HIGHWAY MURDERS 77 



any more of the Crew he might pass undisturbed, 

 he civilly takes his leave of him. He manifested his 

 agility of body by lightly dismounting off his horse, 

 and with Ease and Freedom getting up again when 

 he took his Leave ; his excellent Deportment by his 

 incomparable Dancing and his graceful manner of 

 taking the hundred Pounds." 



When this hero had gone the inevitable way of his 

 fellows, he was buried with great pomp and circum- 

 stance in the church of St. Paul, Covent Garden, 

 with a set of eulogistic verses for his epitaph. Un- 

 fortunately, the old church was destroyed by fire and 

 the epitaph with it. 



Mr. Nuthall, the Earl of Chatham's solicitor, too, 

 who had been to Bath to confer with his gouty and 

 irascible client, was stopped in his carriage as it was 

 ojoino; towards London across this dreaded wilderness. 

 Th^ highwaymen fired at him, and he died of fright. 

 Two other notable murders by highwaymen took 

 place here — in 1798 and 1802 — and bear witness to 

 the degeneracy of the craft. Tlie first was Mr. Mellish, 

 who was fired upon and killed as he was returning 

 from a run with the King's hounds. A Mr. Steele 

 was the other victim, and his assailants, Haggarty 

 and Holloway, who had planned the crime at the 

 " Turk's Head," Dyot Street, Holborn, it is satisfactory 

 to 1)0 able to add, were hanged. The execution took 

 place at the Old Bailey, when twenty-eight persons 

 amono; the crowds who had come to see the sio-ht 

 were crushed to death. Up to the year 1800, the 

 Heath was a most famous place for gibbets. "The 

 road," as a writer of the period says, " was literally 



