which these bloodstained scoundrels were convicted a further body of five men, Lawrence and Thomas Kemp, John Brown, Robert Fuller, and Richard Savage, were all tried on charges of highway robbery, of housebreaking, and of stealing goods from a wagon. They were all members of the notorious Hawkhurst Gang, and had been smugglers for many years. All were found guilty and sentenced to death, except Savage, who was awarded transportation for life. The rest were executed at Horsham on April 1st, 1749. One of them had at least once already come near to being capitally convicted, but had been rescued from Newgate by a party of fellow-smugglers before justice could complete her processes.