At Tyburn, Matthew Clark stopped short. He had just fled a house where he had slain Sarah Goldington, and the blood had already soaked into his linen. The sight of the gallows looming beside the highway was enough to turn him back upon his steps. He took up the reins of a waggon whose carter had lamed himself, as though the journey toward London might still afford him sanctuary. Those in pursuit overtook him before he reached the city.
Prior to this flight, he had entered the alehouse where Sarah attended upon travelers. She was alone within the house. Upon crossing the threshold, he addressed her as an old acquaintance; he lingered near an hour, drinking and exchanging familiar jests. All the while, as the Newgate account relates, he cast about for the means to rob the house, fearful lest Sarah, knowing his face, should afterward name him. He had already concealed a knife beneath his coat. The man who had entered under the guise of friendship was shortly to silence the woman who had welcomed him.
Matthew Clark hailed from St Albans. His parents, people of modest station, had placed him in service to a gentleman of the neighborhood. He might have acquired a broader education there, the chronicle observes, but his tenure was marred by idleness and insolence. His master discharged him after bearing with his conduct for some time. Clark subsequently took to field labor, following the plow and driving the cart. The chronicler notes that he was accustomed to such toil, yet grew resentful of the hardships he fancied himself forced to endure. In turn, he abandoned the farmer. The chronicle portrays this departure as a deliberate choice of theft over honest labor; it paints the man in terms of moral reprobation, though the facts it records begin with this succession of forsaken employments and contemplated thefts.
He prowled about Bushey Heath, watching the travelers upon the road. The money he sought was to fund his revels, his merry-makings, and his country dances, according to the same authority. The chronicle does, however, record one distinct fact: he attached himself to a young woman of the district, and thereafter carried her to London with the professed intention of marriage.
Arrived in London, he found himself without coin enough to purchase a wedding ring. He informed her that he had inherited fifteen pounds, a legacy he must fetch from the country, and promised a speedy return. He quit the town, taking the road toward Neasden and Willesden Green, parishes where he had formerly dwelt. His design, as the chronicler recounts, was not to claim an inheritance: he intended to lie in wait for an opportunity to rob wayfarers and thereby scrape together the promised sum. He declared himself resolved to assault passers-by, yet at the critical moment his courage failed him.
The highway yielded none of the gold he sought. It being hay-harvest, the master of a neighboring public house observed him loitering when hands were needed. He offered him employment as a servant. Clark remembered that the household, save for the maid, would be absent in the hayfields. Once the master had departed for the meadows, he returned to the inn. Sarah Goldington had remained behind to draw liquor and attend callers. He was already acquainted with the maid, having formerly courted her.
He went in, resumed their former intimacy, and sat down to drink and converse. The talk held on for nearly an hour. Sarah suspected nothing, according to the narrative, of his felonious intent; Clark, however, feared that their past acquaintance rendered his undertaking far too hazardous. He resolved to dispatch her before seizing the money. His first attempt faltered: concealing his knife, he embraced her, but lacked the heart to strike. Returning to the assault, he cut her throat. Sarah managed to utter his name and struggled to regain her feet. Clark fell upon her anew, inflicting fresh wounds, and then made off with a meager booty. Seized with panic and confusion, he carried away very little.
He struck out along the London road. The prospect of passing Tyburn filled him with sudden dread; he turned back. It was then that he fell in with a waggon. The driver having injured his leg, Clark offered to guide the team in his stead, hoping thereby to avert suspicion. He was traveling upon this road when the men dispatched in pursuit of the murderer hailed him. They inquired whether he had seen any suspicious fellow pass that way. The question unsettled him. Upon inspecting him more closely, they perceived the blood upon his shirt-sleeve.
Clark replied at first that a soldier had insulted him upon the road, and that during their scuffle, blood issuing from the soldier’s mouth had stained his sleeve. He maintained this defense with great assurance, but soon perceived that they would not suffer him to depart. Whereupon, seized with violent agitation, he confessed the murder. The detour around Tyburn and the attempt to blend into the ordinary traffic of a carrier’s cart had failed to efface the visible token of his deed at the alehouse.
At the following sessions of the Old Bailey, Clark was convicted and sentenced to die. He subsequently strove, the chronicle reports, to compose his mind during the days he lay under sentence of death. His father came to visit him. After he had taken his leave, Clark recounted with deep affliction the words the old man had spoken: had he been condemned for any other crime, his father would have moved heaven and earth, enlisting every friend and connection to preserve his life; but a murder perpetrated with such barbarity could, in his eyes, be expiated only by his son’s blood.
The chronicle affirms that the circumstances of the murder touched Clark with remorse; it notes as well that he dreaded the hanging of his body in chains far more than death itself. In his final hours, Clark sought to govern the memory he would leave behind. He declared that he bore no malice toward the woman he had slain, and that he had indeed loved her. The account also notes a prevailing rumor that he had intended to sell the young woman he brought to London into Virginia; at the foot of the gallows, he denied any such purpose, while acknowledging that he had resolved to abandon her.
Lastly, he was anxious to clear his former companions of suspicion. He declared that no person had been privy to his robberies or shared in his guilt. He was thereupon executed, on the 28th of July, 1721, in the twenty-fourth year of his age.