Dundee, and particularly the outlying districts of the Hawkhill and the Scouringburn, began to relax a little. For a few months there was peace; people could worry less about their property when they were at work and could walk the streets with more confidence. The quiet, however, could not last when the streets were not policed and youths were bored, frustrated and knew only violence and theft as a means of existence. In early spring 1823 the jail opened its doors and the young men of Wallace’s gang swarmed back into the streets. They had no jobs, no permanent homes, no future and no reason to like the authority that had locked them up or conventional life that had constantly rejected them. The gang collected: Gardiner, Gray and the Shaw brothers together again, roaming the streets, breaking into houses, breaking heads, and breaking every law they could. When temptation forced Peter Wallace from the straight and narrow to the broad path he knew so much better, mayhem was as inevitable as the tide of the Tay.
Robbery was a way of life, theft from houses and shops a pastime, violence habitual, but with Wallace’s astute brain behind them they soon found a novel way of making ends meet. For years there had been a virtual war in Scotland between those who illegally distilled and sold whisky and the forces of the Excise, backed often by the military. Dundee was a natural target for the whisky smugglers, having a growing and thirsty population and being within striking distance of the Highlands. One well-trodden route for this peat reek was by way of the Angus Glens, the Sidlaw Hills and the notorious smuggling village of Auchterhouse. Usually on foot and driving a packhorse, the smugglers headed for the western suburbs, congested, busy and full of hard-working and hard-drinking millworkers. It was even sweeter that there were no peace officers on patrol, so the smugglers made hay while the sun shone. However, Peter Wallace saw his opportunity and decided to rob the smugglers.
After all, what could be easier? The smugglers could hardly complain to the authorities. The commodity they carried had a ready market and it was being taken right to the hunting ground of Wallace’s gang. As the smugglers slid from the countryside with its patrols of dragoons and Excisemen, they relaxed, and walked into the ambushes set by Wallace. On one notable occasion Wallace’s gang watched while revenue men and smugglers exchanged blows and calmly carried off the prize: two ankers of finest peat reek, the illicit whisky of the Highland glens.
It could not last, of course. Sooner or later even the patience of the Dundonians would break and retaliation would be harsher for the months and years of torment. The behaviour of June 1823 provided the spur. First there was the Sabbath day riot, but that was followed a few days later by a further incursion into the Scouringburn. One of the Shaw brothers wandered in, alone, unsupported and probably drunk, but no doubt sure that the reputation of the Wallace gang would defend him. As usual, he was aggressive, pushing people aside, but when he knocked a woman to the ground, the people of the Scouringburn turned on him.
A crowd gathered to help the injured woman and Shaw ran, but the Scouringburn blood was up and they chased him. Jumping over garden walls, Shaw hid in an outhouse, but the people followed, kicked down the door and dragged him out. There was a flurry of boots and fists until Shaw was subdued, somebody tied his hands with a piece of rope and he was hauled unceremoniously to the lock-up house and thrown in to await the judgement of authority. And although Peter Wallace was locked away, Dundee was not yet finished with the pestilent gang that had caused so much terror.
If the members of the gang had taken any note of public affairs they might have been more on their guard. Following the suggestion of the local Justice of the Peace, the people of the Scouringburn had held a meeting and sworn in a body of acting constables to patrol the streets and keep down predators such as the Shaws or Peter Wallace. Forty volunteers had come forward, determined to restore order to their neighbourhood, and every night they marched, eight at a time, in search of Wallace’s followers.
One by one the pests were hunted down and arrested. One of the most violent was Alexander Gardiner. When he was seen in the Fish Market, a long way from the Scouringburn, a peace officer moved in at once. Gardiner did not come quietly and in the ensuing struggle he tried to throttle the constable and might have succeeded if a street porter had not run to help. Subdued and arrested, Gardiner was thrown in the lock-up house, with two porters standing on guard. Catching Gardiner, however, was not quite as easy as holding him, for while the porters remained stubbornly in place at the front of the lock-up house, some other members of the gang slipped over the back wall, forced open the door behind the sentinel’s back and freed their companion. The porters apparently saw nothing.
The war against Wallace’s gang continued, with skirmishes constant and victories on both sides. The Scouringburn constables dragged the streets, searching every known depraved den and filthy haunt of the gang. They started at the Witchknowe and ended at the Wellgate where they located Ferguson, grabbed him and hauled him, protesting and swearing, to the lock-up house. They entered the long, densely packed Overgate and found the second Shaw and another man, possibly Scott, in the festering sewer of Broad Close. The two fugitives, as instinctive as any hunted animals, scrambled up the side of a house, slipped over the roof and descended into Tay Street, where they jumped a fence and headed for their own territory of the Scouringburn. However, the constables were tenacious and followed hard on their heels. Shaw and Scott were both arrested in a seedy close off Small’s Wynd and joined Ferguson in the lock-up house.
The gang was being whittled down, but rather than go into hiding, the remnants continued to act as if they were immune to justice. On the evening of Wednesday 24th June, John Gray and Ferguson were again on the rampage. Once more in the Scouringburn, they picked on a quiet man named Robert Petrie, punched him to the ground, kicked out some of his teeth and bloodied his face. Gray might have stabbed him to death if his mother had not made a belated appearance and hauled back her son. The drama was resolved when a group of locals came hurrying up and the attackers sauntered away, laughing as they reminded each other of Gardiner’s escape from confinement.
The squeeze continued, however, and Alexander Gardiner was soon once again in jail. He had been with a group of wild men in David and Helen Mathewson’s pub in the Hawkhill. The Mathewsons were probably well aware of the gang’s reputation and would watch them closely. The drink had flowed freely, but the money to pay for it was less forthcoming, and when David Mathewson saw one of Gardiner’s companions stealing from a wall press he immediately challenged him. The thief made a quick exit out of the nearest window. David Mathewson slammed Gardiner into a chair and warned him to stay there until he saw what had been stolen. Gardiner tried to hit Mathewson with a bottle,Mathewson blocked the blow and his daughter ran out of the pub to find a policeman, slamming shut the door behind her, but not before Gardiner’s other companions slipped free.
At some time in the next few moments Gardiner thumped Mrs Mathewson, so the publican and his wife must have been relieved when their daughter banged on the door, and shouted she had brought a policeman. Mathewson opened the door, but was shoved to the floor as Gardiner’s companions began a rescue mission. Everybody rushed outside, with Gardiner’s friends threatening to kill the publican, but even so Gardiner was arrested and hustled into captivity. It seemed as if Wallace’s gang was effectively broken. Wallace was in jail, along with both the Shaw brothers, Alexander Gardiner, Gray, Scott, Ferguson and the two Stewarts. The war had been waged and the forces of the law, ragged and as yet unorganised, had been victorious.
It was 9th October before the trials were held, and that Thursday David Jobson of Haughhead, one of Dundee’s most eminent men, and David Blair of Pitpontie held the court in the Town House, the same building that contained the cells in which Dundee’s most infamous pests were held. After hearing of the reign of terror the Wallace gang had put Dundee through, the Justices of the Peace were not inclined to mercy.
James and John Shaw pleaded guilty to committing assaults and riots in West Port and t
he Scouringburn; both were banished from Forfarshire for five years. If they were found in the county in that time they would spend three months in the cells on bread and water. The Shaws listened impassively, showing no emotion as their fate was read out to them. Exile was no light punishment, for it meant separation from friends and family and could mean destitution and the life of a beggar, for who would employ a banished stranger? As it happened John Shaw paid so little heed to the sentence that he was back in Dundee by the weekend, and got three months on bread and water for his trouble.
Scott and Gray were handed the same sentence and bore the disgrace with the same lack of fear. As they left the court they exchanged cheerful greetings with Alexander Gardiner, much to the chagrin of the massed ranks of the respectable, who hoped for repentance or, even better, dismay at the severity of the sentence. Gardiner, now twenty-three and described as a ‘stout-looking fellow’ was more inclined to complain than to cringe before the majesty of the court. When details of his scrimmage at the Mathewson’s pub were read to him, he did not deny anything, but stated he had been kept in irons before the trial. In return he was reminded that he had already tried to escape from the authorities, and he was told he would remain in jail and in irons until the Circuit Court in Perth.
The Dundee Great Escape
If the authorities had thought about it, they might have considered putting extra guards on Dundee’s most daring criminals, but by the time they realised their fault it was too late. Once confined in the upper storey of the jail, the members of Wallace’s gang, together with the other assorted riff-raff of the town, contrived their escape. While Gardiner and a notorious thief named Rose Bruce industriously spun yarn, it was Ferguson who discovered that the wall of their cell was merely lathe and plaster. He hacked his way through without much difficulty to find himself in the upper lobby of the jail. There was nobody on watch, the jailer lived in Castle Street and the watchman remained in the guardroom as Ferguson casually lifted the keys from their resting place and opened the cell doors. It was the work of a triumphant moment to release Gardiner from the fetters that held his feet and then all they had to do was leave the building.
There were seven prisoners in this Dundonian version of the Great Escape: Ferguson and Rose Bruce, John Shaw and Alexander Gardiner, David Scott and two women, Robertson and Thomson, who had been imprisoned for returning to the town despite being outlawed. In the early hours of an October Sunday, while the good people of Dundee were still asleep, they entered the Town House jail kitchen, opened the window and, tying rope to the restraining bars, lowered themselves to the ground. However, things now began to go wrong.
Word of the intended escape must have leaked, for the turnkey saw the mother and sister of one of the prisoners lounging at the back of the jail and chased them away with insults and dire threats. Duty done, he retired to the guardhouse, from where he heard a scuffling noise that must have been the prisoners working their way down the wall. By the time he left his chair and peeped outside, most of the prisoners had vanished into the tangle of closes behind the jail, one was lying on the ground in obvious pain and another was by her side.
Robertson had slipped from the rope while descending the wall and had fallen heavily, and her companion Thomson had remained by her side, preferring loyalty to her friend than freedom with a guilty conscience. In the twenty minutes it took Charles Watson the jailer to come after being summoned from Castle Street, all the other escapees had vanished.
Having gone to so much trouble in capturing the wild young men of Wallace’s gang the first time, the authorities had no intention of allowing them to escape. Town officers were sent to scour the streets, an express was sent on a fast horse to Patrick Mackay who was in Forfar, and everybody was put on alert for a sighting of the outlaws.
Almost immediately there were results. William Clark, one of Dundee’s town officers, traced Scott and Gardiner to Tealing, a tiny village a few miles to the north, and arrested them before twelve o’clock the next day. In the meantime, Patrick Mackay was in pursuit of the others. After riding through Angus and eastern Perthshire, he found traces of his quarry and followed the trail to the west, asking questions, offering descriptions and using all the power of his official position to catch the escapees.
A reward was set for Ferguson, who was required for his promise to turn King’s Evidence in another high-profile case involving a major robbery at Colonel Chalmers’ house, but Patrick Mackay saved the town’s finances by capturing him in Glasgow. Mackay next proved his high reputation by also putting Shaw and Rose Bruce in his bag, and while Shaw was outlawed from Dundee, the others were conveyed back to gaol. There Gardiner, Ferguson and Gray waited for the spring circuit and the decision of a higher judge; the rest just waited for the drear days to drag past.
It was always a scene of high drama when the Dundee prisoners were sent off to Perth for trial, and April of 1824 was no exception. Half the town seemed to turn out to watch the fun, support their friends or weep for loved ones who might be destined for the gallows or Van Diemen’s Land. If anything there was more excitement than usual, for Ferguson had again attempted to escape, attacking the turnkey with more aggression than forethought and had been once more subdued and despatched in irons two days early. From before first light to high noon, any Dundonians not busy at work packed the High Street to witness the convicts depart, while the escorting Scots Greys sat on their tall horses, watching for any attempt at rescue.
The judges at Perth seemed to be arbitrary in their decisions. While John Gray was released with his case found not proven, Alexander Gardiner was tried for theft and housebreaking, found guilty and sentenced to seven years’ transportation. There was no chance of reprieve and Gardiner would know his next seven years would be spent under a harsh regime in a land nine months’ travel away. On 4th November 1824 he was one of 210 convicts transported to Van Diemen’s Land. But Gardiner’s fate only seemed to make the remaining members of Wallace’s gang more contemptuous of law and order.
Within a few days of his returning to Dundee from his trial, Gray was suspected of stealing clothes from the bleaching green at Upper Chapelshade. As he was under sentence of banishment from an earlier case, he was taking the risk of an uncomfortable time on bread and water under the care of Charles Watson, but he was not alone. Scott was back in Dundee, and Peter Wallace had also completed his term of confinement and was roaming the streets that had given him a living but not much else. Once again, however, the authorities acted and Gray and Scott were thrown into the upper storey of the Town House. Mr Mackay was also busy, for he collared John Shaw and sent him to join his friends for a few weeks.
The next months were like a merry-go-round, with Wallace’s gang returning to their old haunts, being picked up and thrown into jail. Scott was again in the cells at the end of June; Rose Bruce, likewise banished but caught robbing a house in the Overgate a few days later, also returned to the cells. No sooner was she out than in August she was back inside, having been caught in the Murraygate. Scott was next, with Patrick Mackay picking him up in early September and escorting him back to the cells. By now the authorities were tiring of Rose Bruce and banned her from the county for life, but she returned to Dundee, was spotted by Mackay and speedily locked up in a gaol which by now must have seemed like her second home. She was followed by Scott a few days later and Shaw the following week, but then Gray and Bruce came under the influence of a far more predatory personality. Peter Wallace was after bigger game than the few pennies he might find in the poor houses of the Overgate or the Scouringburn.
By November 1824 Wallace realised that returning to Dundee merely invited arrest. Instead he remained in the countryside where he was not so well known. Basing himself outside Carnoustie, a few miles north of Dundee, he may have visited Montrose on a thieving expedition, but he certainly gathered what was left of his old companions and grabbed the pack from a travelling pedlar. The pedlar, however, was not inclined to see his livelihood disappear and yelled
for help. A number of country folk rallied round, helped by the fortuitous appearance of Mr James Hunter, a local solicitor. Rose Bruce and Gray were both caught, but Wallace, who had been carrying the pack, dropped it as a decoy and ran. Mr Hunter trussed Bruce and Gray to a cart and trundled them south to the gaol they knew so well.
The Legacy of Peter Wallace and His Gang
Alone once more, Wallace was suspected of robbing a shop in Forfar after neatly cutting through the window, and was also reported in Dundee; sightings and rumours were numerous, but he proved elusive until in the middle of the month he made a couple of minor mistakes. Roaming in southern Perthshire, he arrived at Dunkeld, saw an Army recruiting party and enlisted under the name of either John or Thomas Barry (his writing was not the most legible). Remembering that Wallace had already made one attempt at holding down a respectable job, and crediting him with more intelligence than his companions, it is worth considering if he was genuinely hoping to make a fresh start. Or was he hoping to grab the enlistment bounty and disappear? With a man as obviously complex and clever as Wallace, either is possible, but the evidence seems to suggest the former, for after receiving the initial advance of the bounty, he returned to Perth to be sworn in.
As he entered the magistrate’s house where the ceremony would take place, two of the day patrol constables were waiting for him. One tends to imagine that the Army lost a first-class recruit, but instead Wallace’s hands were tied, he was bundled into the Perth–Dundee packet boat and unloaded at the pier where he was reported as looking ‘crestfallen’. Once again Wallace, together with Gray and Bruce, faced a sheriff and jury, and once again sentence was pronounced.
A Sink of Atrocity: Crime in 19th-Century Dundee Page 12