Part 1 (1/2)

Trial of Mary Blandy.

Edited by William Roughead.

PREFACE

In undertaking to prepare an account of this celebrated trial, the Editor at the outset fondly trusted that the conviction of ”the unfortunate Miss Blandy” might, upon due inquiry, be found to have been, as the phrase is, a miscarriage of justice. To the entertainment of this chivalrous if unlively hope he was moved as well by the youth, the s.e.x, and the traditional charms of that lady, as by the doubts expressed by divers wiseacres concerning her guilt; but a more intimate knowledge of the facts upon which the adverse verdict rested, speedily disposed of his inconfident expectation.

Though the evidence sheds but a partial light upon the hidden springs of the dark business in which she was engaged, and much that should be known in order perfectly to appreciate her symbolic value remains obscure, we can rest a.s.sured that Mary Blandy, whatever she may have been, was no victim of judicial error. We watch, perforce, the tragedy from the front; never, despite the excellence of the official ”book,”

do we get a glimpse of what is going on behind the scenes, nor see beneath the immobile and formal mask, the living face; but, when the spectacle of _The Fair Parricide_ is over, we at least are satisfied that justice, legal and poetic, has been done.

Few cases in our criminal annals have occasioned a literature so extensive. The bibliography, compiled by Mr. Horace Bleackley in connection with his striking study, ”The Love Philtre” (_Some Distinguished Victims of the Scaffold_, London, 1905),--which, by his courteous permission, is reprinted in the Appendix, enumerates no fewer than thirty contemporary tracts, while the references to the case by later writers would of themselves form a considerable list.

To this substantial cairn a further stone or two are here contributed.

There will be found in the Appendix copies of original MSS. in the British Museum and the Public Record Office, not hitherto published, relating to the case. These comprise the correspondence of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, Mr. Secretary Newcastle, the Solicitor to the Treasury, and other Government officials, regarding the conduct of the prosecution and the steps taken for the apprehension of Miss Blandy's accomplice, the Hon. William Henry Cranstoun; a pet.i.tion of ”The n.o.blemen and Gentlemen in the Neighbourhood of Henley-upon-Thames” as to the issuing of a proclamation for his arrest, with the opinion thereon of the Attorney-General, Sir Dudley Ryder; and the deposition of the person by whose means Cranstoun's flight from justice was successfully effected. This deposition is important as disclosing the true story of his escape, of which the published accounts are, as appears, erroneous. Among other matter now printed for the first time may be mentioned a letter from the War Office to the Paymaster-General, directing Cranstoun's name to be struck off the half-pay list; and a letter from John Riddell, the Scots genealogist, to James Maidment, giving some account of the descendants of Cranstoun. For permission to publish these doc.u.ments the Editor is indebted to the courtesy of Mr.

A.M. Broadley and Mr. John A. Fairley, the respective owners.

The iconography of Mary Blandy has been made a feature of the present volume, all the portraits of her known to the Editor being reproduced.

A description of the curious satirical print, ”The Scotch Triumvirate,”

will be found in the Appendix.

Of special interest is the facsimile of Miss Blandy's last letter to Captain Cranstoun, of which the interception, like that of Mrs.

Maybrick's letter to Brierley, was fraught with such fateful consequences. The photograph is taken from the original letter in the Record Office, where the papers connected with the memorable a.s.sizes in question have but recently been lodged.

For the account of the case contained in the Introduction, the Editor has read practically all the contemporaneous pamphlets--a tedious and often fruitless task--and has consulted such other sources of information as are now available. He has, however, thought well (esteeming the comfort of his readers above his own reputation for research) to present the product as a plain narrative, unenc.u.mbered by the frequent footnotes which citation of so many authorities would otherwise require--the rather that any references not furnished by the bibliography are sufficiently indicated in the text.

Finally, the Editor would express his grat.i.tude to Mr. Horace Bleackley and Mr. A.M. Broadley for their kindness in affording him access to their collections of _Blandyana_, including rarities (to quote an old t.i.tle-page) ”nowhere to be found but in the Closets of the Curious,”

greatly to the lightening of his labours and the enrichment of the result.

W.R.

8 OXFORD TERRACE, EDINBURGH, April, 1914.

INTRODUCTION.

In the earlier half of the eighteenth century there lived in the pleasant town of Henley-upon-Thames, in Oxfords.h.i.+re, one Francis Blandy, gentleman, attorney-at-law. His wife, nee Mary Stevens, sister to Mr. Serjeant Stevens of Culham Court, Henley, and of Doctors' Commons, a lady described as ”an emblem of chast.i.ty and virtue; graceful in person, in mind elevated,” had, it was thought, transmitted these amiable qualities to the only child of the marriage, a daughter Mary, baptised in the parish church of Henley on 15th July, 1720. Mr. Blandy, as a man of old family and a busy and prosperous pract.i.tioner, had become a person of some importance in the county. His professional skill was much appreciated by a large circle of clients, he acted as steward for most of the neighbouring gentry, and he had held efficiently for many years the office of town-clerk.

But above the public respect which his performance of these varied duties had secured him, Mr. Blandy prized his reputation as a man of wealth. The legend had grown with his practice and kept pace with his social advancement. The Blandys' door was open to all; their table, ”whether filled with company or not, was every day plenteously supplied”; and a profuse if somewhat ostentatious hospitality was the ”note” of the house, a comfortable mansion on the London road, close to Henley Bridge. Burn, in his _History of Henley_, describes it as ”an old-fas.h.i.+oned house near the White Hart, represented in the view of the town facing the t.i.tle-page” of his volume, and ”now [1861] rebuilt.” The White Hart still survives in Hart Street, with its courtyard and gallery, where of yore the town's folk were wont to watch the bear-baiting; one of those fine old country inns which one naturally a.s.sociates with Pickwickian adventure.

In such surroundings the little Mary, idolised by her parents and spoiled by their disinterested guests, pa.s.sed her girlhood. She is said to have been a clever, intelligent child, and of ways so winning as to ”rapture” all with whom she came in contact. She was educated at home by her mother, who ”instructed her in the principles of religion and piety, according to the rites and ceremonies of the Church of England.” To what extent she benefited by the good dame's teaching will appear later, but at any rate she was fond of reading--a taste sufficiently remarkable in a girl of her day. At fourteen, we learn, she was mistress of those accomplishments which others of like station and opportunities rarely achieve until they are twenty, ”if at all”; but her biographers, while exhausting their superlatives on her moral beauties, are significantly silent regarding her physical attractions. Like many a contemporary ”toast,” she had suffered the indignity of the smallpox; yet her figure was fine, and her brilliant black eyes and abundant hair redeemed a face otherwise rather ordinary. When to such mental gifts and charm of manner was added the prospect of a dower of ten thousand pounds--such was the figure at which public opinion put it, and her father did not deny that gossip for once spoke true--little wonder that Mary was considered a ”catch” as well by the ”smarts” of the place as by the military gentlemen who at that time were the high ornaments of Henley society.

Mr. Blandy, business-like in all things, wanted full value for his money; as none of Mary's local conquests appeared to promise him an adequate return, he reluctantly quitted the pen and, with his wife and daughter, spent a season at Bath, then the great market-place of matrimonial bargains. ”As for Bath,” Thackeray writes of this period, ”all history went and bathed and drank there. George II. and his Queen, Prince Frederick and his Court, scarce a character one can mention of the early last century but was seen in that famous Pump Room, where Beau Nash presided, and his picture hung between the busts of Newton and Pope.” Here was famous company indeed for an ambitious little country attorney to rub shoulders with in his hunt for a son-in-law. It is claimed for Miss Blandy by one of her biographers that her vivacity, wit, and good nature were such as to win for her an immediate social success; and she entered into all the gaieties of the season with a heart unburdened by the ”business”

which her father sought to combine with pleasures so expensive. She is even said to have had the honour of dancing with the Prince of Wales. Meanwhile, the old gentleman, appearing ”genteel in dress”

and keeping a plentiful table, lay in wait for such eligible visitors as should enter his parlour.

The first to do so with matrimonial intent was a thriving young apothecary, but Mr. Blandy quickly made it plain that Mary and her 10,000 were not to be had by any drug-compounding knave who might make sheep's eyes at her, and the apothecary returned to his gallipots for healing of his bruised affections. His place was taken by Mr. H----, a gentleman grateful to the young lady and personally desirable, but of means too limited to satisfy her parents' views, a fact conveyed by them to the wooer ”in a friendly and elegant manner,” which must have gone far to a.s.suage his disappointment. The next suitor for ”this blooming virgin,” as her biographer names her, had the recommendation of being a soldier. Mr. T----, too, found favour with the damsel. His fine address was much appreciated by her mamma, who, being a devotee of fas.h.i.+on, heartily espoused his cause; but again the course of true love was barred by the question of settlements as broached by the old lawyer, and the man of war ”retired with some resentment.” There was, however, no lack of candidates for Mary's hand and dower. Captain D---- at once stepped into the breach and gallantly laid siege to the fair fortress. At last, it seemed Cupid's troublesome business was done; the captain's suit was agreeable to all parties, and the couple became engaged.

Mary's walks with her lover in the fields of Henley gave her, we read, such exquisite delight that she frequently thought herself in heaven. But, alas, the stern summons of duty broke in upon her temporary Eden: the captain was ordered abroad with his regiment on active service, and the unlucky girl could but sit at home with her parents and patiently abide the issue.

Among Mr. Blandy's grand acquaintances was General Lord Mark Kerr, uncle of Lady Jane Douglas, the famous heroine of the great Douglas Cause. His lords.h.i.+p had taken at Henley a place named ”The Paradise,” probably through the agency of the obsequious attorney, whose family appear to have had the _entree_ to that patrician abode. Dining with her parents at Lord Mark's house in the summer of 1746, Mary Blandy encountered her fate. That fate from the first bore but a sinister aspect. Among the guests was one Captain the Hon. William Henry Cranstoun, a soldier and a Scot, whose appearance, according to a diurnal writer, was unprepossessing. ”In his person he is remarkably ordinary, his stature is low, his face freckled and pitted with the smallpox, his eyes small and weak, his eyebrows sandy, and his shape no ways genteel; his legs are clumsy, and he has nothing in the least elegant in his manner.” The moral attributes of this ugly little fellow were only less attractive than his physical imperfections. ”He has a turn for gallantry, but Nature has denied him the proper gifts; he is fond of play, but his cunning always renders him suspected.” He was at this time thirty-two years of age, and, as the phrase goes, a man of pleasure, but his militant prowess had hitherto been more conspicuous in the courts of Venus than in the field of Mars. The man was typical of his day and generation: should you desire his closer acquaintance you will find a lively sketch of him in _Joseph Andrews_, under the name of Beau Didapper.

If Mary was the Eve of this Henley ”Paradise,” the captain clearly possessed many characteristics of the serpent. As First-Lieutenant of Sir Andrew Agnew's regiment of marines, he had been ”out”--on the wrong side, for a Scot--in the '45, and the butcher c.u.mberland having finally killed the cause at Culloden on 16th April, this warrior was now in Henley beating up recruits to fill the vacancies in the Hanoverian lines caused by the valour of the ”rebels.” Such a figure was a commonplace of the time, and Mr. Blandy would not have looked twice at him but for the fact that it appeared Lord Mark was his grand-uncle. The old lawyer, following up this aristocratic scent, found to his surprise and joy that the little lieutenant, with his courtesy style of captain, was no less a person than the fifth son of a Scots peer, William, fifth Lord Cranstoun, and his wife, Lady Jane Kerr, eldest daughter of William, second Marquis of Lothian. True, he learned the n.o.ble union had been blessed with seven sons and five daughters; my Lord Cranstoun had died in 1727, and his eldest son, James, reigned in his stead. The captain, a very much ”younger” son, probably had little more than his pay and a fine a.s.sortment of debts; still, one cannot have everything. The rights of absent Captain D---- were forgotten, now that there was a chance to marry his daughter to a man who called the daughter of an Earl grandmother, and could claim kins.h.i.+p with half the aristocracy of Scotland; and Mr. Blandy frowned as he called to mind the presumption of the Bath apothecary.