The Rise And Fall Of The Essex Gang
Butcher, baker or candle stick maker would you have joined the gang?
Richard Turpin better known as Dick was born at the blue bell inn located in Hempstead, Essex in 1705 the 5th child of John Turpin and Mary Elizabeth Parmenter.
Throughout Dick's childhood he grew up watching his farther work as a successful butcher and eventually joined the business as an apprentice once he was of age. While working he met Elizabeth Millington whom he married in 1725 and the couple moved to Buckhurst Hill, Essex once Dick finished up his apprenticeship.
Once the couple were settled Dick opened his own butchers shop in the local town but struggled with the costs of running a business by himself and turned to stealing cattle from nearby farms to cut costs on the meat. These actions didn't go unnoticed when a member from the notorious Essex gang proposed a deal. The gang were deer poachers and persuaded Dick in 1730 to help them dispose of the poached deer through his shop to which Dick agreed.
Dick continued to help the gang on and off for the next few years until he officially joined as a full time member at the beginning of 1734. By that point the gangs members consisted of Samuel Gregory, his brothers Jasper and Jeremiah, Joseph Rose, Mary Brazier, John Jones, Thomas Rowden, John Wheeler and later William Saunders, Humphrey Walker and John Fielder.
A few months into 1734 and the gang had moved away from their deer poaching roots and onto raiding homes collecting a payout of around £540 the modern day equivalent would be about £92,119 but by the end of 1734 at least six of the gangs members where caught by the authorities.
In December of 1734 Three of the gangs members where recognized by a young servant boy who had witnessed their last robbery and quickly left to report their whereabouts to the local constable who immediately went and arrested them drinking in the alehouse in Bloomsbury. They were taken straight to prison where the gangs youngest member John Wheeler Ratted them out betraying his friends by giving his captors detailed descriptions of all the remaining gang members in exchange for his freedom.
Dick was also part of the group that evening but managed to escape fleeing back to the safety of the gang to warn them of Fielder, Saunders and Wheeler's capture along with the news of Wheeler's betrayal. The remaining members decided it would be best to move away from the area leaving to lay low in an alehouse located in Debden, Westminster. Dick left right after to visit family in Hempstead close by.
A few nights later a fight broke out which led to the arrest of Rose, Brazier and Walker when they tried to escape from the scuffle.
Two months passed and on February 26th 1735 Fielder, Rose, Saunders and Walker all went to trial at the Middlesex general session where they were found guilty and transported to Newgate prison but Walker died before his sentence was carried out and as punishment his body was hung in chains to rot.
Just under two weeks later Fielder, Rose and Saunders where all hung on March 10th their bodies where also hung in gibbets along side Walker on Edgeware road. Brazier how ever did not share the same fate due to her involvement being a lot less and she was shipped off to the thirteenth colony in Georgia, USA.
Whilst the sentences on Fielder, Rose and Saunders where being carried out Jasper Gregory was detained on March 5th and much like his fellow gang members was tried, found guilty of burglary and sentenced to death on March 31st.
By now the gangs members had dwindled down fast due to the actions of Wheeler giving out their descriptions they where now being identified more often than not. Samuel and Jeramiah found themselves in a similar situation to the others when they were noticed and a brawl broke out ending with them both being arrested on April 9th and imprisoned in Winchester where Jeremiah died. Samuel went to trial in May and was executed on June 4th his body also transported to hang in chains with the rest of the gang on Edgeware road.
With almost all of the gang dead or shipped away Dick fled along with the other surviving members Thomas Rowden and John Jones turning their hands to highway robbery and spent the rest of 1736 robbing highways between London and Hertfordshire until December when Jones and Rowden where caught and shipped off to the thirteen colonies just like Brazier had been before them.
After their capture Dick lay low until March 1737 when he was seen to be working along side two other highwaymen Tom King and Stephen Potter. The three men were responsible for a string of robberies between March and April of that year.
To Be Continued...
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