The Jacobite Murders

by G. M. Best

  ‘What the devil is the meaning of all this?’ gasped the battered occupier of the room.

  ‘Villain! You have debauched my daughter and got her into bed with you!’

  ‘My wife is no daughter to you, sir!’ declared the husband and, turning to Partridge, he shouted angrily, ‘This man’s a madman!’

  At that moment Westbrook spotted the lady in question and was confounded to see that she was indeed not his daughter. The enormity of his mistake came rushing upon him and his anger dissipated as rapidly as it had erupted. He knew not what to say in his embarrassment.

  ‘I assure you, landlord, I am not this man’s daughter,’ sobbed the distraught woman.

  ‘I thought this was a respectable inn,’ said her injured husband, looking furiously at Partridge. ‘Instead I find you harbour a man intent on robbing or murdering us! This is worse than a bawdy-house, sir!’

  ‘I apologize, sir, but this madman more or less forced his way into my inn demanding his daughter.’

  ‘And I was wrong, sir,’ added Westbrook, finally finding voice to apologize. ‘In my haste to find my daughter I mistook the situation.’

  This did nothing to appease the man who had been attacked. ‘If you fear that your daughter is with a man, sir, then all I can say is that you come from a family of little honour and I suggest you leave us at once. Landlord, I want your assurance that we will go unmolested for the rest of the night. As for any bill in the morning, you can go hang!’

  ‘Aye, that goes for me too,’ said the occupier of the next room icily, mopping some blood from a cut lip with the sleeve of his shirt.

  Partridge made what excuses he could and escorted a humbled Westbrook downstairs. ‘May I suggest that I provide you with a room and bring you a meal. We have some excellent mutton pie and I will select a bottle of my best wine. You can do no more today because night has already fallen. I think whatever information you were given was falsely given because your daughter is certainly not here. I suggest an early night and then you can return first thing in the morning to Bath and discover where she has really gone.’

  Confused and embarrassed, Sophia’s humbled father readily acceded to this request. The emotion of the day and the journey he had undertaken had combined with the fight to leave him utterly exhausted. He promised that he would compensate the landlord for his losses and for any damage he had inadvertently caused before he left in the morning to resume his search. Partridge expressed his thanks and then, having issued orders for a meal to be prepared, took Westbrook to the guest room that was furthest away from the one in which he had placed Sophia. Once he was sure that Westbrook was not going to re-emerge, he ran over to her room and sought admittance. She had heard the noise of the fight and recognized the unmistakable sound of her father’s angry voice so she and Mrs Newton were already dressed and ready to depart.

  ‘I beseech you, sir, if you have any compassion, please do not betray my presence here!’ she begged.

  ‘I never betrayed anyone in my life and I will not commence now. Having seen the unreasonable nature of the man my only surprise is that you have not run away long before this! I suggest that you stay hidden in this room until your father is gone.’

  ‘Your advice may be sound but I dare not risk it. He might resume his search here in the morning. It is a clear moonlight night so there is light enough for us to see as we walk until we can find some alternative accommodation. Just set us on the right road and Mrs Newton and I will make our escape long before my father rises.’

  ‘What you suggest is a most dangerous course of action. Outside it is bitterly cold and there is no guarantee that you will find somewhere to stay. Should the sky cloud over you would be quickly lost in the dark.’

  ‘I would rather risk that than be caught by my father in the morning,’ replied Sophia.

  ‘I insist, Miss Westbrook, that you do not attempt to walk outside. It is sheer folly. You will appreciate that I cannot leave this establishment unattended for too long, not least in case your father makes a reappearance downstairs once he has slept off his initial weariness, but I will try and take you in my cart as far as Wotton under Edge tonight. Gloucester is about another twenty-five miles or so beyond that. With luck you can be there the day after tomorrow and there is a regular coach from there that will take you to London.’

  Sophia burst into tears as she conveyed her gratitude at Partridge’s kindness. He was as good as his word. Once he had prepared his cart, the two women climbed aboard and he covered them with as many blankets as he could to protect them from the ice-cold night air. Then he drove northwards. However, the pace at which they could travel was very slow because the road was badly potholed. Partridge had to take extra care in the limited light provided by the moon not to overturn their means of transport. After they had been travelling for a couple of hours he reluctantly pulled his cart to a stop at a fork in the road.

  ‘What is wrong?’ asked Sophia, sticking her head out of the blankets.

  He pointed to the clouds that were beginning to appear in the sky. ‘I think they will bring rain before the night is much older and, before that happens, they will block out all the moonlight, then I will not be able to drive this cart. It is imperative that I turn back now if I am to get back to Old Sodbury this night. I told Polly, my serving girl, to say that I have gone to visit a neighbour should your father leave his room and ask for me, but that story will not hold if I do not return. He will then know that I have been helping you and your chances of escaping him will be very poor. Though it pains me to say it, I think it therefore wiser for you to walk the rest of the way so I can instantly set about the return journey. I can assure you that it is not much further from this fork to Wotton under Edge.’

  Sophia and Mrs Newton understood his reasoning and clambered out of the cart. Sophia thanked him profusely and he, not without a heavy heart, turned around and, with a wave and prayer for their safety, set off back where they had come from. The two women, each still with a blanket over her clothes, watched till the cart disappeared round a bend and then set out on foot. In silence they walked for about half an hour, acutely aware that the cold night air was increasingly seeping into their bodies. Suddenly they became aware of a low moaning sound and there sprang up a sudden wind, which blew keen and hard. This was soon accompanied by the fall of raindrops that increased in size and quantity with every passing second.

  ‘Madam, this is sheer madness,’ complained Mrs Newton, trying hard not to shiver uncontrollably as the increasingly heavy rain began to soak through her clothes. ‘I am already almost frozen to death and I fear that I will lose a piece of my nose unless we find a place to stay.’

  At that instant the clouds covered the moon and the resulting darkness was so dense that neither woman could see a hand in front of her. Fortunately Mrs Newton espied a glimmering light through the trees ahead and began stumbling towards it, crying out, ‘I think Heaven has heard my prayers and brought us to a house. Come this way before we are wet through entirely.’

  ‘We cannot just knock at any strange door at this hour of the night!’ shouted back her mistress.

  ‘We can when the alternative is to die in this sudden storm. I beseech you not to despise the goodness of Providence. If the owners of this house are Christians, they will not refuse entry to people in our miserable condition.’

  Such was her weariness that Sophia surrendered to her maid’s entreaty and also approached the place whence the light issued. With each step nearer to the house their tired spirits rose. However, when they reached its porch and knocked loudly and repeatedly on its door, no one appeared. ‘O lud, have mercy on us! Surely the people must all be dead,’ sighed Mrs Newton, all hopes of rescue fleeing from her mind.

  ‘Do not be so foolish. It must be nearing midnight. They have long gone to bed and I dare say they are understandably fearful of opening their door to strangers at such an ungodly hour.’

  As if to prove the truth of this, a casement window was opened above them
and a small, thin old woman stuck out her head, exposing a lined and wrinkled face that revealed a mix of fear and curiosity. ‘Who’s there? What do ye want?’ she shouted.

  ‘We have missed our way in the dark and require a bed for what remains of this night else we will perish in the cold,’ replied Sophia with a slight tremor of her lips.

  ‘I’ll have no whores in this house!’ the old woman said waspishly, shaking her fist at them.

  ‘I’ll have you know that my mistress is a woman of quality,’ remonstrated Mrs Newton in an injured tone.

  ‘I am surprised then to see sich a person journeying on foot at this time of night. Even a dog lies quiet by the fireside in freezing weather like this! How do ye come to be here at this hour?’

  In response Mrs Newton began to feign that she was crying. ‘Please help us,’ she sobbed. ‘We should have got to the inn where we were staying before it got dark but our escort somehow lost the way. After travelling in what direction I know not my mistress’s horse stumbled and threw her. I got off mine to assist her and, while I was attending her, both our mounts took fright and fled. Our escort rode after them but he did not return. We waited and waited till it got dark and then we realized that we had probably been deceived. The man must have deliberately got us lost in order that he could later seize the moment to steal our horses.’ Mrs Newton paused in her inventive tale in order to wail even more loudly. ‘We’ve been reduced to walking in circles for many hours and are now so lost that we’ve no idea where we are.’

  Sophia was rather taken aback by her maid’s version of events but she squeezed her arm in gratitude for her quick thinking. She had the sense to add on her own accord, ‘We are both exhausted and will die if we do not find shelter. Please help us. I will give you half a crown if you give us shelter for what remains of this night.’

  Whether motivated by pity, curiosity or greed, the old woman signified her assent and shortly afterwards they heard her unbolting the door to give them entry. Clutching a worn but clean gown around her, the old woman looked out warily at her unexpected visitors and was at once shocked to see the extent of their sodden and frozen condition. Her natural kindness immediately asserted itself. ‘Come in, come in,’ she urged. ‘Come sit by the fire at once and take off yer wet clothes so that I can hang ’em to dry or else ye will catch yer death of cold. Dear me, what ye must have been through! I’ll bring ye some warm blankets from upstairs and I’ll make ye something hot to drink. Then, once ye have warmed up, I suggest ye both get as much sleep as ye can. Ye both look exhausted.’

  The house proved to be modest and plain in its furnishings but very neat and tidy. The old woman quickly put some fresh wood on the embers of the fire in the hearth and beckoned them to sit on the oaken settle that stood nearby. Within a very short while both Sophia and Mrs Newton looked like two embalmed figures so snugly were they wrapped up in front of the flickering fire. As they felt the warmth slowly returning to their hands and feet, they became aware of just how tired they were. However, before they fell asleep Sophia insisted on informing her hostess of how vital it was that they should make their way towards Gloucester the next day. The old woman replied, ‘Set yer mind at rest, m’lady. When me son arrives here tomorrow morning I will ask him to take ye in his cart to Stroud and from there ye can hire fresh transport. Now go to sleep and may God’s angels watch over ye.’

  The next morning the old woman’s son turned out to be a deep-chested, broad-shouldered man named Peter. His face was dominated by his large eyes and bushy eyebrows, a hawkish nose and a firm-set jaw. He was a man of very few words but whenever he did speak, he tended to wave about his long arms, which made them very conscious of his unusually large hands. Though not prepossessing in appearance, he had an air of honesty about him that helped reconcile Sophia, though not Mrs Newton, to the discomfort of his vehicle as they travelled the twelve miles to Stroud. It did not help matters that many sections of the road they took had been reduced to a quagmire by the heavy rain that had fallen throughout the remainder of the night. Sometimes this made the cart slide and more than once they thought it was going to overturn into a ditch. More frequently the wheels got stuck in the mud and on such occasions both women had to clamber out in order to lighten the load. Even then it usually took the strength of all three of them to haul the cart back onto firmer ground. As a consequence the state of their clothes got progressively worse.

  The journey was particularly hard on Sophia who was not used to labour of any kind, but she bore it all uncomplainingly. The same could not be said for Mrs Newton, who periodically gave voice to the stupidity of the journey they were undertaking. After they had been travelling for a couple of hours, Sophia decided that it might be a good idea to see if the old woman’s son could tell her anything about the Methodist movement that Jenny Jones had joined. All she knew about Methodists was that her vicar hated them and chose to repeatedly condemn their horrid enthusiasm. He had often lambasted the preaching of one of their leaders, a Gloucester-born clergyman called George Whitefield. ‘Do you know anything of a Mr Whitefield?’ she enquired of Peter. ‘Or about the Methodists?’

  ‘Aye, ma’am, I’ve met Mr Whitefield and I knows a few who call ’emselves Methodist.’

  ‘I have heard that he is a fanatic and that all his followers are caught up in a strange madness. Is that true?’

  ‘There are them, ma’am, as would say a person has to be afflicted with madness to want to spend part of each day praying and reading the scriptures when attending church once a week is sufficient for even most clergy.’

  ‘And is that all these Methodists want to do? Surely they must be doing other things than praying and reading to have brought on themselves such frequent condemnation?’

  ‘Methodists are condemned round ’ere because they dare to preach in the open to those who nivver enter a church and who know nothing of God.’

  Sophia adjusted where she was sitting to try and reduce the jolting that arose from the cart passing over a particularly bad stretch of road. ‘That hardly seems enough to condemn them unless what is preached is seditious nonsense.’

  ‘I speak as I do find, miss, and I tell ye that I’ve heard Mr Whitefield preach a number of times and, if ever a man speaks like an angel, he does. These Methodists go out of their way to ’elp the poor and those who’re sick. The clergy say their behaviour is madness but, if ’tis, then I confess ’tis a condition I wish more shared.’

  Sophia appreciated that this was quite a speech for the usually silent man. ‘I begin to believe that it is wrong that these Methodists should be so vilified. Who do you think I should speak to if I want to find a woman who has joined them and who is now in London? Her name is Jenny Jones.’

  ‘I know nothing of ’er or London but I tell ye that finding her will depend on which group of Methodists she’s with. Some still look to Mr Whitefield, but others now follow Mr John Wesley and his brother, Mr Charles Wesley.’

  ‘And why is that?’

  ‘I’ve not had the schooling to follow their arguments, miss. All I know is that Mr Whitefield thinks most of us are headed for damnation, whilst the Wesleys preach God’s salvation is for all who are prepared to accept it.’

  ‘Then I think I prefer what the Wesleys have to say. Where can I find these men?’

  He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I dunna know, miss. Like Mr Whitefield they travel the country encouraging the creation of religious societies.’

  ‘If yer ask me,’ interrupted Mrs Newton, lifting her head and pushing back a stray hair, ‘those societies are just a cover for promoting political discontent. The lot of ’em are probably secret Jacobites!’

  The cart fell silent and Sophia’s thoughts turned increasingly to how her injured lover might be faring. She wondered whether Tom knew that she had fled for his sake or whether that was being kept from him. Her reverie was broken only by their arrival at the cloth-making town of Stroud. The place had little to commend it, but she was grateful to be able to purchase new clot
hes for herself and her maid after the rigours of two days of travelling. Once this was done their driver drove up a steep hill to a coaching inn called the Bear of Rodborough, which stood on land overlooking the town. Sophia thanked him profusely for his assistance and handed over some coins in generous payment. Within a very short time of his departure, she and Mrs Newton had managed to find not only a room for themselves at the inn but also had paid to be transported to Gloucester the next day.

  Both women welcomed the opportunity to wash and change into their new clothes and then to enjoy a proper rest after the exertions of the day. The previous night Sophia had been first too frightened that her father might capture her and then too exhausted to think much about what condition her lover might be in, but now, as she relaxed, her thoughts turned increasingly to how Tom Jones was lying injured in the house in Queen Square. She wondered whether he knew what she was enduring for his sake or whether that information was being kept from him. Did he think that her failure to visit him stemmed from her new position as the bride to be of John Burnett? The very thought brought tears to her eyes. That night, lying in bed her last thought before going to sleep was a fervent prayer: ‘May God ensure your speedy recovery, my dearest love, and may I not rest until I have found out whose son you really are and hopefully proved you are not an unworthy match for my hand!’