Welcome to Criminalia, a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio.
There's a handful of famous historical highway robbers whose names and stories are still recognizable today, but the stories of many highway robbers have become lost to history, or sometimes confused with other robbers, or they turn out to be fictional. Highway robbers primarily robbed carriages and often homes too, along
their preferred roads. When caught, charges against them were often for robbery and horse theft, and during certain periods in history, rewards and sometimes large rewards, were offered to anyone who could capture a highwayman, and those convicted of highway robbery were executed by hanging for their crimes. Jocelyn Harwood in Our hot Seat this episode was a highway robber who took things way too far one night, adding four horrific
and gruesome murders to his rap sheet. We are not going to go into detail on his various highway robbery adventures because frankly, a lot of them read kind of the same way. Pull out your pistol, yell your money or your life. His crimes escalate greatly, though, so instead we're going to talk about his first hold up and his last. He was insolent, he was violent, and this is his bloody story. Welcome to Criminalia. I'm Maria Tremarky.
And I'm Holly Frye. Jocelyn Hardwood was a highwayman who committed such quote barbarous murders, and he was just so wow that his fellow criminal associates betrayed him and gave him up to the authorities, because even they could not stomach his depraved behavior. The night of his final crime, if any highwayman jumped the shark, as the saying goes, it may have been Joscelyn. Moralized stories of crime that may not be entirely factual appeared in the popular Newgate Calendar,
and Joscelyn's story was one of them. In print, He's described as quote a degenerate plant from a good tree, and that actually seems like a pretty apt description. His father was, as far as anyone can tell, an honest person, and the family was well off and had a good reputation. Author Pascal Bonenfont writes that Joscelyn was the quote greatest misfortune of his father's life. Joscelyn was born in sixteen
sixty nine at Wateringbury in Kent. Some accounts of his life report that he was educated, while a few others suggest that maybe he had just some schooling. But whatever his education level, none of that really mattered to Joscelyn.
Around the age of seventeen, Joscelyn committed his first offense. He ran away from his family's home and took about sixty pounds with him. He fled to London, where he was looking for some excitement and to whet some of his appetites. He lavishly spent the money he stole from his father on all of the vices he could afford, and you know, making a rain like that caught the attention of the wrong crowd, and soon Jocelyn was working
for the wrong crowd. In the first three years running with them, his jobs primarily included smaller crimes like pickpocketing and pilfering. But he wanted some power and wealth of his own and decided to dip his toe into highway robbery. This was a time in highway robbery where those actively working the gig could make quite a bit of money. Another plus, he could be his own boss.
Joscelyn stole a horse, which he named Blackheath. He also stole a bridle, a saddle, holsters, and flintlock pistols, and he got out of town. Well really, he just went to the roads near town, ready and excited for his first highway robbery. He soon came upon two men traveling together in a carriage, approaching them on horseback. He pulled out his pistol and yelled out the highway greeting your
money or your life. But things definitely took a turn from what he may have imagined and hoped for from this robbery, and it was definitely for the worse, at least for him. One of the men drew a gun and shot the horse, Black Heath, causing Joscelyn to fall to the ground. Still alive, he walked away with non fatal wounds, but he was without his horse because Blackheath's injuries were too great.
But Joscelyn couldn't help but notice something about that failed robbery attempt. As he shuffled away from the scene. The men who should have been his victims and should have been frightened of him, weren't. Instead, they'd been brave enough to attack him, and he had not expected or even considered that victims would do that. There were indeed some passengers who did travel with armed escorts or they themselves
carried pistols for protection. In spite of this failure, Joscelyn didn't quit life as a highway robber, and for about two or three years he continued to target carriages and homes on the highways around London. He got better at it and it became a lucrative time for him. However, much like when he stole money from his father only to play it away, Joscelyn spent most of his highway robbery loot in excess on his vices.
We're going to take a break here for a word from our sponsors, and when we're back we will tell the story of how Joscelyn the highway Robber became Joscelyn the murderer.
Welcome back to Criminalia. Let's talk about the final crime Jocelyn committed and how it cost him and four other people their lives.
The abbe LeBlanc, who we've named dropped in previous episodes this season, wrote in the mid seventeen hundreds about highwaymen. His writing about the attitudes of the English toured highwaymen has an interesting and kind of opposite flavor from what most highwaymen were actually like. He states, quote tales of their cunning and generosity were in the mouths of everybody, and he continued quote a noted thief was a kind of hero that, though sounds very little like the reality
of most highwaymen. Joscelyn's story has never been confused with the heroic legend of robin Hood, as is the case with some of his peer highway robbers. He's also never been considered a romantic figure or a gentleman robber. But even though there are a lot of stories like that, not many highwaymen actually were.
The night Blackheath was killed by Joscelyn's intended victims is his first crime as a highway robber, And as we noted earlier in the episode, instead of repeating the stories of all the carriages he robbed and how many homes he looted over the years, we're going to jump to his last crime, and this is when a highway robber turned into a ruderous burglar.
There were highway robbers who robbed but also kidnapped and murdered. Many of them were actually violent there's one anecdote about a highwayman who cut out the tongues of his victims, ensuring that they could not describe him to authorities, but that certainly was not a requirement for the job. Joscelyn committed his most barbaric crime when he was only twenty three years old, and that crime was not highway robbery, but it was robbery at least it started out that way.
Joscelyn learned, you know that kind of wink wink, nudge nudge, learned of a man named Sir Neiamiah Burrows. But note though his given name sometimes differs depending on who's telling the story, and he was at least rumored to be a very wealthy man. Those in the robbery business assumed he had a fortune just waiting to be taken. That fortune was thought to contain money and plate he kept
in his house. In this instance, plate could refer to plate money, which is usually made of cheap metal like copper, and stamped to indicate their value, which is usually quite low. But that's really doubtful. It's much more likely to be referring to Burrow's tangible wealth, such as his silver goblets and his ornate serving plates and precious stones and jewels, you know, the things that showed off just how wealthy he was.
As you may expect, Joscelyn immediately wanted that fortune, and with two accomplices, he committed what might be his first burglary. When the men broke into the house, they first tied up the domestic help. Then they tied up Burrows and his wife. Next, scouting the house, Joscelyn found the bedroom that the Burrough's daughter shared. As he was tying up the girls, one of them asked him to be gentle, and in return, she said she would not identify him
in this crime. According to the popular papers of the day, she pled quote pray, sir, use us civilly, which if you do, we will use you in the same manner in case you and your companions should be taken for I am sure we shall know you again, Joscelyn replied to her, but not with any kind of romanticized highway gallantry or even just silence. Rather, he said, quote shall you so? I'll take care then to prevent your doing any mischief.
And then Jocelyn's first burglary took a very big turn into a murderous bloody night. He was not gentle, and they wouldn't be able to identify him because after tying them up, he proceeded to quote cut the girls in pieces with his hangar sword, which is a sword designed as a side arm for close quarter fighting. Next, he murdered Burrows and his wife, and then he walked away, pleased and looking like he'd been awarded a new Merit badge.
According to the Newgate Calendar, Joscelyn's a acomplices were both astonished by his violence and his viciousness. This was not what they had planned or expected, and so they decided to expose him his crimes and his inhumanity. They gave him up to authorities.
We're going to take a break for a word from our sponsors, and when we're back, we'll talk about Jocelyn's capture and his death.
Welcome back to Criminalia. Of course, there is more than one version of how Joscelyn Harwood was captured. The first is actually pretty short. His horrified accomplices were able to overpower him, then tie him up, and then they left him in the house with an incriminating piece of evidence for authorities to find. What they left behind is lost in this version, but I'm thinking all of those bodies
probably were enough. They wanted actually to bring Joscelyn to justice, and while they left the scene without him, they did still take the loot.
And the second version, the one most often told, goes like this. His accomplices agreed they'd capture him, but it wasn't in the Burroughs home. It was on horseback. Unclear if this was the same night as the murder or if it was just shortly thereafter. Their first move was to shoot his horse out from under him. After he'd fallen to the ground, they tied him up both hands
and feet and left him there on the ground. With him, they also left an incriminating piece of evidence by his side, Burrow's plate, which would have been traced back to its owner. The next day, after some questioning and investigation, Jocelyn was found in the same place and same condition as when his accomplices had left him.
Apprehended, Joscelyn was sent under the eye of heavy security to Shrewsbury Jail. An account suggests that once he got there he quote behaved very audaciously. He could have gone on trial for a variety of crimes, but it was the murder and robbery that he committed at the borough's home that he stood for. Joscelyn's trial was reportedly quite a thing, and mainly because of his behavior during it.
There is little to read about the details of the court proceedings, although there are some that give us descriptions that say he spit in the faces of the judge and jury, and almost all records agree that he used vulgar and indecent language in the courtroom, and he did so loudly.
He was sentenced to death by hanging, to be followed with his body being gibbeted to warn other highway robbers or other criminals not to follow his brutal path. But one notable thing about his behavior in the courtroom wasn't necessarily the profanity when the judge handed down his sentence. It didn't seem to bother Joscelyn or make any impression
on him at all. He just continued his disrespectful and rude behavior through the entire trial as if he hadn't heard he was just given a death sentence.
Specifics of the day of his execution vary, but only by a little. Some accounts indicate that he arrived at Tyburn quote insolently drunk. His intoxication is really the only maybe part. Tyburn Tree was a wooden gallows where criminals were, for more than six hundred and fifty years hanged to death. Most accounts report Jocelyn continued that same defiant and contemptuous behavior that he had in the courtroom as he approached
the gallows. He was executed in sixteen ninety two, shouting from the gallows that quote, he would act the same murder again in the same case.
Jocelyn's crimes and his execution for them came at the beginning of what's called the Golden Age of highway robbery, which is largely considered to have been between sixteen sixty and seventeen fourteen, though the crime was certain not confined to those years. At that time, horses were cheap to buy, guns were easy to buy. Taverns meant for on the go passengers to have a bite to eat and maybe rent a room, were also easy hideouts for robbers to
plan and to distribute loot amongst themselves. Plus, with new turnpike roads to improve transportation, it all led to new criminal opportunities which led to highway robbery.
The idea of robbing people on the road dates back to the Middle Ages at least, and maybe men probably earlier. But during the Golden Age, give or take a decade, it's said that highway robbers in England were quote as common as crows. The end of the highwaymen came about a century after Joscelyn robbed the roads. The downfall began at the end of the eighteenth century, and in eighteen oh five mounted police started to patrol the roads around
London day and night. The officers that took part in this patrol were nicknamed Robin Redbreasts because of their red uniforms. But things got even worse for highway robbers when the official Metropolitan Police were established in eighteen twenty nine. After the last highway robber gang, the Hannam and Cockroad Gang, were apprehended by police in eighteen fifty, there remained only some small, remote clusters or even fairly isolated men and women still trying to get your money or your life.
What you got in that hip flask?
Who ready? Man?
Um?
Yeah, this one's scary, just because, as Maria and I were discussing before we started recording, this person is clearly a sociopath and it's very frightening. Yeah, just the complete disregard for anything is very very scary.
There's something going on and it's not it's scary.
He's a scary person in me. I, in thinking about a drink for this, did not want to do any of the gruesome things. But the detail that kind of caught my attention than that, I found myself thinking about a lot this round is actually the Tyburn Tree, which I looked up and started reading about because it is I mean, it's a spot that is still marked today and it is very interesting. So I wanted to do
a drink that had a plant note to it. This actually has a couple and I wanted to do something that was a little hard hitting without being too crazy. It's just a nice, simple cocktail. But I will say I loved it. And this is one of those ones where, unlike normally when I'm preparing for the show and I am making drinks and testing them, I have a couple SIPs and the rest kind of goes in the sink. Not this one. I didn't mean. It's another one of those.
I didn't mean to drink the whole thing, but it was like the first one, I was like, is this too tart? And then the second sip I was like, no, this is actually pretty smooth, it's just not super sweet. And then the third sip I was like, I really like this one, and then it was you know, weird trouble after that. So this one, you're gonna prepare by doing a trick we've done before, which is infusing some
gin with green tea. So you're just gonna take four ounces of gin and throw a tea bag or equivalent loose tea into it. You'll have extra, you'll have enough to make two drinks because you need two ounces, but doing two ounces of a tea bag seems wasteful. You can get more flavor out of it than that, so let that sit. Doesn't take long twenty thirty minutes, and it's very green tea, so you are going too in your shaking tin. Also make sure you have a cocktail
glass chilling. You're gonna put one ounce of lime juice, just a half ounce of simple syrup, and then we need an ounce of pear juice. And we're gonna take this from like one of those little snack pack cups of dice pears, or you can do canned pears, but I will tell you this. We need an ounce, and in my testing, a snack pack cup yields exactly one ounce of pear juice after you have taken the fruit out of it.
Let me ask you a question about pear juice. Yeah, I am a big fan of but I believe it is pear nectar that I get, which is a little bit thicker.
It is it's sweeter. So if you do that, I would only do a half ounce, and I would I would thin it a little bit with water, or you can add a little extra lime juice, but it will be more part so to this. So at this point we have an ounce of pear juice, an ounce of lime juice, a half ounce of simple syrup, and then you're gonna add two ounces of your green tea infused gin and just give it a really good hard shake.
You want it ice cold. This is one where when I strained it into my glass, I used a mesh strainer instead of a hawthorn strainer because it have a little bit more of a foamy finish on top. And it just looks pretty and smooth and it's delicious and it smells really good. That foam tends to like retain the depending on what gin you select, you know, it always is going to have its own flavors and profile
that have different herbal notes to it. So you get that, you get the pear smell and that little bit of lime. That's it. It's an easy drink, so delicious. It's not super sweet even with that little bit of simple in it. Without the simple, it was too tart. I did a version with no simple, and I was like, this is actually not balanced, So you do want to put just a splash in there. So yummy, foolishly yummy. So this
one is really easy to do. Your mocktail version, you were just either you can just make straight up green tea if you want, but if you want it to have that little bite so it kind of mimics a cocktail a little bit more, you'll do the trick we've done in the past where you let some tonic water go flat and then infuse that with green tea. And that's a perfect sub in my opinion. It doesn't taste exactly the same, but it has a very similar feel when you take a sip. So that is the Tyburn tree.
This is one where I wanted to use pear because pair gets used all the time in autumn recipes, and I love it in autumn recipes, don't get me wrong. And part of that is the seasonality of pairs. But we can have pairs whenever we want, thanks to you know, modern agriculture and storage, and so I'm like, why not put it in more spring and summer drinks because it's so yummy. I love pear everything, and so this just seemed exactly correct to me. So if you make the
Tyburn Tree, I hope you love it. I know I am probably gonna go make another after we're done recording, because I got two more ounces of gender use up where.
You know, I'm really glad that you that you focused in on the on the tree because we mentioned Tyburn all the time, but we never talk about Yeah, the tree and the gallows and you know, just people go there and they're hung is as basically as much as we've ever talked about. So it was kind of a nice detail to add, and I'm so glad that you focused on it.
Well, the other options were not great in this one. I don't want to I don't want to make a drink inspired by someone being chopped pieces that's that would be.
Terrible if you if you had come out with like, here's my red drink, and I'm like, I'm out, no, no, no, I'm sorry. I'm laughing after this horrible episode. But we need if I don't.
Oh man, yeah, you need a tyburn tree is what you need. That'll just smooth it right out. I hope if you make this drink that you love it as much as I do. I was kind of surprised by how much I love it, because I do tend to like things a little sweeter than this. But I don't know something about it works. We will be right back here next week with another tale of highway robbery and drinks to go with it. Criminalia is a production of
Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, please visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,