Arthur
Thistlewood was born in Tupholme in 1774. Arthur, the illegitimate
son of a prosperous farmer and stockbreeder, was educated at Horncastle
Grammar School and then trained as a land-surveyor. However, he disliked
the work and at the age of twenty-one he obtained a commission in
the army.
In January 1804 Arthur Thistlewood married Jane Worsley but she died
two years later giving birth to their first child. Four years later
he married his second wife, Susan Wilkinson, the daughter of a butcher
in Horncastle. Thistlewood left the army and with the help of his
father purchased a farm. The farm was not a success and in 1811 he
moved to London.
Within a few months of arriving in London Arthur Thistlewood had joined
the Spencean Philanthropists. By 1816
Thistlewood was being reported on by police spies who described him
as a "dangerous character" who believed in revolution. Thistlewood,
along with James Watson and Thomas Preston,
was now a member of the five-man committee that ran the organisation.
John Castle, a police spy, was also a member
of the committee and was able to provide the authorities with a detailed
account of Spencean activities.
In October 1816 Castle reported to John Stafford,
supervisor of Home Office spies, that the Spenceans were planning
to overthrow the British government. The plan was to encourage rioting
at a mass meeting and while this was going on, to seize power by taking
the Tower of London and the Bank
of England.
The mass meeting was organised to take place at Spa Fields, Islington,
on 2nd December 1816. The speakers at the meeting included Henry
'Orator' Hunt and James Watson. The
magistrates decided to disperse the meeting and while Stafford and
eighty police officers were doing this, one of the men, Joseph Rhodes
was stabbed. The leaders of the planned uprising went into hiding.
Thistlewood decided to emigrate to America with his wife and child
but was arrested as he boarded the ship on the Thames. The other leaders
were also arrested and charged with high treason.
James
Watson was the first to be tried. However, the main prosecution
witness was the government spy, John Castle.
The defence council was able to show that Castle had a long criminal
record and that his testimony was unreliable. The jury concluded
that Castle was an agent provocateur (a person employed
to incite suspected people to some open action that will make
them liable to punishment) and refused to convict Watson. As the
case against Watson had failed, it was decided to release Arthur
Thistlewood, Thomas Preston and John Hopper, the other three men
who were due to be tried for the same offence.
The Spenceans continued to meet
in 1817. A new police spy who had joined the group, John Williamson,
reported to John Stafford that Thistlewood
was still trying to organise an armed uprising. James
Watson now doubted the wisdom of this strategy and although
he still attended meetings, he gradually lost control of the group
to the more militant ideas of Thistlewood.
In
1817 Thistlewood wrote to Lord Sidmouth,
the Home Secretary, demanding payment of £180, the cost of
the three tickets that he purchased for the trip to America. When
Sidmouth failed to respond to the letter, Thistlewood challenged
him to a duel. Sidmouth ordered Thistlewood's arrest and he was
charged with threatening a breach of the peace. Thistlewood was
found guilty and sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment in Horsham
Jail. Thistlewood wrote several letters to the Home Office complaining
about the conditions in prison. One of his complaints was that
three men had to share one bed and a cell measuring only seven
feet by nine feet.
Arthur Thistlewood played an important role in the protest meetings
that followed the Peterloo Massacre.
He organised the public reception of Henry
Hunt after he arrived back in London after the massacre. The
Times estimated that over 300,000 people turned up to
see Hunt and to hear speeches from Sir
Francis Burdett, Major John Cartwright,
James Watson and John
Thelwall. However, these men tried to distance themselves
from Thistlewood because of his known revolutionary beliefs.
On 22nd February 1820, George Edwards
pointed out to Thistlewood an item in the New Times that
several members of the British government were going to have dinner
at Lord Harrowby's house at 39 Grosvenor Square. Thistlewood and
a small group of Spenceans decided
to take part in a plot to kill the government ministers dining
at Lord Harrowby's house on 23rd February.
William Davidson had worked for Lord
Harrowby in the past and knew some of the staff at Grosvenor Square.
He was instructed to find out more details about the cabinet meeting.
However, when he spoke to one of the servants, he was told that
the Earl of Harrowby was not in London. When Davidson reported
this news back to Thistlewood he insisted that the servant was
lying and that the assassinations should proceed as planned.
On the 23rd February Thistlewood's gang assembled in a hayloft
in Cato Street, a short distance away
from Grosvenor Square. However, government ministers were not
meeting at the home of Earl of Harrowby. The Spenceans had been
set up by George Edwards, a government
spy who had infiltrated the Spencean
Society.
Thirteen police officers led by George Ruthven stormed the hay
loft. Several members of the gang refused to surrender their weapons
and one police officer, Richard Smithers, was killed by Thistlewood.
Four of the conspirators, Thistlewood, John
Brunt, Robert Adams and John Harrison escaped out of a window.
However, George Edwards had given the police a detailed list of
all those involved and the men were soon arrested.
Drawing of Arthur
Thistlewood killing Richard Smithers
On
the 23rd February Thistlewood's gang assembled in a hayloft in
Cato Street, a short distance away from
Grosvenor Square. However, government ministers were not meeting
at the home of Earl of Harrowby. The Spenceans had been set up
by George Edwards, a government spy
who had infiltrated the Spencean Society.
Thirteen police officers led by George Ruthven stormed the hay
loft. Several members of the gang refused to surrender their weapons
and one police officer, Richard Smithers, was killed by Thistlewood.
Four of the conspirators, Thistlewood, John
Brunt, Robert Adams and John Harrison escaped out of a window.
However, George Edwards had given the police a detailed list of
all those involved and the men were soon arrested.
Eleven men were eventually charged with being involved in the
Cato Street Conspiracy. Charges against
Robert Adams and John Monument were dropped when they agreed to
give evidence against the other men involved in the plot.
On 28th April 1820, Arthur Thistlewood, William
Davidson, James Ings, Richard
Tidd, and John Brunt were found
guilty of high treason and sentenced to death. John Harrison,
James Wilson, Richard Bradburn, John Strange and Charles Copper
were also found guilty but their original sentence of execution
was subsequently commuted to transportation for life. Arthur Thistlewood
was executed at Newgate Prison on
the 1st May, 1820.
The
Execution of Arthur Thistlewood at Newgate
(1820)
(1)
George Theodore Wilkinson described Thistlewood being interviewed
after his arrest in May, 1820.
"My genius is so great just now, I don't think there
is any man alive has so great a genius as mine at the moment."
Then he would pour upon the ground for a minute or two in deep cogitation;
and at length break into the following soliloquy: "If it is the
will of the Author of the World that I should perish in the cause
of freedom - his will, and not mine, be done! It would be quite a
triumph to me! - at the same time throwing his arms about in a manner
which savoured strongly of insanity.
(2)
John Hobhouse, a government minister,
observed the executions and that night wrote about it in his diary
(1st May, 1820)
The men died like heroes. Ings, perhaps, was too obstreperous
in singing 'Death or Liberty', and Thistlewood said, "Be quiet,
Ings; we can die without all this noise."
(3)
The Traveller (May, 1820)
The executioner, who trembled much, was a long time tying up the prisoners;
while this operation was going on a dead silence prevailed among the
crowd, but the moment the drop fell, the general feeling was manifested
by deep sighs and groans. Ings and Brunt were those only who manifested
pain while hanging. The former writhed for some moments; but the latter
for several minutes seemed, from the horrifying contortions of his
countenance, to be suffering the most excruciating torture.
(4)
George Theodore Wilkinson, An Authentic History of the Cato Street
Conspiracy (1820)
Thistlewood struggled slightly for a few minutes, but each effort
was more faint than that which preceded; and the body soon turned
round slowly, as if upon the motion of the hand of death.
Tidd, whose size gave cause to suppose that he would "pass"
with little comparative pain, scarcely moved after the fall. The struggles
of Ings were great. The assistants of the executioner pulled his legs
with all their might; and even then the reluctance of the soul to
part from its native seat was to be observed in the vehement efforts
of every part of the body. Davidson, after three or four heaves, became
motionless; but Brunt suffered extremely, and considerable exertions
were made by the executioners and others to shorten his agonies.
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