464 
MR. W. G. CLARKE ON “ FLINT JACK.” 
until the doctor’s death in 1840. At that time he was described 
as an “ active and more than ordinarily intelligent young fellow.” 
Upon his master’s decease, Edward Simpson took to a roving life 
around Whitby and Scarborough, gathering and cleaning genuine 
fossils. During this period he appeared before the Scarborough 
magistrates for some offence, but escaped on the plea of being 
a geologist. In 1843 he was shown a barbed flint arrowhead by 
a dealer at Whitby, who asked if he could make one like it. 
At tirst he had many failures, and was musing one morning, when 
lie took off the hasp of a gate, and with the curved part absent- 
mindedly struck a piece of flint. A flake flew off, and he tried 
again, soon acquiring the knack of chipping however he wished. 
At that time he could make and sell fifty flint arrowheads per 
day. Thenceforth dates the extraordinary supply, and the life of 
imposture which he led for so many years. 
The distinctive signs of prehistoric flint implements were then 
not so well understood as they are at the present day; and although 
no fault could be found with the shape of the spurious implements 
made by “Flint Jack,” the chipping was of the crudest description. 
The spurious implements made by Brandon knappers nowadays 
are distinctly superior. He studied various antiquities in 
museums, and set himself to the fabrication of all kinds of 
antiques, for which purpose he spent years in comparative seclusion. 
In the beginning of 1844 Edward Simpson was at Bridlington, 
and by judiciously leavening his spurious with genuine implements, 
made a collection of six hundred “genuine” for a local antiquary. 
He ordinarily walked thirty or forty miles a day, vending his wares 
and collecting materials. Towards the end of the year he started 
making British and Homan urns, first near Bridlington, and then 
near Raven’s Hall. After a “ baking-day ” he would proceed either 
to Whitby or Scarborough, and there dispose of his “collections,” 
which he solemnly declared were taken from tumuli (pronounced 
toomoolo by him) on the moors. These urns were too thick in the 
walls, of wrong material, ornament, shape, and burning, but the 
knowledge of British antiquities was then but small, and there 
was little risk of detection. “Flint Jack” was asked his opinion 
of a set of genuine implements, and, in a moment of weakness, 
confessed that he made them. At Malton, he sold a local anti- 
quarian a spurious hatchet of ironstone for one shilling. Out of 
