The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1912-07-05
FAMOUS PISTOL
OF DICK TURPIN
Finding of Relic Recalls Story of
Highwayman Hero.
THE MASTER OF BLACK BESS.
Reckless Knight of the Eighteenth
Century Was a Robber Whose Ways
Appealed to Popular imagination.
His Biography as Told by Ainsworth.

Century Was Robber Whose Ways
Appealed to Popular Imagination.
His Biography as Told by Ainsworth.
A dispatch from London the other
day conveyed the information that
Dick Turpin's pistol had been found
the same presumably with which the
famous highwayman shot his friend
that equally notorious highwayman,
Tom King. 1t is a double flintlock
horse stick" and it bears the inscrip-
tion:
Presented to Dick Turpin at the
White Bear Inn, Drury Lane, Febru-
ary Z, 1885"
In common with many another rob
Der Turpin was something of hero in
his day. The highwaymen Of the
time appealed to the popular imagina-
tion.
Among the accounts of Turpin's ac-
tivities none is better known than that
found in Harrison Ainsworths "Rook-
wood" 1t is partly true and partly leg
endary. 1t mentions many of the IA
nous gentry of the road by name. AMI
King roaring out alternate verses at
the White Bear inn or that hostelry
in Kilburn which the gang affected
singing it, perhaps, on the very night
on which Turpin killed King and start
ed off on his wild gallop of a hundred
miles from London to York. High
toby is the name by which the game
of stand and deliver was familiarly
known to its steady practitioners. and
here are few stanzas of the "Chap-
ter of Highwaymen:"
OF every rascal of every kind
The most notorious to my mind
Was the cavalier captain, gay Jenny
Hind!
Which nobody can deny.
"Prince of Prigs."
James Hind, known as the prince
of prigs," was a royalist captain Of
some distinction who was hanged,
drawn and quartered in 1862. 1t was
said that Oliver Cromwell was among
the many whom he had robbed.
But the pleasantest coxcomb among them
all
For Lutte. corranto and madrigal
Was the gallard Frenchman Claude Du |
Val!
Which nobody can deny.
Du Val was a gentleman highway
man who made life miserable for trav- |
elers going TO and from London.
And Tobygloak never q coach could rob,
Could tighten pocket or empty fob
With a neater hand than Old Mob, Old
Mob
Which nobody can deny
"Old Mob" was Thomas Simpson, |
who was not particularly scrupulous |
as to his method of appropriation. He
told a widow whom he robbed that |
'the end Of a woman's husband be-
gins in tears, but the end of her tears
is another husband"
Ainsworth alleges it was through
treachery that Turpin was led to
shoot King. However that may be,
Turpin mounted his mare and was off,
by a posse, across England.
Dick, says his chronicler, was "the
crack rider of England of his time
and perhaps of any time" and he rode
Black Bess in "masterful fashion,"
jumping over the cart and donkey of
a farmer who tried to bar his progress
and leaping the High Hornsey tollgate.
After covering nearly a hundred
miles Black Bess lost something of
her energy. The pursuers, who had
killed steed after steed, commander
Ing fresh ones by the way, were gain
ing on him, and Dick poured down the
mares throat the contents of a bottle
given him by an old fellow "who was
n knowing nd 70 IL, ]
his day." the liquid being guaranteed
to make a horse go as long as he'd a
leg to carry him"
Tragic End of Black Bess.
"Hark away, Bess! Dick cried to
his steed Gfter fnrding the Ouse to