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question that was put by one of the jurymen, I believe a gentleman by the name of Mr. Goodchild: if this is law, certainly I am a very illiterate character, I know nothing of law; but I should wish to know from the gentlemen who sit and stand round me, is this law? My lord, he stated it in these words. "My lord, I wish to be informed on a point of law, is arming and resisting the civil power, levying war." To which the learned judge answered, "Yes." If this is law, gentlemen, certainly I am guilty-I certainly am guilty, if this is law; but it is law only in my case. Gentlemen, it is not law I am well convinced, ignorant as I am; it is not law I am certain; and as for the whole course of this evidence, it has never come out that ever I was seen by the soldiers, or that ever I was recognized by the officers. When the officers came, being, as I acknowledge I was, in the place, I made the best of my way I could; but to say I have been guilty of high treason, I have been guilty of no such thing; and I will not go out of the world with the stigma of its being said, that I have been a traitor to my country and my king. Say I was an enemy to lord Castlereagh and lord Sidmouth, and the rest of the cabinet, but do not heap upon my head, that I am a traitor to my king or my country. I never suffered any man to run on against my sovereign in my life, and why should high treason be reckoned to me! If any man has done a thing of that sort, let him be punished for it; but I should not have been here on that charge. Let me be tried for murder, if I have committed it; but I am no traitor-I am no enemy to my king. I have a love to my king and country; but I am an enemy to the boroughmongering faction, that destroys the vitals of my country; but to my king and my country I am a loyal and dutiful subject. I consider the king equally enslaved as the people, by those very men; if you mean to say the sovereignty of the people is vested in the boroughmongering faction, then I am guilty of high treason; but if you do away with that, the verdict ought to be set aside.

Now I will go a little further; when the jury were called back, the learned judge will admit this I am sure, whether it might be that he did not hear I will not say, I will not impute wrong motives to the judge, whether he did not hear the question I cannot tell, but I will presume to say this, that two of the learned judges, the one on his right and the other on his left, immediately rose from their seats, and whispered to the learned judge that tried me. I have not the pleasure to know his name, nor is that material, but the jury were called back, and he wished the gentleman to repeat the question again, at which he was very confused, as, I dare say, a man of common capacity in a crowded court is, and he may make an error; he begged the judge's pardon for intruding, but he considered it a duty to put the question to the judge; and the learned judge said, the conspiring and

aiming to depose the king, was a levying of war. This is a different question from that put by the jury-this is a very pretty perversion of justice-I maintain, if I were tried again by an honest jury, an honest set of men, give me justice, and there is no man on the face of the earth can prove me to be a traitor. Even Adams acknowledged that the moment Ings and I came into the room, after we had heard the proposal of Harrison, we said no, we would have nothing to do with it, that nothing would do but putting those obnoxious characters out of the way-I mean obnoxious to us, not to you, gentlemen, to the man who has nobody to look up to to protect him, and who, when he petitions and cries for bread for his family, can get none. I have been in the habit of earning three or four pounds a-week, and then I never troubled myself about government; but when I came to earn, perhaps, not ten shillings, I began to inquire why I had a right to be starved; the Creator of the world, who made the world, gave every man a right to live in it; and why it was taken from the people, and I and thousands more should be starved, why men who toiled should not enjoy a little, and why millions should toil and some few should dissipate it; and this brought me to the conclusion of being an enemy to those men. After the massacre of Manchester, but not before, when I considered there was not sufficient, with heaping up all the treasure in the country, to relieve the country, but that these men were starving them to death, liter ally starving them to death, and that yet they were not satisfied, but they must call in ruffians, not men, to murder them, for I am a descendant of the ancient Britons. I thought nothing could be too bad for those men, and there would be men in the country who would come forward and join me; Edwards told me he had got plenty, and I was willing to be one; I am satisfied nothing can be done in this country if men are afraid of their lives. I do not mean to say that I was not willing to die in it-I was willing to do even murder in liberty's cause; and I would have died there upon the spot, if my lord Sidmouth and lord Castlereagh had come to take me, they should not have had me; but when I heard the man say at the door, the soldiers are coming, I made the best of my way off; I found the thing could not be done then, and now I am indicted for high treason. If resisting the police, if resisting a man that came into the room and stood forward, as I declare a man did to this man (Thistlewood), and said, if you make any resistance I will blow your brains out, is treason, where is the man that can withhold his arm then? Is not my life as dear to me as a peace officer's life? certainly; had the man come as a soldier, I should have said, he has sworn allegiance to the king, and it is my duty to obey him; but when a man comes threatening me with authority, without shewing a warrant, and threatening to kill me, here is an arm that, while there is a nerve in it,

shall resist. This is the extent of my guilt, but why say I am guilty of conspiring to levy war or depose the king? I have never been guilty of any thing of the sort.

Now, gentlemen, on the other hand, as I am here for the last time of declaring the truth which I know, I will declare another fact respecting the two Monuments, upon whom the learned solicitor-general did not forget to pass the highest encomiums for gravity; their appearance standing up there at that bar; they were such pure witnesses that no man in his senses could doubt that they were very good indeed; these two witnesses came forward here to swear the lives of eleven individuals here, and I know they have rehearsed their evidence as common as they do a new piece at the theatre; these men have been in the habit of meeting twice a-week in the Tower; I know they have met twice a-week; I do not even know their christian names, but I believe they were John and Thomas; the one who is in custody said to me at Cold-bathfields, and at Whitehall, at the Treasury, that he knew me, and why did not I tell him something; I told him for certain reasons, namely, because I did not know myself; he says at this bar he was instigated by fear to come; and he said to me in the room, "why did not you tell me what was going to be done, and I would have brought my brother;" then when he sees me at Cold-bath-fields, he says, why did not you tell him more? and I said, because I knew nothing more. Then my lord Sidmouth, who has a very great feeling to us, or the public in general, sends his brother to him; but, my lord, I have a previous remark to make my lord Sidmouth told him, in the first instance, "I will be a friend to you;" that would enliven him very much, and if he could have sworn all the Englishmen's lives away that were upon the earth, he would have done it; and as a small memorandum, says he, he sent my mother a pound note, as she was very much disturbed; then this very man, who is coming as an evidence against us, goes twice a-week to the Tower, and, because his brother knows nothing there, he tells him something; they rehearsed together, and they do not deviate a jot or a tittle; how can they, till one of them comes to speak of what passed in the room, and then the brother was not there; this is admitted to be a very excellent witness; it must be famous evidence to take my life upon, when they met twice a-week for two or three months, to compare their evidence, in

order to take my life; he swears, that I said I would sooner perish myself than the cause should be dropped; and Adams swears, that I said if there were only six or eight I would be one. To take my life away on such evidence cannot be justice.

I expect to go out of the world shortly; I care not how soon it is, for I shall die with the same sentiment that I stand here; I know that injustice is done me, and that I have an undoubted right, as an Englishman, to demand

justice in this Court; I never conspired, and no man can be found, unless he is a villain and a traitor, to say that I conspired to depose my sovereign, or that I conspired to levy war, unless the repulsing the police officers is treason; if you call that treason, I am guilty of treason; and I admit that I and others have agreed to attempt that which I wish we had done; for if I could have seen some of those men put out of the way, I should have thought the country would have been highly compensated, for I think it is what they merit, I actually think it is what they merit; I think the circular issued by lord Sidmouth was nothing but a thing sent out to instigate the cavalry to murder those men at Manchester; and if a man murders my brother I have a right to murder him. What does the scripture say, "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." I have no private enmity against any gentlemen in the country; it was for the public good that I came forward, and I would have gone through with it. I declare, at the hazard of my life, which I cared nothing for, but the king's name was never called in question where I was; and as to the attempt to find me guilty of conspiring to depose his majesty, or to levy war against him, I am not guilty; the verdict ought to be set aside. Try me for murder-hang me-draw me-quarter mebut let me have justice, that is all I have to say.

Tidd. My lords and gentlemen, being only found guilty so late last night, I have not had an opportunity to make up any defence; for my own part, I am a very indifferent orator, or perhaps I might have brought in something more satisfactory; but all I can say is this,

that I do positively say, that every evidence of that gentleman there, captain Fitzclarence, that came against me swore falsely, exclusive and he stated, that he did not know that I shot at him; but sooner than I would shoot at that gentleman, as a private gentleman, I would shoot my own father. I cannot say further, gentleman, for I am not prepared.

Wilson.-Gentlemen, I am not gifted with a tongue much to say much, but I certainly have been drawn into this by Hiden.

Harrison.-They were all false witnesses; they have all sworn falsely against me.

Bradburn. My lords and gentlemen, the evidence that Adams has given against me I consider is not right.

gentlemen, that as to the evidence that Mr. Strange. I have only thus much to say, Mr. Adams gave against me, I declare soBrunt's apprentice, Joseph Hale, and likewise lemnly to God, before whom I now stand, and the gentlemen round, they are both perjured villains.

Gilchrist.-What I shall say I will say as in the presence of my God, and before you. I knew nothing of it till about four o'clock in the afternoon; I was going to look for work;

I had neither money nor bread, so I met with! a man who told me to come to the Horse and Groom, that they were going to have a supper there. I was not a man that suffered myself to be among radicals, but I had nothing to eat, and absent from my friends, and none to help me. I went to the place appointed, as I have stated to my Attorney, and likewise stated to my lord Sidmouth, at six o'clock at night; I cannot cut it short; I must tell the truth; I went to the place at six o'clock at night, and met four or five men whom I did not know, but Charles Cooper. I borrowed a halfpenny, and bought some bread at a shop; with that I followed Hiden; I was a few yards behind him in going to this shop; before I could get a penn'orth of bread they were away from me; I followed them on, not knowing what I was going about; as my God hears me that is true, and I never wish to come out of this place if I say any thing false. I went on, not knowing what I was going about, and when I went up stairs, in a very little time came in bread and cheese; I took an old sword and hacked it down; the men came round seemingly as hungry as I was, and I never asked, 'till near about the conclusion that the officers came, the meaning of those arms; this very man that came here was the very man that answered me first; he says, you shall know by and by; there is one that we expect to come; says I, I am not willing to stop here; says he, ranging the swords, any man that shall go out here I will run him through. I immediately, in a manner, went backwards from the end of the table, stepping towards this little man, and I was then going to make an excuse to get away out of this company, when up came an officer, and the words that he said were, "Lay down your arms." I heard no more; I was confounded. I knew by his neckcloth, and the appearance of a gentleman, that it was my duty to surrender myself. I never had any thing in my hand, but that sword that I cut down the loaves with, and I stand here convicted of high treason. I served my king and my country twelve years, and this is the recompense; O God! I have nothing more to say.

Cooper.-My lord, I have very little to say; I am brought in here unexpectedly this morn ing; I did not expect to be called up so soon; in the first place, they have called no evidence, but they convict me of high treason, I have been given to understand. I consider, my lord, there is no evidence to convict me of high treason; I am certain of that. It was my intention to say more, but it seems the desire of my friends, that I should say nothing more; but I consider myself a voluntary exile for the good of my friends.

Gilchrist. I would volunteer myself, if my life would save another man's. I never knew this man (Cooper) till I came into this room, but with compassion I will resign myself, if it is to save another man's life. I am innocent; indeed I never meant to take any man's life.

SENTENCE.

Lord Chief Justice Abbott.-Arthur Thistlewood, William Davidson, James Ings, Thomas Brunt, William Tidd,-you have severally been tried and found guilty upon an indictment charging you, together with others, with the crime of high treason, in compassing and imagining to levy war against his majesty, in order to compel him to change his measures and councils.

John Harrison, Richard Bradburn, John Shaw Strange, James Gilchrist, Charles Cooper, you being each persons charged with the same offence, by the same indictment, originally pleaded Not Guilty to that indictment, but after the trial and conviction of the five persons first indicted, you desired to be allowed to withdraw those pleas of Not Guilty, and to plead guilty to the charge of treason imputed to you by that indictment, and you were permitted so to do.

James William Wilson, you having been charged with the same offence, pleaded to that indictment a mistake in your name-of that plea you had the benefit, but it was a benefit that could not long be of any avail; another indictment for the same offence was preferred against you, and to that indictment you, after the trial of the five persons whom I first named, have also thought proper to plead guilty.

You, therefore, James William Wilson, John Harrison, Richard Bradburn, John Shaw Strange, James Gilchrist, and Charles Cooper, have thought fit voluntarily to acknowledge the crime with which you are charged, and to cast yourselves upon the mercy of your sovereign. If any of you shall have your life spared, which as to some of you I trust may be the case, I hope you will always bear in your minds, that you owe that life to the benignity of your sovereign-to his merciful disposition, aided and seconded by the merciful disposition also, of those very persons whom you had doomed to a violent and sudden death.

One of you (Arthur Thistlewood) has now complained, that at your trial, you proposed to call certain witnesses, whom the court refused to hear. It is true that you did request permission to call a person with a view of impugning the testimony of a witness of the name of Dwyer, and no other, as far as I then understood; the learned counsel, whose assistance you have had, previously called witnesses for the same purpose; it could not be allowed to you, according to the ordinary course in which justice has been administered in this country for ages, at that time to adduce such evidence; nor, indeed, could it have availed

any thing, if you had been allowed so to do,

because your case did not depend upon the testimony of that witness alone; and three several verdicts pronounced upon the same conspiracy, by juries before whom that witness Dwyer was not examined, have shown that the testimony of that person was not necessary to establish the conspiracy, or to prove the guilt of any of those concerned.

Some of you have thought fit to say much of a person who has not appeared as a witness upon this occasion. We proceed only upon the evidence that is laid before us; of that person, therefore, to whom you have alluded, or of his actings, we have had little proof; upon the testimony, however, that was adduced against you, there was abundance to satisfy the juries of your guilt, and that each of you voluntarily took a most active part in the treason.-From all that has appeared in the course of these trials-from much that has been now urged by many of you, the Court has plain reason to see that you did not embark in this most wicked design, till you had first suffered your minds to be corrupted and enflamed by those seditious and irreligious publications with which, unhappily for this country, the press has so long teemed. Your case shows that which indeed, even without evidence, may in the case of all great crimes be reasonably presumed, that no man wholly forgets his duty to his king, or his duty to his neighbour, until he has put from his thoughts the fear of God and a future state. I make not these remarks to aggravate your guilt, or to enhance the sufferings of your present situation; I make them as a warning to all those who may hear of your unfortunate end, that they may be taught by your example to avoid those dangerous instruments of seduction, by which the heart of man is influenced to every evil deed, and is withdrawn from every moral and proper sentiment.

The treason with which you were charged, and of which you have been found guilty, was that of compassing and imagining to levy war against his majesty, for the purpose of compelling him to change his measures and councils. The assassination of those persons by whom the affairs of his government were at that time, and had for some time before, been administered, was intended by you as the first, but by no means the only step to be taken; many of you hoped, that at that same instant, other persons, connected with yourselves and acquainted with your designs, would make violent attempts in other parts of this great metropolis, to seize arms and ammunition, and who were to be joined by you after you should have accomplished that abominable purpose. You vainly hoped that there were in this great town, thousands and tens of thousands ready to join you in your purpose of mischief and destruction, and to enable you to assume the whole government of this country into your own hands. To the proof of that intention on your part, the evidence of all the witnesses concurs; and the gentlemen of the jury by whom you were tried, must have been satisfied that the assassination of his majesty's ministers was a part only of the purpose which you had contemplated.

You have endeavoured now to complain of the testimony of some of those persons who were examined as witnesses against you; several of them were accomplices in your guilt, It has happened to you on the present occasion

as to many others before you, that the principal instruments by which you are brought to justice, are persons who have partaken in your own guilty design. I trust that that circumstance will have its due weight in the consideration of all who shall become acquainted with your situation, and with the circumstances of the trials, and that they will ever, for the sake of their own personal safety, if they cannot be restrained by any other consideration, be induced to abstain from those evil combinations and confederacies which have brought you into the melancholy situation in which you now stand. The intention to assassinate has been now avowed by some of you; an intention to which, all that we had ever heard of, before we became acquainted with your case, bears no comparison. That individuals, laying aside the national character, should meet and assemble to destroy the lives, in cold blood, of fifteen persons unknown to them, except by public character, is without example in the history of this country, and I hope will remain without a parallel in future times.

It now only remains for me to pass upon you the awful judgment of the law; but before I do so, let me exhort you to employ the time that may yet be left to you, in endeavouring to obtain mercy from that Almighty Power whom you have so deeply offended; the mercy of Heaven may be obtained by all who will duly seek it; but it must be sought in penitence and in prayer, sorrow for your crime, and prayer to the Almighty for mercy, through the merits of our Redeemer. Whether the exhortation that I have offered to you will be by you received and acted upon, it is not for me to say; but I again, once more, solemnly intreat you not to suffer your eternal happiness to be lost by a perseverance in that hardness of heart which too many of you have exhibited even in this place at this time. Repent, I exhort you-repent, and obtain the mercy of that God whom you have offended. The judgment of the law is, that you, and each of you, be taken from hence to the gaol from whence you came, and that you be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution, and there be hanged by the neck until you be dead; and that afterwards your heads be severed from your bodies, and your bodies divided into four quarters, be disposed of as his majesty shall direct, and may the God of mercy have mercy upon your souls!

Tidd. The irons I have got on are so heavy, that I cannot step; my legs are very tender, they have been very bad for some time.

the keeper of Newgate will do every thing in Lord Chief Justice Abbott.-I have no doubt his power to contribute to your ease, so far as it can be done with safety.

Mr. Attorney General.-My lord, an order was made three days ago, directing Mr.

and conclusion of the trial of John Thomas * See the proceedings at the commencement

Brunt supra.

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[The affidavit of Elijah Litchfield was read, stating, that he had, on the 26th instant, served the order of this Court above referred to, upon William Innell Clement, by delivering it to a servant of Clement, at the house of Clement, No. 169, in the Strand, at the same time showing to the servant the original order.

The order was read, directing William Innell Clement, the printer, publisher, and proprietor of a certain newspaper, called the Observer, to attend this Court this morning at the hour of nine precisely, to answer for unlawfully and contemptuously printing and publishing in the said newspaper, the trials. of Arthur Thistlewood and James Ings, for high treason, pending the proceedings against John Thomas Brunt and others, who were included in the same indictment with the said Arthur Thistlewood and James Ings, for the same high treasons, contrary to the order of this Court and to the obstruction of public justice.]

Mr. Attorney General.-My lord, I have also an affidavit, which will satisfy your lordship of the extent of this publication; an affidavit of the register of newspapers in the Stamp-office, and also another person, that on the 15th day of April instant, there were supplied at the Stamp-office, for the use of the Observer-newspaper, published by William Innell Clement, of No. 169, Strand, in the said county of Middlesex, fifteen thousand stamps; and on the 21st instant, three thousand stamps, for the same paper; and on the 26th instant, five thousand stamps for the same paper, making a total of twenty-three thousand. The other deponent then states, that he has for the last six months supplied ten thousand stamps every week for the said Observernewspaper; so that it appears that during the last week, in consequence of the publication of these trials, they had stamps to the extent of twenty-three thousand. This Sunday newspaper was published in a double sheet, one sheet containing the trial of Thistlewood, and the greater part of the other occupied by the trial of Ings; and in this very paper, as I have stated to the Court, there is a notice given by the lord chief justice on the first day, on the commencement of the trial, interdicting the publication of these trials, so that this person has knowingly published this against the express injunction of the Court.

Lord Chief Justice Abbott.-Is the newspaper a weekly paper?

Mr. Attorney General. - Yes, my lord; the who purchased it, who was a newsman, was a price paid for the two sheets by the person shilling; the price paid by the public is sevenpence for each sheet.

It will be in the recollection of your lordship, that at the request of the prisoner's coundesired to withdraw from the court, in order sel, the witnesses for the prosecution were that they might not be apprised of what was passing during the examination of others; and undoubtedly your lordship's order was intended more for the benefit of the prisoners than otherwise, that the subsequent juries might come, with as little knowledge as possible of what had passed, to the consideration of the cases they were to try.

Lord Chief Justice Abbott.-No person can has been complained of, manifestly tended to rationally doubt that the publication which obstruct the course of public justice; it is extremely desirable that all the gentlemen who may be assembled as jurymen to serve on any trial should come with minds as little influenced as possible by any thing that may have taken place on any former trial. It was requested by the learned counsel for the prisoners, that the witnesses to be examined on the part of the Crown at the first trial should be examined separately, that no one should know what another had said; but by the publication of what had been said on any one of the trials, the persons summoned as witnesses were enabled to obtain that knowledge previously to a future trial, which it was the proper desire of those who were intrusted with the interests of the prisoners to prevent their obtaining. The mischievous tendency of such publications cannot, as I have already said, be doubted by any mind; the Court thought it right before the first trial was begun, to express in the strongest terms its opinion as to the impropriety of any such publication, and to admonish those who were concerned in the publication of the daily or weekly papers to abstain from such insertion; to that admonition it seems the editors and publishers of all the daily papers, and, as far as I am informed, of all the weekly papers, yielded a due and respectful obedience, with the exception of the single person whose case has been brought before us; that person, therefore, must have been led to this by a desire of gaining to himself extraordinary profits, by becoming the first who was to gratify the public curiosity, by the publication of these trials-a desire to engross the whole of the profit to himself, in contempt of the admonition of the Court, in contempt of the general rules and principles of law, and to the prejudice of all persons concerned in the public newspapers, who had, as I observed before, yielded obedience to the law and to the admonition of the Court. Being called upon now by an order of this

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