The robbery of the Bicester wagon brought Anthony Drury to Tyburn; in the chronicle of his life, the condemned man ascribed the very design of the theft to Robert King, the driver.
Drury was born in Norfolk, of parents whom the chronicler describes as being of reputable family and competent fortune. He received an education whose care and expense the narrator remarks upon, though without providing particulars. Concerning the earliest years of his life, information is wanting: the author expressly writes that he will not invent adventures merely to divert his readers. He knew only that Drury had lived in Oxford and Bicester before settling at Wendover, where he possessed a house and maintained a family.
He appears to have followed no regular trade. He learned, however, the art of curing smoky chimneys, an occupation by which he earned a sufficient livelihood and gained throughout the county of Buckingham the nickname of the “Smoky Chimney Doctor.” A few years prior to his death, he married at Oxford a widow, reputed to be a woman of fortune. It was reported that she possessed fifteen hundred pounds, a sum the chronicler suspects may have been exaggerated. The writer intimated that Drury had proved an indifferent husband; yet this judgment belongs to his own commentary, rather than to any established judicial record. Until that time, the chronicle observes, Drury’s reputation in the neighborhood had remained untainted.
On September 25, 1726, Drury attacked the Bicester wagon as it was coming from London. The indictments returned against him concerned several robberies committed upon the highway. Thomas Eldridge was despoiled of fifteen moidores, two hundred and ten guineas, and eighty half-guineas, as well as moneys and goods belonging to a Mr. Burrows. Another indictment charged him with assaulting Sarah, wife of Robert King, and taking from her two shillings and sixpence. A third count concerned the assault upon Eldridge and the theft of a calico gown and petticoat belonging to Giles Betts, valued at twenty shillings. A fourth indictment, for another robbery of two shillings and sixpence from Mary, wife of Joseph Page, was not tried: the former three sufficed to expose Drury to the capital penalty.
Under sentence of death, he displayed, according to the observer within the prison, no excessive terror, but appeared rather embarrassed and confused. He at first entertained hopes of obtaining a reprieve, or at least of being transported. He wrote to several persons whom he believed capable of interceding on his behalf. At the same time, he perused the religious volumes placed in his hands and attended chapel with gravity. The chronicler describes his devotions as an outward show, reserving judgment upon inward dispositions that he could not discern.
Drury was particularly desirous that his wife should come to London. He sent her several pressing letters; she returned no answer. He then wrote to a friend in the neighborhood, begging him to urge her not to forsake him in this extremity, but to join him in order to solicit his pardon. The friend replied that the woman was so lame she could not dress herself without assistance, that her maid had departed, and that she lacked the money necessary for the journey. He himself declined to visit, alleging a severe cold contracted in London during a previous journey undertaken on Drury’s business.
The prisoner sought another means of prevailing upon his wife. He informed her that he had pawned plate in London for twenty-four pounds, though the articles were worth, he claimed, more than double that sum, and ran the hazard of being lost after his death. The friend reported that the wife would reimburse anyone who redeemed the plate and brought her word of it. Still, she gave no promise of making the journey. Drury concluded that she had no desire to see him live, but added that he heartily forgave her.
He consistently denied having taken part in any robberies of a similar nature before. He acknowledged that, with his wife’s substance and the profits of his chimney business, he might have lived comfortably in the country; he confessed to having managed his affairs ill, but attributed the robbery entirely to the solicitations of King. The latter, according to Drury, had at first represented the attack as an easy and safe undertaking, promising there would be no resistance. He was to receive half the booty in exchange for his counsel and assistance. To disguise their collusion, Drury was then instructed to take about four pounds from the driver’s wife.
A minister of the Church of England who came to visit him exhorted him not to extenuate his guilt, but to make a sincere confession. Drury promised to speak candidly, protesting that he had no reliance but upon God. When the petitions for a pardon had failed, he sent for this clergyman and received the sacrament. He then acknowledged the crime for which he was to die, maintained his accusation against King, and declared that he forgave both him and his wife. The narrative presents this final confession as confirming his earlier statements, yet it records no judicial proceedings against King.
A woman who had accompanied Drury during his last days offered a different piece of evidence. He had conveyed her in a chaise to Wendover. On the road, they met King, who desired Drury to alight and speak with him. The two men walked aside and conversed with much warmth; the woman could not tell what was said between them. Upon returning to the chaise, however, King said to her: “You need not fear, you will certainly have what you desire.” She thus confirmed a meeting and certain words, though she could bear no witness to the agreement Drury alleged was concluded there.
Persons of distinction still endeavored to obtain his pardon, but without success. The chronicler conjectures that the hope nurtured until the eve of the execution may have unsettled the prisoner’s mind; yet he could not determine what passed within his breast. On the evening of November 2, a woman visitor sent by the female companion’s former master asked Drury what he had to say against King. Drury repeated that the driver had drawn him into the crime, that his life and all he possessed were upon that man’s head, and then brought the conference to a close to resume his prayers.
The following morning, November 3, 1726, Drury attended chapel and left Newgate without any visible sign of fear. On the way to Tyburn, he spoke of his errors, observing that he had not been addicted to drink, but had kept company too freely with women, which had rendered his wife jealous. At the scaffold, he reiterated his accusation against King, adding that the driver had also advised him to rob the Banbury wagon. He stated that, instead of the four pounds they had agreed upon, he had taken only three shillings from King’s wife: this sum, according to the chronicle, corresponded to the indictment upon which he had been convicted.
The Ordinary then reminded him that a man accused him of having married another’s daughter at Norwich, who was still living. Drury answered that many things were laid to his charge, and that he forgave all men; he neither affirmed nor denied the accusation. He then desired to speak with a gentleman standing near the gallows concerning his temporal estate, which he said he had settled, and exhorted the bystanders to lead virtuous lives. He died at Tyburn on that Thursday, being about twenty-eight years of age.