Hung For Stealing The Same Horse Twice

 

This is the story of the ill fated John Edmunds (Edmonds) alias Brock Edmunds who was executed for stealing the same horse twice. 

Born in 1801, John was said to be a mostly steady boy who got mixed up with a dissipated crowd who lead him astray. He does not seem to have acted with anyone else during the crimes he was eventually executed for however. See below for his family connections though..

In 1825 John was working for the farmer Mr Richard Webb at Marlow Bottom as an "odd jobber". He left after working there about 18 months, it seems by mutual consent - I'm sure if he had been sacked for bad behavior this would have featured in his criminal trial. It is shortly after this that John made a serious mistake. He decided to steal his former master's gelding valued at £25. This he managed to extract from it's stable without difficulty on August 1st. He then sold it on more than a month later in Uxbridge, having pretended to act on behalf of it's true owner Mr Webb. The man he sold it to knew him, and believed John had authority to sell the animal. He did not know that John had left Mr Webbs employ, so he paid him both for the horse, and a commission for bringing it to him for to sell. It was a good animal and was resold almost immediately, and then again, ending up in Windsor. It was found there by farmer Webb's son Charles who had travelled far and wide in an attempt to find the missing gelding. 

John took the sale money to London but it soon ran out. He then returned to Marlow with the idea of stealing another horse. And not just from anyone, but from his old master again in particular. Perhaps he thought he had achieved this so easily before, it was worth trying again? What John did not know was the first horse he had sold had been traced to it's eventual buyer, and back up the chain of sale to the Uxbridge horse dealer -  a man who had told the authorities that he knew the man offering the stolen horse for sale. And that man was John Edmunds. 

John entered Mr Webb's stable on the 23rd September with the intention of stealing the farmer's second horse, an animal which he considered to be more valuable than his first he had abstracted. But he was surprised to find the one he had already stolen there instead. The other horse was now kept in a place less immediately accessible so John stole horse no 1 again. 

 But John made the mistake of again selling the horse to another man who knew his master - horse dealer Job Harris of St Pancras.  His method of bringing the animal to the dealer was not one to soothe any doubts the buyer might have had. John slipped the horse into the dealers stables over night, where the puzzled proprietor found this strange horse in the morning. John then arrived and he used the same excuse for selling the horse as he had before - he claimed his master had asked him to transact the business on his behalf. But John did not know that in between his taking the horse and his bringing it to a dealer,  this same dealer had spoke to farmer Webb while both were attending Henley Fair. Job therefore knew the horse was reported stolen and no one could truthfully claim authority to sell it. As soon as he heard John's tale, he immediately guessed the truth and collared the thief.  Some reports say John was captured in a nearby inn, where the horse dealer had sent him to celebrate the "sale". It does not seem to have crossed anyone's mind that John had stolen the horse again, before his capture. It does not seem he was an immediate suspect the first time round either, until the horse was traced to the first buyer. There had been no witnesses. What was John thinking? He must have known that trying to sell a good horse if you were obviously not very well off would give rise to questions. But to give the explanation that he did, one that could easily be discovered to be a falsehood, to people who could identify him seems foolhardy. He does not seem to have been thinking straight, for whatever reason. 

On his arrest, John said he had needed money and had been in bad company. The theft of a horse was always taken seriously, and to be convicted twice of this offence meant there was little doubt of the outcome at John's trial. Richard Webb recommend John for mercy, but the sentence was death. There was no reprieve and he was hung at the Old Bailey in January 1826 aged 24. 

The peculiarity of John's conviction for stealing the same horse twice meant the case was famous for a while and widely reported. In a final twist, it was said John's body was bought back to Marlow by the very same horse he had twice stolen. This was apparently a coincidence, the horse having been hired from farmer Webb by a third party who was originally supposed to use a different animal for the task. But this other horse had become lame. Mr Webb had not known the purpose of the journey when he loaned the horse.  Perhaps this part of the story is too good to be true and a journalistic embellishment, but who knows? 

Note:

Three years after John's death, his brother George was reported arrested on suspicion of leading a "desperate gang" in the neighourhood of Marlow. He was they said, a "notorious character." 

Written and researched by Kathryn Day. For a post dedicated to Marlow Bottom Farm with more about Richard Webb see here

To find other posts related to crime and policing in Great Marlow and nearby, see the index here

To find all mentions of an individual here use the A-Z Person Index in the top drop down menu. New content added daily! 

 Sources include:

Old Bailey Report 1826. 

St. James Chronicle 21 April 1829, British Library Archive.