“We were much discouraged at the jailer’s behaviour. So we agreed to lay the matter before God in prayer, and beg of Him that He would touch the jailer’s heart, and cause him to let us in. The next morning, which was Sunday, after begging hard for grace, wisdom, and courage, we went to the prison; and, to our great surprise, the turnkey opened the door, and, without speaking a word, took us straight to the condemned men, and let us be with them as long as we thought proper; a liberty which we were allowed twice a day till they suffered.” John Wilkes confessed to the two women that he had robbed the house at Madeley, in which the poor widow lived. He became a penitent. The nine days’ Journal of his sister and Elizabeth Childs concludes thus:— “Saturday, April 3, the day of his execution, John Wilkes was exceeding happy, and employed in breathing out prayers and praises to God. In the morning, we spent about two hours with him and his fellow-prisoner, praying and praising together in their dungeon, with much brokenness of heart, and many tears of joy and sorrow; for we were both persuaded that John Wilkes had saving faith, and an unshaken well-grounded confidence that God would take him to glory. “About two hours before the execution, which was between four and five in the afternoon, his sister asked, ‘Dost thou find thyself happy in the Lord?’ To which he answered, ‘Yes, I do, I do, more and more.’ “When they were come to the place of execution, John Wilkes’s companion desired the spectators, especially young people, to take warning by them; which was the more affecting, as he was supposed to be only about twenty years old, and John Wilkes was not above nineteen. They sang and prayed some time under the gallows; and the last words John Wilkes was heard to speak were, ‘Lord, from this place receive me into Thy heavenly kingdom!’” Some will condemn Fletcher’s action, or rather inaction, in the case of John Wilkes; but, a hundred years ago, public opinion respecting crimes, criminals, and criminal punishment was widely different from the public opinion of the present day. It certainly seems to be a savage thing to hang a youth of nineteen years of age for thieving; but the law of the land authorized this; and Fletcher evidently had but little hope of any good arising from reprievement in a case like that of Wilkes. Perhaps he was right, or perhaps he was wrong. At all events, Wilkes became a penitent thief, and, as such, his sister and his sister’s master had reason to rejoice and to give thanks. Fletcher immediately published a pamphlet on the occasion with the title, “The Penitent Thief; or, a Narrative of Two Women, fearing God, who Visited in Prison a Highwayman, executed at Stafford, April 3, 1773. With a Letter to a Condemned Malefactor. And a Penitential Office, for either a true Churchman, or a dying Criminal, extracted from the Scriptures and the Established Liturgy.”