All That Glitters: A Maggie Power Adventure (Maggie Power #2) *Unedited version*

Document Insert 9 - Newspaper Clipping From The Margaret Power Archive

Clipping From the Maggie Power Archive

From The London Illustrated News, November 12th 1842

The Crime of the Century – A Day At An Execution by Nicholas Upson

Rarely, if ever, even during its long and bloody history, has Newgate Street witnessed anything of its like before. Accompanied by one of the largest crowds in recent memory – as wrathful, vengeful and, in many ways, as odious as any mob I've ever stood amongst, many of whom camped throughout the night to bare witness – Jeremiah Beagle and John Sexton finally faced their executioner. 

    Prior to the killers appearance, an almost festive mood of goodwill prevailed among the thousands gathered, to whom the distractions of singing, dancing, eating and drinking passed the peaceable, but impatient hours until a first glimpse of the condemned two could be had.

    No pity or mercy was wasted upon those two most despised creatures, either, by the assembled mob when they at last appeared. There was plenty of noise; or rather a noise. A sound, so it seemed to me, dragged from the very torments of hell: a shrieking, cacophony of revulsion, like the sound of a fallen angel damned to the fires of perdition for eternity. 

    Once upon the platform, not a single word or look passed between the two men – found guilty of the murders of ten, young, innocent souls – as they were dragged out toward the gibbet.

    First the tall, black-haired man, Sexton – a figure of whom Satan himself might counterfeit, if ever he determined to manifest himself as human and walk amongst us again. When brought forward, he stood erect and fearless throughout the entire episode. As the crowd jeered and threw lumps of stale bread and fruit in his direction, he simply looked blankly beyond them, to someplace else, his defiance to all natural law and civilised conduct a constant until his very last breath.  

    Beagle was another matter altogether, however. He struggled with the turnkeys, pushing outward his chest and wriggling at his bound hands, shouting and making a great to do of the matter. He shouted and roared but most of his wailing was drowned out by the equally wicked chorus of hate from the assembled crowd.

    From my own vantage point, close to the gibbet, I recorded for posterity the tormented man's final words. "Sir, why have you forsaken me?" he cried, as if performing a priestly sermon. "I know you are somewhere out there, watching. Will you let me die? You know I am the best abused man alive? All I have done, I have done for my love of Queen and Country! I've nothing to do with these venal crimes, as well you know. Show yourself now!"

    Eventually, even his cries for mercy where drowned out – as much by the crowd's jeering, and then, forever, by the placing of the hood over his head. Likewise the unmoved Sexton was covered too.

    Once dispatched from this world – to the pits of hell one presumes – the sound of revenge fled from the crowd and a carnival atmosphere of mirth and delight once more filled the air. Much dancing and merriment continued as the sellers of various wares, foods and drinks began to circulate once more. Some drifted away, others stayed on to perform ballads of remorse, or to tell one another tales of executions past.

    On my way home from Newgate Street, it is true bouts of fighting broke out between those most base creatures amongst the mob. Sticks and bricks at point were hurled between one group of men and another. The matter and cause of the violence seemed to all involved unimportant. It was the fight alone which mattered.

    Despite the excesses of certain classes amongst the crowd, a great moral lesson could be discerned from outside the walls of Newgate on this day: the commandment, Thou Shalt Not Kill, can be seen to still exert some meaning in a world in which, day by day, our shared values seem to be fracturing more and more under the weight of quick pleasures and modern ideas.

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