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iMUMG JJ£€1I ZOTTO mh Mim
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AFOPPISHLY-DRESSED young fellow with a
baby-face sauntered into the Golden Lion tavern near
Hyde Park one spring morning of 1774 and called for
drinks all round. 1 wo bow btreet
runners — 18th century version of
the London "bobby" — coughed
self-consciously and made as if to
move on. As they had only recently arrested the dandy on .
a charge of highway robbery, which had fallen through for
lack of evidence, they doubted their welcome. The dude '
highwayman, however, was not one to bear a grudge over a i
non-suit.
44 A PINT of mild and bitters for
" the law, too," he shouted,
clapping the thief-takers over the
shoulders. "May it always have
such efficient guardians," he add
ed, with an ironic grin.
"And one for the beadle, too,"
said the expansive dandy, as that
portly worthy breasted the bar
for his pre-lunch appetiser. "If
he were fleeter instead of fatter
I'd have no boodle."
The three men took their chid
ing in good part. "Next time,
Jack, we'll get you," they said,
topping off their tankards with
gusto.
And next time they did. They
also topped the jester off — at Ty
burn.
"Sixteen-String" Jack Rann, as
the man of fashion was known,
was "an impudent and self-cre
ated gentleman" who was re
nowned on the road for his finery
He became' famous indeed, as the
"dandelion of the highroad,"
though he was somewhat more
po'sonous than his emblem.
He was very much the exhibi
tionist, boasting publicly of his
profession. Once when he lost a
100-guinea ring during a scuffle,
he announced that an evening's
work would reimburse him.
On another occasion, he flam
boyantly pushed his way through
the milling crowd at a Tyburn
execution, shouting: "Perhaps it
Is very proper that I should be a
spectator on this
occasion."
Once, when
being chased by
Bow Street run
ners, he startled
the Tottenham
Court Road toll-,
keeper by pac
ing his mount
out of the shad
ows, uinounc-
ing that he was
a fugitive from
justice and that
he -/as "Six
teen - String
Jack, the fam-
o -i s highway-
ir. a."
Tith that
lit ie bit of ex-
hibitionism off his chest, he told
.the turnpike man to inform the
, runners they were too late to
cr ch him and galloped into the
n 'it.
t was the joy of his life to
m fools out of the runners or
"s'Uy decrepit old Charlies." And
for three years he succeeded.
His reign as fashion arbiter for
the highwaymen was short but
eventful and even earned him a
backhanded compliment from
that ponderous wit of the coffee
houses, Dr. Samuel Johnson.
In epitaphing one of his de
ported poet-friends, the doctor
described him as towering as
much "above the ordinary run of
versifiers as Sixteen-String Jack
above the ordinary footpad."
"''hat offended Jack to some ex
tent, and he indignantly denied
that he had ever been a footpad
or would ever sink so low. Foot
pads he regarded as sartorial
"ragbags."
There were no gaily-fluttering
strings attached to John Rann
when he was born "of .poor but
industrious parents" in a village
a few miles from the fashionable
watering place of Bath. As a boy
he peddled fruit from a donkey-
The denizens of Bath liked his
fresh-faced countenance, how
ever, and one of the idle rich
"taking the waters at the spa"
decided she could do with him as
a footman. In that way, young
Jack got a foot in society.
It was to prove his undoing, for
he soon conceived grandiose ideas
of living above his station.
As his mistress's favorite, he
was taken to London, and was
soon broadening his outlook as a
stableman at Brooke's Mews.
From there he graduated from the
ranks as a liveried postilion, to
officer's batman, and finally to
post-chaise driver to the Earl of
Sandwich. .
Savile Row knew this upstart
postilion as a young fellow "par
ticularly neat in his dress," which
was distinguished by two dandy
features — sixteen silk string# at
tached to the knees of his
breeches and a "remarkable"
button-crowned hat with strings.
That was how he got his nick
name of "Sixteen-String Jack,"
which he also adopted as his
highway nom-de-plume, cultivat-
. ing the rumor that each string
represented an unsuccessful at
tempt to prosecute him.
He sported, in particular, flow
ered-satin waistcoats and full-
skirted, elaborately - embroidered
damask coats of silk, in which "he
played very Cupid with the girls."
Jack soon found that his wages
were insufficient for his expensive
tastes in good clothes- and ques
tionable women.
He tried to make a little money
on the side. Heavy losses at the
gambling-tables convinced him
that card-sharping was not his
forte, and he had to fall back on
petty larceny and pocket-picking,
the classical apprenticeship to
highway robbery.
Caught consorting with a gang
of three other cutpurses, Jack
Rann lost his job. He did not
care, for picking pockets, he
found, was an easier method of
paying for his finery.
He was soon so expert that the
gang made him their leader. The
youngest' member, a mere boy
named Colledge, in a fit of hero-
worship called
himself "Eight-
String Jack."
Drifting "by
easy stages" in
to the society of
highway-
men and re
ceivers, Jack
Ranr abandon
ed petty pilfer
ing for a more
"heroic" career
on the High
Toby. "He was
cut out for the
road," it was
written, "a n d
he soon equip
ped himself with
a horse, a brace
of pistols, a
crepe mask," and an even finer
suit of clothes.
His first job — holding up a post-
chaise on Hounslow Heath in late
1772— rwas nearly his last. Be
cause of his finery, the Bow Street
runners tracked him down, but
conflicting evidence nonsuited the
case.
That made him cheeky, and he
boasted publicly of the easy
money he was making. With
other criminals such boasting was
the quickest way to Tyburn.
Sixteen-String Jack appeared
to have a charmed life, however.
It may be he was popular with
the Bow Street Runners, bribed
them off, or was just plain lucky.
Many times he appeared in court,
only to be discharged because of
conflicting evidence.
Some of the luck was due to
his shrewdness in avoiding per-
sonal contact with the fences who
bought his loot. His stolen goods
passed through many hands,
during which the authorities lost
trace of it.
Moving in this intermediate
circle between the robbers and
the receivers was a beautiful but
fallen girl named Ellen Roche. A
former respectable milliner, she
took the downward path after be
ing heartlessly seduced by an of
ficer of the Guards.
Sixteen-String Jack and Ellen
teamed up, and took lodgings to
gether. When highway robbery
fell off, Ellen became the bread
winner.
The happy combination nearly
crashed in April, 1774, when the
watch of a Mr. John Devall, who
had been robbed on Hounslow'
Heath, was pawned by one of
Ellen's girl friends.
She implicated both Ellen and
Jack, who were brought before
the celebrated "blind magistrate
of Bow Street." Sir John Fielding,
half-brother of the novelist.
Henry Fielding.
Ran was |
proud and de
fiant in the
dock, and
though in irons
wac cr.ill riresseil
to kill in blue satin bows, a fine
coat, and a nose ay "as large as
a birch-broom," besides his- six
teen strings. Even his fetters were
festooned with blue ribbons.
"I know no more of the matter
than you do — perhaps not half so
much," said Jack, with a shrewd
dig at certain snide business deal
ings that the magistrate was
known to carry on with crooks.
The finery, of course, was lost
on the blind magistrate, but not
the defiance.
Sir John Fielding rather under
standably bridled, and committed
the highwayman and his doxy for
trial.
At the Old Bailey the following
July Sixteen-String rode boldly
through the prosecution. Boast
ing of his prowess with women, he
claimed that Ellen's girl friend
had tried to "put them in"
through jealousy.
As the evidence was circum
stantial, the jury chose to believe
him. \
That night Ellen and her Don
juan made wnoopee at zasnion-
able Vauxhall Gardens. On the
way home her consort kept his
hand in by bailing up a carriage-
load of travellers and relieving
them of two watches and three
purses.
Not long after he was detected-
in another escapade — and this
time it was Ellen Roche's turn to
be jealous. For the Bow Street
runners caught him climbing
through , the window of a house
at midnight.
Arrested for house-breaking
and brought to trial before the
blind magistrate once again,
dandy Rann produced his draw-
card. The window he was climb-/
ing through happened to be a!
bedroom window, and the bed
room belonged to one Doll Framp-
ton, who was only too happy to
testify that he was a welcome vis
itor. So Sir John Fielding had
no option but to dismiss the
charge.
The authorities, having failed
either to catch or to frame Jack
Rann, tried to get him out of
the way by arresting him for debt
—an easy procedure, for he had
been off the road for several
months during his spate of court
cases and had run up many bills.
A tailor was swiftly found to pro-'
ceed against him.
The method was quite ineffec
tive, however, as his girl-friends
simply put around the hat and
in no time the "Release-Rann"
fund was oversubscribed.
On his release Rann called the ;
bailiff's men everything in the «
calendar. "When Sir John Field
ing's men come after me," he
complained bitterly, "they use .me
genteelly." /
They were so ashamed of being'
vulgarians that they lent him 5s
to shout the bar. It is not record-./
ed that they were ever refunded/
It was bravado that finally
caught up with Jack Rann. For
he made the mistake" of robbing
the notable Dr. William Bell
chaplain to Princess Amelia
daughter of the late unlamenteo
George II and sister to the reign- .
ing monarch, George III.
All Rann got for his efforts wa:
a miserable eighteenpence and i
presentation-watch, not over-
valuable but easily identified v
That was to bring him to th<
gallows.
He expected another acquittal /
and even ordered a slap-up din
ner to celebrate his release, bul-
things did not work out that way /
Instead he was hustled into th(
death-cell at Newgate. "Thus"
as- a chronicler somewhat biblic
ally put it "the supper went colc
and was not eaten."
Prison life, however, was not toe
strict and Jack
wen aheac
with anothei
bibulous cele
bration -— his
ffirAXirpll - Hinnoi
—to which he invited sever love
lies. Sweet Ellen was not among
them, being on her way to the
New England plantations for s
penal stretch of 14 years for help-'
ing him with his crimes. !
Even to the last, Sixteen-String
Jack kept up his sartorial. splenf
dor. |
On November 30, 1774, he rose,
clad himself in his best pea-greeif
coat and waistcoat, "unblemished'
white buckskin breeches and six' i
teen strings, to become "the most'
admir'd figure in the three-mile
journey from Newgate to Tyf
burn." . |v
Once at the triple tree he look'
ed quizzically at his seventeenth
string dangling from the cros.'
beam "as if it were an object
which he had long expected tr
see." -
He was duly turned off "with ad-
air and a jest" at the gay age or
24, and, "having hung the usual
time, his body was delivered over
to his friends for interment."
Imfi &jsTi !M \i ilaflwr
..The scene in an Old English pawn-. shop, where most of 1 6-String ; > ;; Jack's loot ultimately found its way ; ' through a string of intermediaries. | 'I One of these was his mistress, Ellen 3 ; Roche. ! Help
..The scene in an Old English pawn-.
shop, where most of 1 6-String ; >
;; Jack's loot ultimately found its way
; ' through a string of intermediaries. |
'I One of these was his mistress, Ellen 3 ;
Roche. !
i Even in the dock 'on trial for his ; life, 16 - String ;Jack was the high- J>wayman dandy in ; new velvet suit with 16 strings at knee and cuffs and a huge posy J; of .flowers in his J I buttonhole. Here he is seen with his i mistress, Ellen . Roche, who was on ; trial for pawning | ; the goods ho stole. ; On this . occasion | ! they were acquit- ! ted. The law, however, caught up with them. He choked out his life | on Tyburn Tree; she was trans- ported. Help
i Even in the dock
'on trial for his
; life, 16 - String
;Jack was the high-
J>wayman dandy in
; new velvet suit
with 16 strings at
knee and cuffs
and a huge posy
J; of .flowers in his
J I buttonhole. Here
he is seen with his
i mistress, Ellen
. Roche, who was on
; trial for pawning
| ; the goods ho stole.
; On this . occasion
| ! they were acquit-
! ted. The law,
however, caught
up with them. He
choked out his life
| on Tyburn Tree; she was trans-
ported.
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