At Dumfries, a turnkey was struck down with a heavy stone during an attempt to break gaol. David Haggart snatched the key to the outer gate and fled. Hours later, concealed within a haystack, he learned that Thomas Morrin was dead. Throughout the months that followed, he traversed Scotland and Ireland under diverse names; when at last he was identified, he was conveyed back to Dumfries to answer for that blow.
Haggart was born near Edinburgh on the 24th of June 1801, the son of a gamekeeper in the service of a gentleman of fortune. The lad began by stealing a bantam cock from a neighbour; by the age of sixteen, according to Pelham’s chronicle, he had already taken to the high road alongside M’Guire, a young Irish pickpocket. Upon the racecourse, he made his first essay at robbing a punter in broad daylight. He tugged so violently at the man's pocket as to tear it away along with the money. The owner turned round upon the instant, but Haggart had already passed his booty to his confederate. The take amounted to eleven pounds.
The two youths subsequently frequented the fairs and races of northern England and Scotland. At Newcastle, they lodged in the house of a widow who took them for respectable travellers. Haggart went by the name of Wilson, his companion by that of Arkinson. They sat at table with their landlady’s three daughters and accompanied them to the playhouse. At times, one of the two would remain beside the young women while the other slipped out into the press of the crowd to mark out a pocket to pick.
In January 1818, whilst journeying toward Durham fair, they forced an isolated dwelling through a window. The master of the house offered resistance; they beat him, bound him hand and foot, and gagged him with a neckerchief. The other inmates, all women, remained too terrified to intervene. The robbers carried off about thirty pounds. Apprehended the following day at Durham, Haggart had changed his attire, and the victim could not initially swear to his person. He was set at liberty. Two or three days later, both he and M’Guire were retaken, clad in the very garments they had worn during the burglary.
Convicted of the crime, he was still awaiting sentence when he set about contriving an escape. Together with M’Guire and other felons, he undermined the wall of their cell and gained the back passage, but the turnkey came upon them. They bound him fast and took his keys. In the yard, several prisoners scaled the wall; M’Guire and another fell back and were taken. Haggart, however, made good his escape. He returned to Newcastle, then made for Durham with a Yorkshireman to assist in breaking M’Guire out. Two constables overtook them on the road. Haggart fired upon one of the officers, who fell; he continued his flight without knowing whether the man had been killed. Later, a rope ladder enabled him to clear the prison wall and convey a small saw to M’Guire, who cut through the bars of his window.
Parted from his companion following the latter’s capture at Kelso, Haggart returned to Newcastle, and thence to Edinburgh. A severe sickness brought him back for a season to his parents’ roof, but he was soon arrested for an earlier shop robbery. Upon his release, he resumed his thieving in company with a former fellow prisoner, Graham. He stole a pedlar’s pack together with bolts of linen, assumed the guise of an itinerant chapman, and disposed of the wares along the roads. On the 1st of March 1820, he was apprehended at Leith alongside an accomplice named Forest.
On the 27th of March, he prepared another escape. With a file, he severed his leg-irons, forced the door of his cell, and patiently laboured through a thick stone wall. He worked until midnight, resumed his toil upon the outer wall, and then summoned Forest to his aid. He likewise aroused a debtor, who assisted him in breaking the chain of his handcuffs. A few minutes before five o’clock in the morning, he had displaced stones enough to pass through. Seeing a man approach upon the stair, he took him at first for an officer; the man called out to him to run, swearing he would not stay him. Haggart nevertheless waited for Forest to emerge, took him by the hand, and drew him along in his flight.
At Dumfries, Haggart fell in once more with M’Guire, who had received sentence of fourteen years’ transportation. The chronicle soon places Haggart within Dumfries gaol, where other prisoners proposed an escape. Laurie wished to stun the turnkey; Haggart initially deemed violence needless, hoping to secure his own deliverance by other means. A prisoner under sentence of death, M’Grory, pressed the design; Haggart at last consented to overpower the principal turnkey, Thomas Morrin, and seize his keys. The turnkey Hunter had gone to the races. The conspirators called for Morrin upon some pretext. Haggart sprang forward and dealt him a blow with a heavy stone, dashing him down the stairs; he then took the key to the outer gate from his person.
Dunbar snatched up the stone, and Simpson seized Morrin by the shoulders, striking his back against the steps; Haggart pushed past them, crossed the yard, and unlocked the gate. Haggart fled alone; Dunbar joined him without. The moment an officer came in sight, the two fugitives doubled back, but Dunbar was taken. Haggart covered nearly ten miles in less than an hour. He cast away his coat, cleared a hedge, and ran across a field where labourers were digging potatoes; these men joined in the hue and cry. He reached the woods of Cumlangan and concealed himself near the edge. Once the pursuit had passed, he made for Annan and slept in a haystack. A woman speaking with a boy brought him the tidings that Morrin was dead.
He pressed on with his flight, disguised himself in the rags of a scarecrow, and at length returned to Edinburgh. He showed himself but little and altered his course whenever he feared he had been marked. At Belfast, Robert Platt, who had been confined with him at Dumfries, pointed him out as the escaped murderer. Haggart affected an Irish brogue and swore he had been born in County Armagh. The magistrates placed him under the guard of two yeomen; he plied them with drink, seized upon their inattention, and leapt from a window.
At Dublin, he joined forces with a pickpocket named O’Brien. Upon the quay, he observed a man in a threadbare coat who had just offered eighteen guineas for a horse. Groping carefully, Haggart found a purse through a tear in the coat’s back pocket and made off with ninety-five gold guineas, besides sundry bank notes. During the days that followed, the pair took fifty-four pounds at the entrance to a theatre, purchased new clothes, and set off in a carriage with two women. Their month-long excursion through several counties cost them upwards of one hundred and ninety pounds. Having returned to Dublin virtually penniless, Haggart took to the road once more on foot.
His final apprehension occurred following a robbery at a fair near Downpatrick. At his trial, he was sentenced to seven years’ transportation. As he was led from the bar, he was recognised as the Belfast fugitive and transferred to Kilmainham. There he endeavoured to mine through the wall with several fellow prisoners, but an inmate raised the alarm. Haggart was the first to emerge through the breach; he received a blow, and the soldiers secured the fugitives before they could surmount the outer wall. He was then handcuffed, and an iron engine was placed upon his head, an iron tongue entering his mouth to prevent him from speaking. On the following day, he was drawn up in the yard alongside hundreds of prisoners. Richardson, a Scottish officer, identified him. Haggart attempted his feigned accent once more, but the officer addressed him by his true name. He was dispatched under a heavy escort to Dumfries. Upon his arrival, a vast concourse of people awaited the prisoner. As he ascended the stair, he was obliged to pass the very spot where Morrin had fallen. He later wrote that the stones there seemed to burn his feet.
He was subsequently conveyed to Edinburgh to stand trial for murder. Pelham records that the evidence was found sufficient, and he received sentence of death. For a fortnight, Haggart appeared indifferent; he then declared that he would make no attempt to escape, even were the doors thrown open, for death was, in his eyes, the only means left him to atone for the crimes he had committed. On the morning of the execution, following the chaplain’s prayers, an officer directed all strangers to quit the cell. Haggart cried out: “I take it that is the hangman.” His composure deserted him for a moment; he paced the room with folded arms, his countenance marked with despair. He recovered his calm when the man entered, knelt to pray, and addressed a few words to the multitude. He was executed at Edinburgh on the 18th of July 1821, three weeks after completing his twentieth year.