Adams, John Bodkin (1899–1983), general practitioner and forger, was born on 20 January 1899 in Randalstown, co. Antrim, the elder son of Samuel Adams, watchmaker, and his wife, Ellen Bodkin (d. 1943), formerly of Desertmartin, co. Tyrone. The younger son was born in 1903 and died of pneumonia in 1916. Shortly after ...
Article
Percy Hoskins
revised by Michael Bevan
Article
Ady, Joseph (1775/6–1852), fraudster, was the son of John Ady (1743/4–1812), a recording clerk for the Society of Friends. He was a hatter, hosier, and accountant at various times, in premises at 11 The Circus, Minories, London, and 6 Charlotte Street, Wapping. Failing in business, he devised a means of extracting money from the credulous. He would look up the lists of unclaimed inheritances, dividends, and bequests, and then write, without stamping his letters, to any people of those names that he could find, offering to produce '...
Article
Annesley, Richard, sixth earl of Anglesey (bap. 1693, d. 1761), kidnapper and bigamist, was baptized on 26 November 1693 at St Peter's Cathedral, Exeter, Devon, the third son of Dr Richard Annesley (1654/5–1701), dean of Exeter, from c.1700 third Baron Altham, and his wife, ...
Article
Backhouse, Sir Edmund Trelawny, second baronet (1873–1944), Sinologist and fraudster, eldest of the four surviving sons of Jonathan Edmund Backhouse, first baronet (1849–1918), a banker, and Florence (1845–1902), youngest daughter of Sir John Salusbury Salusbury-Trelawny, was born on 20 October 1873 at The Rookery, Middleton Tyas, Yorkshire...
Article
Steven C. Bullock
Bell, Thomas (b. 1713), fraudster, was born on 18 February 1713 in Boston, Massachusetts, the first of three recorded children of Thomas Bell (d. 1729), sea captain and shipwright, and his wife, Johanna Adams. The younger Thomas, who became known as Tom Bell...
Article
Bolland, James (c. 1727–1772), sheriff's officer and forger, was probably born in the parish of St Olave, Southwark, reputedly the son of a butcher, who, according to A True and Genuine Account of the Life (1772), died while Bolland was a child; his mother, who survived her husband, supported herself and ...
Article
Richard L. Greaves
Bolron, Robert (fl. 1665–1682), informer and perjurer, was born in Newcastle upon Tyne. Apprenticed to a jeweller in London, he left after a year to become a foot soldier at Tynemouth Castle. During the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665–7) he served on a frigate. In 1674 ...
Image
Horatio William Bottomley (1860–1933) by Bassano, 1918 © National Portrait Gallery, London
Article
A. J. A. Morris
Bottomley, Horatio William (1860–1933), journalist and swindler, was the only son of William King Bottomley (1827–1863), a tailor's cutter, and his wife, Elizabeth, née Holyoake. He was born on 23 March 1860 at 16 St Peter's Street, Bethnal Green, London. Orphaned by the age of four, ...
Article
Broun, Sir Richard, eighth baronet (1801–1858), pamphleteer and fraudster, was born at Lochmaben, Dumfriesshire, on 22 April 1801, eldest of the four sons and one daughter of Sir James Broun (1768–1844) of Coalston Park, Lochmaben, and his first wife, Marian, née Henderson (...
Image
Elizabeth Canning (1734–1773) by Louis Philippe Boitard, pubd 1754 © National Portrait Gallery, London
Article
Canning [married name Treat], Elizabeth (1734–1773), convicted perjurer, was born on 17 September 1734 in the City of London, the eldest of five surviving children of William Canning (d. 1751) and his wife, Elizabeth, who continued her husband's business of sawyer after his death. The family occupied two rooms in ...
Image
Mary Carleton (1634x4242–1673) by T. Thrumten Ashmolean Museum, Oxford
Article
Carleton [née Moders], Mary [nicknamed the German Princess] (1634x42–1673), impostor, is recorded in contradictory texts, making the accuracy of information about her origins difficult to ascertain. She was probably born Mary Moders in 1642 and baptized on 22 January; however, she is also recorded as being born eight years earlier, while ...
Article
Carter, Henry [Harry] (1749–1829), smuggler and Methodist preacher, was born early in 1749 at Pengersick, Germoe parish, near Breage, Cornwall, the seventh of ten children of Francis Carter (bap. 1712, d. 1774), smallholder and miner, and Annice Williams (1714–1784). Henry (always known as ...
Article
Paul Hopkins and Stuart Handley
Chaloner, William (d. 1699), coiner and sham plotter, was born in Warwickshire, the son of a weaver; he had at least one brother and one sister involved in coining.
Chaloner's father found him difficult to control and apprenticed him to a nailer in ...
Image
Elizabeth Chudleigh (c. 1720–1788) by Thomas Gainsborough Christie's Images Ltd. (2004)
Article
Chudleigh, Elizabeth [married namesElizabeth Hervey, countess of Bristol; Elizabeth Pierrepont, duchess of Kingston upon Hull] (c. 1720–1788), courtier and bigamist, was born probably at the family estate of Ashton, Devon. She was the younger daughter and youngest child of Colonel Thomas Chudleigh (...
Article
Richard Davenport-Hines
Cole, Joseph Windle (b. 1808x10, d. in or after 1858), swindler, was a shipping clerk during the 1830s with the London merchant house of Forbes, Forbes & Co., and in 1840–44 represented them in Bombay. He was summarily dismissed as their Liverpool agent in 1845, and in the following year became a partner with ...
