400 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[2-«» S. IX. May 26. '60. 



" The Case of Elizabeth Barker, widdowt 

 daughter of Hugh Peters. 



" That her said father being seized of a small estate, 

 some reall & some personall, both here & in New Eng- 

 land, did on the first of Nov. 1659, by his deed in 

 writeing grant all his said Estate to his said daughter 

 Elizabeth. 



" That in y e year 1660, the s d Hugh Peters, being con- 

 demned & executed for High treason, & the said Eli- 

 zabeth soon after her father's death haveing peticon'd 

 to King Charles the 2 d in Councell, his Majesty was 

 pleased to order the goods of her said father to be re- 

 stored to her. 



"That notwithstanding the fforfeiture of the said Hugh 

 Peters, his estate in New England w ch consisted in some 

 small parcells of land of an inconsiderable value was 

 never seized for the Crowne, & the said Elizabeth, by 

 reason of her then ignorance, as well as great grief, have- 

 ing omitted to mencon the same in her peticon, some 

 persons there takeing advantage thereof, & of the ab- 

 sence & poverty of y e s d Elizabeth, have entred into the 

 same, & are still in possion thereof, tho' they derive noe 

 title thereto, either from the Crowne or from her said 

 father or her self, but are ready to compound with her if 

 the}- may be secure therein. 



" The said Elizabeth being very poor, haveing been a 

 widdow many yeaves, & haveing had a Constant charge 

 upon her of 8 children, 3 of w™ in the last warr died in 

 his Majesties service, & the rest being uncapable to 

 afford her a maintenance, & she being altogether help- 

 less, her hard circumstances render her a fitt & just 

 object of her Majesties Clemency ; and therefore prays 

 her Royal letter to Collonell Dudley, Govornu of Boston 

 Colony, to pass a Patent to her for the said lands for- 

 merly her father's." 



From a memorandum on the back of this docu- 

 ment it appears to Lave been received from 

 "Mr. Pen" on the 12th May, 1703, and to have 

 been read on the 3rd June following ; but the 

 result I have not been able as yet to discover. 



William Henry Hart. 

 Folkestone House, 

 ■ Roupell Park, Streatham. 



TYBURN GALLOWS. 

 The following note from Mr. A. J. Beresford 

 Hope, published in The Times of May 9th, 1860, 

 should be preserved in " jST. & Q." It is ad- 

 dressed from Arklow House, Connaught Place, 

 May 8th:— 



" The site of Tyburn gallows has been a frequent sub- 

 ject of discussion amongst London antiquaries. It may 

 be interesting to those who care for such questions to 

 learn that yesterday, in the course of some excavations 

 connected with the repair of a pipe in the roadway, close 

 to the foot pavement along the garden of this house, at 

 the extreme south-west angle of the Edgware road, the 

 workmen came upon numerous human bones. These 

 were obviously the relics of the unhappy persons buried 

 under the gallows." 



The vexata questio will, I presume, be settled 

 by this fortuitous discovery. T. Lampray. 



[In The Times of May 11th and 14th appeared the 

 following replies to Mr. Hope's communication : — 

 " Sir, — In answer to the letter of Mr. A. J. Beresford 



Hope, in your impression of to-day, allow me to state 

 what has been constantly asserted, and hitherto without 

 contradiction. 



" There is a house in Connaught Square (46. I think) 

 which tradition declares to have been built on the site of 

 Tyburn gallows, such tradition being represented to be 

 founded upon a recital in the lease, identifying the plot 

 of ground on which the house was built with the locus in 

 quo of the fatal tree. Mr. Hope's argument is, to say the 

 least, founded upon an insufficient base. If the coming 

 New Zealander on his way to the ruins of Waterloo 

 Bridge from the debris of St. Paul's were to conclude 

 that the gallows were erected within the walls of New- 

 gate, because he saw skeletons dug up there, he would 

 be, as we know, decidedly wrong. Felons condemned to 

 death pass the place of their burial on the way to the 

 place of execution. The}- are buried near, not under, the 

 drop. 



"Again, with the exception of those condemned to be 

 hung in chains or publicly dissected, the bodies of crimi- 

 nals were invariably given up to their friends. Those 

 who did not care what became cf their inanimate frame 

 themselves sold the reversion of their lifeless corpse to 

 the surgeons, either to procure the necessities of life or 

 means of debauchery. The piety of relatives would se- 

 cure decent interment for others. The proportion of those 

 who had neither friends to care for them, or who, not 

 caring for themselves, had made a profit of their own 

 carcasses, would be but small, and Jack Ketch would 

 have sent their bodies, for a consideration, to Surgeons' - 

 hall as freely as he would have sold their clothes in Rag 

 Fair, rather than be at the trouble of burying them for 

 nothing. 



" Lastly, Mr. Hope did not say whether the skeletons 

 were many or (evr — whether they were interred in coffins 

 or not — whether there were any fragments of clothes or 

 not. 



" I would suggest that they were rather the relics of 

 those who had perished from plague or some similar dis- 

 ease. It is well known that there was a pest-field at 

 Craven Hill for those who had died of plague ; why 

 should there not have been one nearer town, at Tyburn 

 Gate? Were the bones found in separate graves or in 

 one hole? 



"The proprietor of the house in Connaught Square 

 could throw some light on the matter. He can confirm 

 or destroy the tradition. "J. W. Slade. 



"60. Trinity Square, S.E., May 9. 



"Sir, — In reference to a letter which appeared in The 

 Times one day last week respecting the discovery of 

 humau remains in the vicinity of Connaught Place, I beg 

 to state, for the information of all whom it may interest, 

 that in 1811 Dr. Lewis, of Half-Moon Street, Piccadilly, 

 was about to erect some houses in Connaught Place (Nos. 

 6. to 12. I think), and during the excavations for foun- 

 dations a quantity of human bones was found, with parts 

 of wearing apparel attached thereto. 



" A good many of the bones, say a cart -load, were taken 

 away by order of Dr. Lewis, and buried in a pit dug for 

 the purpose in Connaught Mews. 



" If you would be kind enough to find space for this in 

 a corner of your valuable journal, you will oblige 

 " Yours very respectfullv, 



" May 14." " Charles Lane.] 



LONGEVITY IN YORKSHIRE. 



On the fly-leaves of a book named Long Livers, 

 a curious History of stick Persons of both Sexes 

 who' have lived several Ages and grown young 



