A crowd of 200,000 watched today in 1724 as Jack Sheppard, safebreaker and highwayman was 'turned off' at Tyburn. Remember that odd little film Where's Jack? with Tommy Steele in the title role? Well, the real Jack was nearly that cute, apparently, with large, Johnny Depp style eyes and a slight stammer. He escaped twice from the condemned cell at Newgate and nobody knows quite how he did it. They just don't make rogues like him any more.
In other news ...
'It is beginning to be hinted that we are a nation of amateurs,' said Lord Rosebery today in 1900. The only annoying thing is that it took him so long to realize that.
