Jack Sheppard (4 March 1702 - 16 November 1724) was a notorious English robber, burglar and thief of early 18th century London. Born into a poor family, he was apprenticed as a carpenter but took to theft and burglary in 1723, with little more than a year of his training to complete. He was arrested and imprisoned five times in 1724 but escaped four times, making him a notorious public figure, and wildly popular with the poorer classes. Ultimately, he was caught, convicted, and hanged at Tyburn, ending his brief criminal career after less than two years. The inability of the notorious "Thief-Taker General" (and thief) Jonathan Wild to control Sheppard, and injuries suffered by Wild at the hands of Sheppard's colleague, Joseph "Blueskin" Blake, led to Wild's downfall.

Sheppard was as renowned for his attempts to escape justice as for his crimes. An autobiographical "Narrative", thought to have been ghostwritten by Daniel Defoe, was sold at his execution, quickly followed by popular plays. The character of Macheath in John Gay's The Beggar's Opera (1728) is based on Sheppard, keeping him in the limelight for over 100 years. He returned to the public consciousness in around 1840, when William Harrison Ainsworth wrote a novel entitled Jack Sheppard, with illustrations by George Cruikshank. The popularity of his tale, and the fear that others would be drawn to emulate his behaviour, led the authorities to refuse to license any plays with "Jack Sheppard" in the title for forty years, at least in London.

Guy Fawkes is notorious for his involvement in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. He was probably placed in charge of executing the plot because of his military and explosives experience. The plot, masterminded by Robert Catesby, was an attempt by a group of English conspirators to kill King James I of England, his family, and most of the aristocracy by blowing up the House of Lords in the Palace of Westminster during the State Opening of Parliament. Fawkes may have been introduced to Catesby by Hugh Owen, a man who was in the pay of the Spanish Netherlands. Sir William Stanley is also believed to have recommended him, and Fawkes named him under torture, leading to his arrest and imprisonment for a day after the discovery of the plot. It was Stanley who first presented Fawkes to Thomas Winter in 1603 when Winter was in Europe. Stanley was the commander of the English in Flanders at the time.

Fawkes and a number of others implicated in the conspiracy were tried in Westminster Hall. After being found guilty, they were taken to Old Palace Yard in Westminster and St Paul's Yard, where they were hanged, drawn, and quartered. Fawkes, however, managed to avoid the worst of this execution by jumping from the scaffold where he was supposed to be hanged, breaking his neck before he could be drawn and quartered

9" x 5 3/4" Dark brown cloth cover. Blind stamped decorations on front and back cover. Gilt title on spine. Cloth tears in gutter with heavy wear on top and bottom edges.

All pages tight to the spine. Pages and illustrations have foxing throughout. 2 books in one.

195 pages with 28 illustrations both in text and plates for Jack Sheppard. Two column text format. (3/4" tear on bottom of title page)  212 pages with 22 illustrations both in text and plates for Guy Fawkes.

(click on any image above to enlarge)

English novelist, son of Thomas Ainsworth, solicitor, born at Manchester in 1805. He was educated at Manchester Grammar School and articled to the firm of which his father was a member, proceeding to London in 1824 to complete his legal training at the Inner Temple. At the age of twenty-one he married a daughter of John Ebers the publisher, and started in his father-in-law's line of business. This, however, soon proved unprofitable and he decided to attempt literary work.

A novel called Sir John Chiverton, in which he appears to have had a share, had attracted the praise of Sir Walter Scott, and this encouragement decided him to take up fiction as a career. In 1834 he published Rookwood, which had an immediate success, and from that point he was always occupied with the compilation of "historical" novels. He published about forty such stories, of which the best-known are Jack Sheppard (1839), The Tower of London (1840), Guy Fawkes (1841), Old St Paul's (1841) and Windsor Castle (1843). He edited Bentley's Miscellany, in which Jack Sheppard was published as a serial, and in 1842 he became proprietor of Ainsworth's Magazine. In 1853 it ceased to appear, and Ainsworth bought the New Monthly Magazine. He continued his literary activity until his death, but his later stories were less striking than the earlier ones. He died at Reigate on the 3rd of January 1882 and was buried at Kensal Green.

Ainsworth had a lively talent for plot, and his books have many attractive qualities. The glorification of Dick Turpin in Rookwood, and of Jack Sheppard in the novel that bears his name, caused considerable outcry among straitlaced elders. In his later novels Ainsworth confined himself to heroes less open to criticism. His style was not without archaic affectation and awkwardness, but when his energies were aroused by a striking situation he could be brisk, vigorous and impressive. He did a great deal to interest the less educated classes in the historical romances of their country, and his tales were invariably instructive, clean and manly.

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