HISTORY OF BANK

The Paisley Union Banking Company commenced business on 9th September 1788 although the records suggest that an earlier start had been delayed by the Partners on account of "the great number of Bankruptcies which have of late happened both in England and Scotland."  The subscribed capital was £10,000 of which £5,000 was paid up.

As the name suggests the main place of business was Paisley where competition existed from the Paisley Banking Company which was established in 1783.

THE PARTNERS

The Founding Partners were

The Edinburgh agents of the Bank were Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Company, who provided a credit of £5,000. 

The Glasgow Agency was the largest of the several agencies established and was run by James Elliot Henderson of Enoch Bank, Partner.  He was succeeded in 1802 by Andrew Templeman who remained as Agent until his death in 1829, when he was succeeded by William Walker who remain in the post until the Bank amalgamated with the Glasgow Union Banking Company in 1838.

The first Glasgow office was at 17 High Street although was moved to Hutchison Street (premises owned by James Elliot Henderson), then to 17 Glassford Street.  In 1800 the office was relocated to the South East corner of South Frederick Street and Ingram Street. 

Officials.

This is a list to which I hope to add as the site develops.

***** Hamilton, Accountant (Source) - See Robbery of the Paisley Union Banking Company (below).

James Elliot Henderson, Agent, Glasgow (Source) - Letter owned.

John Likly, Cashier, Paisley (Source) - Various letters owned.

David Robertson, Cashier, Paisley (Source) - Various histories.

John Robertson, Porter, Glasgow (source) See Robbery of the Paisley Union Banking Company (below).

Andrew Templeman, Agent, Glasgow (Source) - Various letters owned.

William Walker, Cashier, Paisley (Source) - Various histories,

Robert Walkinshaw, Writer, Glasgow (Source) - Walkinshaw took part in the pursuit of the robbers in 1811 and is then described as John Likly's "friend and Agent" although the inference is that Walkinshaw was a Legal Agent.  While this may well have been the case several letters owned suggest that he was also acting as a "Banking" Agent insofar as he recommended loans for Clients.  These letters do also refer to Andrew Templeman being in Glasgow and further research is required.  Walkinshaw was certainly writing to Likly as early as 1801.

Banknotes.

Banknotes were produced in the following denominations and Kirkwood & Son of Edinburgh were always retained as Engravers.

One Pound - 1827.

One Guinea - 1788 and 1822.

Five Pounds - 1788.

The bank amalgamated with the Glasgow Union Banking Company in 1838. 

The most remarkable event in the history of this Bank occurred at the Ingram Street, Glasgow Office on 13th July 1811.

Robbery of the Paisley Union Banking Company

The following account of the robbery of the Paisley Union Banking Company's Glasgow office is taken from Peter Mackenzie's "Old Reminiscences of Glasgow" (Volume 1) which was first published in 1865.  Any copyright will have long expired!

MacKenzie has a tendency to elaborate on matters which were important to him at the time.  This does make the passage rather lengthy and whilst I would recommend reading the entire passage (it makes for a good insight to the times) I have tried to assist by adding sub headings in red to help identify the key areas.

EXTRAORDINARY BANK ROBBERY IN GLASGOW

PURSUIT OF THE ROBBERS TO LONDON

THE WONDERFUL CASE OF HUFFEY WHITE,

AND SENTENCE OF DEATH ON JAMES McCOUL, &c.

        Our neighbouring Burgh of Paisley was no small drink in this our City of Glasgow, fifty or sixty years ago.  It had here its "Paisley Bank."  It had here also its Paisley Union Bank. The branches, or the agencies of these two banks in Glasgow, did a very considerable deal of business.  The office of the first mentioned bank, was for a long time in one of the ancient tenements near the Cross of Glasgow, opposite the statue of King William, in which same tenement the branch of the present flourishing City of Glasgow Bank recently did its business for several years, under the agency of Mr. William Robertson, till it, removed that good branch to the fine new tenement, recently erected nearly opposite the Tron Steeple, which previously stood the tenement wherein the illustrious Sir John Moore, the hero of Corunna, was born.  The Paisley Union transacted its business in what was considered to be a very beautiful building in Glasgow fifty years ago - in that building to the east, in Ingram Street, nearly opposite Hutchesons' Hospital; and from the front door of the Hospital, this old Paisley Bank office may be viewed still to some advantage.  It forms No.s 49 and 51 of Ingram Street, now occupied by Messrs. Reid and others; and although this Bank, with the other one above named, has long ceased to transact business under those titles, being merged in modern banks still alive and active, yet the old Paisley Union will form the subject of a most extraordinary affair, or rather a chain of the most extraordinary and marvellous circumstances, that proba­bly ever occurred in this city or kingdom.  These, we shall now endeavour truthfully to narrate in our present Reminiscence, and with an interest which will increase and be developed towards the close of it.

            Our readers, however, will please in the first place, to observe the fact, that the office of the Paisley Union Bank as seen now, was very different from what it was, as seen then, viz., in the year 1811, with which year our story begins. 

           Nearly opposite to the Paisley Union Bank, a very celebrated woman at that time in Glasgow, viz., Mrs. Neil Munn, kept a tavern for carriers' quarters, &c.  It has been demolished to make way for modern buildings. Farther on, but nearly opposite the Bank, there was a long dead wall running on the north side, of Ingram Street.  On the east and west, on the south side, there were some beautiful gardens, no longer in existence covered over with the haunts of busy commerce.  Downwards a little to the right, there was the famous Glasgow Bowling Green of old, now forming the site of our City Hall, and bustling Bazaar, in the Candleriggs.  And thus the Paisley Union Bank was seen towering in its pride of place fifty years ago.

            Standing at the old wall near Mrs. Munn's stables, which some yet in Glasgow may remember, any stranger had the best opportunity of reconnoitring the appearance of the Bank, and that it was anxiously reconnoitred at the period referred to, by certain strangers then in Glas­gow, there cannot be the smallest reason to doubt.  This Paisley Union Bank, we may remark, did also a very large business in Edinburgh.  Sir William Forbes & Co., now represented by the great Union Bank of Scotland, were its agents in Edinburgh; and regularly on every Saturday morning, it was the custom of Sir William Forbes & Co. to make up and send a large supply of bank notes, and gold guineas, and silver, in exchange, or otherwise, for the supply of the Paisley Union Bank in Glasgow, during the following week.  There was a strong iron bank box fitted for the purpose, and the porter of the Bank in Glasgow, used regularly to attend the arrival of the Edinburgh Mail Coach at the Black Bull Inn, here, on Saturday afternoon, and fetch away the well chained box, with its valuable contents, to the Bank premise; in Ingram Street, where it was duly and safely deposited within the other huge iron safes of the Bank itself.

            On Saturday, the 13th of July, 1811, the remittance from Sir Wm. Forbes & Co. was unusually large.  It amounted to many thousands of pounds; and the bank porter had some difficulty in carrying the precious load to its assigned place; but he managed to do so in perfect safety.  The Bank was now carefully locked up for the night; and the keys thereof, together with the key of the great iron safe, were duly taken to the dwelling-house situated in St. Enoch Square, of Mr. Andrew Templeton who was the chief Manager of the Bank in Glasgow.  It happened that this was the Fair week of Glasgow.  The trusty porter of the bank, and his douce and faithful spouse, who had apartments for themselves in a separate department of the bank, took it into their heads to walk down to the Green of Glasgow, on that fine summer Saturday evening to snuff "the caller air," and to see the Shows, which then flourished in all their pristine inno­cence in those days.  There was no outlet by any steamers from Glasgow at that time, and of course, none by any railway; and it was a great thing on Saturday, to take a jaunt on “shank’s naggie," and behold Dumbarton Castle!  Mr. Templeton, we may remark, was one of the tallest and stoutest men we ever remember of seeing in Glasgow.  He was much respected.  He was that year Chief Magistrate of the Gorbals; and he was, for several years after­wards, in the Magistracy of the city.

The Discovery.

            When the porter or his wife, as was their wont, got the keys of the Bank from Mr. Templeton's house, in St. Enoch Square, on Monday morning to open the front doors of the Bank and to sweep out the office, they found everything apparently correct, as usual.  But when the Manager himself entered with the key of the iron safe to take out the notes about ten o'clock, for the business of the day, a very different state of matters presented themselves.  The drawers of the press in the inner safe in which the Bank's own notes to a large extent had been deposited, stood rifled, and were completely empty:  nothing left but bills for discount or falling due.  Sir Wm. Forbes & Co.'s iron box also stood open, and was completely rifled.  Every gold guinea, and there had previously been piles upon piles of them in the bank coffers, had disappeared; the silver also: so that this morning, the Bank in Glasgow was absolutely left without a shilling in its coffers.  The loss indeed was enormous; some guessed it at £30,000 sterling, at least; others at £50,000 or more, - a vast abstracted loss surely for one Bank establishment at that time in Glasgow; but for prudential reasons, affecting perhaps its own stability, the Bank never con­descended to state the precise amount.  We shall give, however, a tolerable idea of it afterwards.  Meanwhile, it was sufficient to know, that the Bank had been broken into and robbed of all its most valuable treasure; and this, of course, created a perfect panic, and the utmost, consternation in Glasgow, and especially at Paisley, on the following day, when the news became known, and for many a long day afterwards.  Every Paisley Union Bank note that made its appearance was questioned and re-questioned by its vendor, times and ways without, number.  Bank notes, indeed, of every description, were handled with much uneasiness and doubt, as if coming from the hands of traceable robbers. The following advertisement appeared in the two Glasgow newspapers of the day and in placards over the city and elsewhere:  -

REWARD OF FIVE HUNDRED GUINEAS.

DARING HOUSEBREAKING AND ROBBERY.

Whereas, the office of the Paisley Union Bank Company in Ingram Street, Glasgow, was this morning discovered to have been broken into since Saturday night, and Bank notes of the above and other Banks to a very considerable amount carried off.

A Reward of Five Hundred Guineas is hereby offered for the apprehending of the person, or any of the persons, guilty of the above daring Robbery: to be paid, on conviction, by Mr. John Likly, Cashier of said Bank at Paisley, or Mr. Andrew Templeton, at the Company's Office, Glasgow.

And if any such information shall be given by an accomplice as may affect the discovery and apprehension of any other of the offenders, and lead to the recovery of the property, he will be entitled to the above Reward, and His Majesty's most gracious Pardon will be applied for on his behalf.

It is requested of all Banks and Banking Companies, and of the Public in general, to take notice, and give information as above, or to Mr. John Bennet, Procurator-Fiscal of the City of Glasgow, of any suspicious persons or circumstances tending to a discovery of the offenders, for the recovery of the property; and, to stop any notes which may be offered in exchange or otherwise, under suspicious appearance, till due investigation; for which, suitable reward, and all expenses will be paid as above.

Information may also be transmitted to the house of Sir William Forbes, James Hunter & Co., Bankers in Edinburgh, or to any Banking Company in the neighbourhood of the place where any dis­covery may be made.

Glasgow, Monday, 15th July, 1811.

How it Happened.

         It happened singularly enough, that on Sabbath morn­ing the 14th of July, as early as three or four o'clock, a decent tradesman of the city, whose name was David Clacher, in the employment of our old friend, Deacon James Graham, wright, when looking out of the window of his house in Taylor Street, in the upper regions of the city, which afforded a distinct view of the wall at Mrs. Munn's tavern, opposite the bank above described, beheld the unusual sight of three men leaping over that wall; and when they landed on the inner side of it, excluded as might be supposed from all observation at that particular time, he saw them sitting down on the green sward, and busily arranging various parcels of paper, and other things of that sort, and tying them up eagerly in napkins, handkerchiefs, or bags, and then exchanging some of their own body clothes, and adjusting their cravats and great-coats, and then carrying away the bundles.  He watched those seemingly strange movements a little longer from motives of mere curiosity; and he kept his eye steadily upon the three personages, till he saw them wending their way apparently to the old Coach-yard then in George Street, where he unavoidably lost sight of them.  He called the attention of his wife to these circumstances at the time, and she concurred with him in thinking that there was something remarkable about them, especially so early on a Sabbath morning, in that quiet and then sequestered spot of the city of Glasgow, now teeming with its busy thousands.

               We have stated that the news of this vast and daring robbery, when divulged, created a perfect panic in the city; and David Clacher above referred to, when hearing of it, and consulting with his wife, like a good citizen, lost no time in hastening down to the Bank, and telling what he had seen near the Bank premises, on that Sabbath morning, as above narrated.  We heard all this many a time from Mr. Clacher himself, and others.

            Instantly, on Clacher's statement, Mr. Fiscal Bennet hastened up to the George Street Coach-yard, kept by old Mr. Alexander Leith - Sandy Leith, he was usually called - who had a place besides, in the High Street, for gigs, saddle-horses, sedan-chairs, post-chaises, &c. Many a good hire did we pay to him in our early days.  We have passed through our hands some of his drafts on Grahame of Gartmore, and others, per the Ship Bank, for two hundred guineas at a time, and oftener for much higher sums; but it must not be supposed that we squandered that money, or anything like it, on ourselves.  We introduce the circumstance, because it gives us the opportunity of saying, that Sandy Leith, undoubtedly, was one of the original and greatest horse - coupers of his day in the city of Glasgow.  Next to him, we would probably name Thomas Hibbert; and not going  down, but rather rising in a greatly extended sphere, we would name our old respected friend, Mr James Walker, whose activity in the Tontine Hotel, was proverbial many years ago; nor must we overlook his enterprising junior Mr. Andrew Menzies, and others.  It may be amusing here to state the fact, that Mr. Alex. Leith, who was, we repeat, the greatest postman of his day in Glasgow, (irrespective of Mr. Bain of the Mail Coach Office) had only five or six chaises in his possession altogether, with some thirty or forty horses at the utmost; whereas, we might now count easily enough on at least five hundred chaises, vehicles, or omnibuses, and not less than 1500 posting horses in the city of Glasgow.  And see, all this now, without taking into account the prodigious traffic by steamers and railways, then utterly unknown.  Have we not then been living in a city of progress - in a world of wonders?

               This digression, for such we again acknowledge it to be, only brings us back the more prominently to old Sandy Leith, the king, as we may call him, of the post­ masters and saddle-boys of Glasgow, fifty years ago.  His nose, unfortunately, had been nearly bitten off, by one of  his own favourite horses, perhaps in a fit of good nature,  when he was rubbing it down kindly in his own stables; but he was a good and worthy man, esteemed for sagacity, good humour, and perfect honesty.  The visit, however, of Fiscal Bennet, about the Bank robbery, put him rather “out of sorts," as he often acknowledged to us; but he told the truth without the slightest hesitation.  In answer to the interrogatories of the Fiscal, he and his hostler remembered perfectly, that on the Sunday morning above specified, between the hours of five and six o'clock, they were rapped out of their beds by some gentlemen who wanted a post-chaise immediately for Edinburgh.  The worthy old carle, for such we may here also call him, had some qualms in his conscience about hiring his chaise on Sunday to any strangers whatever, unless in cases of necessity and mercy.  He com­plained that the order for the hire of the chaise had not been communicated to him in due time on Saturday night; whereupon one of the three personages adroitly remarked, that a near relative had taken suddenly unwell in Edinburgh; and that they required to go and see him post-haste.  On this, the scruples of Mr. Leith were effectually removed; the horses ordered to be fed for the journey; which done, the chaise was soon brought out, and the bundles, bags, and portmanteaus duly deposited therein; and away the chaise rattled with its three passengers. The information and description of them given by Sandy and his hostler to Fiscal Bennet, led to the following publication:-

The Search in Glasgow.

It being ascertained that three men, believed to be strangers, left Glasgow under suspicious circumstances about six o'clock on the morning of Sunday last, the 14th of July, in a post-chaise to Airdrie, and proceeded eastward, of the following descriptions, viz.:—

    1st. A man about five feet ten inches, stoutly made, and active a full plump face and ruddy complexion - full stuffed neck cloth, dark coloured long coat, light coloured blueish striped wide pantaloons or trousers - wore over-boots - dark eyes, black short hair, somewhat pitted with smallpox - a dark coloured greatcoat, which he occasionally carried over his arm; sometimes spoke in the English accent, and sometimes Scotch.

    2d. A man about five feet eight inches, lightish made, pantaloons or trousers like the other, and sometimes wore over-boots - long dark coloured coat.

These two appeared somewhat like gentlemen.

    3d. A man five feet nine inches high, slender and ill-made long coat, dark coloured; shoes and light coloured stockings.  Dress and appearance rather like a tradesman.

It is particularly requested of the inhabitants of the city of Glas­gow and vicinity, that any circumstances known concerning these persons or any one of them - the time of their residence in Glasgow - the direction in which they came - their lodgings, and the places where, and persons with whom seen while in Glasgow, may be com­municated immediately to Mr. Templeton or Mr. Bennet. And the names of those who may make such communications will be concealed, if desired

            Meanwhile, Mr. John Likly, the head manager of the Bank in Paisley, came in to Glasgow, and after consulting with his friend and agent, Mr. Robert Walkinshaw, of the firm of Messrs. Walkinshaw & Dow, writers, in the Stockwell, afterwards Messrs. Walkinshaw, Dow, and Couper, who ultimately had their chambers in the Bank premises in Ingram Street, - Mr. Couper is still alive, hail, and hearty, and is at the head of the firm of Messrs Couper, Mackenzie, & Innes; - it was resolved that Mr. Likly and Mr. Walkinshaw should take out their seats in the next mail coach, and proceed to London, to instruct, the Bow Street police officers respecting the robbery; while Mr. James McCrone, the famous messenger-at-arms in Glasgow, should pursue his scent in another direction.

          Singularly enough, when stopping for a few minutes at Darlington on this journey, Mr. Likly ascertained that in that very inn, three gentlemen had arrived in a post-chaise and four on Monday - that they called with all expedition for four fresh horses - that they drank hurriedly two bottles of wine, and paid the charges with a Paisley Union Bank note again, receiving back the difference, and that they sought and obtained change from the innkeeper of another £20 note of the same bank, which notes he still retained in his possession, and they were shown by him to Mr. Likly, who at once  identified them.  The innkeeper at Darlington could not really tell whither the gentlemen went in their post-chaise and four.   He only knew that they had gone off on the London road, but he gave such a vivid description of their persons as left little room to doubt that they were the same as Sandy Leith had described in Glasgow.  Quick as horses' legs could carry them, Messrs. Likly and Walkinshaw proceeded to London; and arriving there, they immediately waited on Stephen Lavender and John Vickery, at the Bow Street police office.  These two officers, we may remark, were in great repute at that time.  They were considered to be the most expert police officers that London ever had; and they died, we believe, many years ago, leaving no inconsiderable fortunes derived by the rewards they had received for the successful performance of many of their duties.  They took up the Glasgow Bank robbery case, with great gusto.  It was just the very case they liked to have; and they assured Messrs. Likly and Walkinshaw, that ere six days elapsed, if the robbers were really within any of the four corners of the city of London, they would have them entrapped and carefully secured with their booty.

The Search in London.

            The six days assigned by the Bow Street officers, Lavender and Vickery, had now nearly elapsed; but no trace of the robbers found in London.  In Glasgow, how­ever, and while Messrs. Likly and Walkinshaw were still away in London, a most extraordinary piece of informa­tion was obtained, which we shall now relate.  A respect­able widow woman of the name of Stewart, who kept lodgers, and resided near the then end of the Broomielaw, at the foot of Carrick Street, a very quiet and secluded part of Glasgow it then was, gave information to the authorities that, for some weeks preceding the robbery, she had three gentlemen lodgers in her house whom she took to be Englishmen, - that they were very quiet in their manners - dined regularly every day at two o'clock - saw no company - went out sometimes very early in the morning to fish, they said, on the banks of the river - (nor was this, by-the-bye, any joke, for although the banks of the river are sadly polluted now, we have seen as many as twenty fine fresh salmon caught in it per net and cobble, on a Monday morning in June, near the very steps of the stairs of the present Glasgow Custom-house!) - but in the evening, she remarked, they oftener went out, to go they said, to the Theatre Royal, in Queen Street, and frequently did not return till one, two, or three o'clock of the morning; but as they were so very quiet in all their movements, and paid their lodgings regularly every week, she had really no suspicion of them all the time they remained with her, which was for a period of nearly two months.  She now remembered, however, that she had seen them occasionally handling and assorting some skeleton keys.  She observed some plans or drawings of keys, and other implements, once or twice on their table; and she remembered of carrying herself, at their special request, a parcel containing some, of those plans or drawings, to Messrs. Howie or Hardgreaves' quarters, in Brunswick Street, who were then the great carriers between Glasgow and London, which parcel was addressed to somebody or other in London; but the name she could not at the moment recollect.  She was certain, however, about the parcel going to London and she further remembered that one of the gentlemen, about three weeks before the robbery, had gone away, as he said, on some business journey to Liverpool or Bristol but that he would return to Glasgow in about a fortnight which he did.  She distinctly mentioned this other fact, namely, that they called for their bill, and finally settled with her for the amount of it, on Saturday night, preced­ing the robbery; and the description which she gave of them tallied exactly with the description which Sandy Leith, and the innkeeper at Darlington, had given, and as before narrated.

            The blunt information, which this decent honest woman (long since dead) had thus given of the skeleton keys, and the parcel to London, turned out to be of the greatest importance.  It was speedily communicated to Messrs. Likly and Walkinshaw in London; and by them it was forthwith communicated to Lavender and Vickery, the two London police-officers, who were beginning to think that the discovery of the robbers in London was getting rather hopeless; for they had expended much of their time, with their retinue of expert assistants, in tracking every coach and mail coach in London - every post-boy - every vehicle - every tavern of good or bad repute: besides the quarters of all the money changers known in London, - to no purpose.  They had also been at every bank in the city of London; but not one of the abstracted notes could there be found.  This fresh information, however, arriving from Glasgow about the parcel and the skeleton keys, made a new light to dawn on the London detectives, and excited their highest hopes and expectations.  They went directly to the Glasgow wagon or carrier's office in London.  They searched out the way-bill.  They got it, and fixed their eyes on one remarkable designation as follows: - "For Mr. Little, care of Mr. John Scoltcock, blacksmith, in Tower Street, off St. George's-in-the-Fields, London."  On perceiving that address, Lavender and Vickery quietly rubbed their hands with ecstasy.  They were now, they thought, and thought truly, scenting out their game - inasmuch as this Mr. Scoltcock was known to them to be a most notorious character for making false or skeleton keys, for the most accomplished robbers in London; and the Mr. Little, to whom to his care this Glasgow parcel was addressed, was suspected or con­sidered by them to be one of the greatest robbers, without exception, that had infested England.  His real name was Huffey, or Henry 'White.  He had a few months before been caught and convicted for robbery, and sen­tenced to transportation to Botany Bay for life; but he made a desperate and successful escape from the Hulks at Portsmouth.  Search was made for him in many parts of England, in vain; and these practised and expert London police officers had come to the conclusion, that Huffey would never turn up till some other great and daring robbery occurred.  They had, therefore, such a case now fairly presented to them from Scotland.

            Their cogitations, as may now be supposed, were intensely directed to the whereabouts of Huffey White, and his Glasgow parcel.  They were all aware that he had left a wife in London; and they knew her residence, and had often watched her movements long before the Glasgow robbery had taken place.  But they came to the prudent resolution, as it turned out to be, not to disturb her at this time, but to go at once and surround the blacksmith's house, in the first instance, and to search all about it.

            It is proper, after the description we have just given Huffey White that we should now introduce to the notice of our readers, the other dramatis personae - his associates and fellow lodgers in the house of Widow Stewart, at the Broomielaw, &c., &c.  The first of those characters, and the greatest by far of importance, was Mr. James Moffat, alias McCoul, who performed the extraordinary part which this Reminiscence will soon describe, and which will render his name for ever famous or notorious in the criminal annals of Scotland; and the other or second personage, was one Harry French, a London thief, famous at lock picking, for which quality he was the confidant of Mr. McCoul. Those three per­sonages, viz., Huffey White, James Moffat or McCoul, and Harry French, we may here repeat, completely answer the original description in the Glasgow papers before referred to.

            The Bow Street police officers were now thoroughly armed and equipped for the important task before them.  But before noticing it further, we must here remark, that neither Huffey White nor Harry French could read or write; but Mr. McCoul could do both: he was rather an expert scholar, and to him therefore the gang committed the charge of the precious notes, as best knowing the real value and bearing of them.  He had thus, as he fan­cied, not merely the absolute control of the notes, but the destiny of his guilty associates in his own hands.  He had partly arranged with them for some shares of the plunder; but he took especial care to keep by far the most convenient and precious part of it to himself; and when the guilty trio reached London, which they did early on Wednesday or Thursday morning, Mr. McCoul gave to Huffey White and Harry French a few Bank of England notes out of the robbed parcel got in Glasgow, in order to enable them to go and see their dulcinas in London, and to make all things ready for an agreeable division of the whole spoil, in the course of the following night.  They therefore cordially and sincerely agreed to meet on that night, in the house of their old friend, Mr. Scoltcock, the blacksmith, and then finally arrange how to melt or smash the Paisley Union Bank notes, or get them disposed of for gold or other monies in London, through the agency of certain resellers, then as now, we are afraid, reaping a villainous but lucrative occupation.

                Mr. Scoltcock, the blacksmith, was, as may be ima­gined, perfectly delighted to see his three very particular friends back again safely to London.  They let him know how they had "done the job" to an enormous amount in Glasgow; and they were laughing and crow­ing at the feats of Mr. McCoul in particular, who not getting the skeleton keys to suit his hand at first in Glasgow, had gone back to London to get a fresh set prepared, which ultimately answered; and this accounts for the absence of McCoul, who pretended to his landlady, Mrs. Stewart, in Glasgow, that he was away on a visit to Liverpool or Bristol.  They also, over their cups and pipes, described to Mr. Scoltcock, how often they had been in the Bank in Glasgow under cloud of night, or early in the morning, measuring and trying the keys - how often they had been alarmed and scared in their purpose - how, on one occasion in particular, on a Sun­day, they thought they were caught and done for, by the unexpected opening of the front door of the Bank, and the entrance of the porter into the lobby; they kept quiet, but had their pistols cocked, and their daggers ready to plunge into his body; but happily for himself, the porter came no farther than that lobby to carry away some umbrella; and by a piece of the most marvellous good luck for themselves at the time, they saw the porter retiring and locking again the front door of the Bank, he having no earthly conception of the ugly customers then armed within, who, there can be no doubt, would have murdered him on the spot rather than be captured.

The Robbers Celebrate.

            It is singular to relate, but it is the fact, that although the robbers on that occasion had complete possession of the Bank, they did not think there was money enough in some of the Safes, to tempt them to take it then away.  They therefore, at great hazard to themselves, carefully relocked the doors, and came away skaithless, determined to await the arrival of a larger parcel of notes and specie from Edinburgh, the movements of which, on Saturday afternoons, they had for some time been carefully watch­ing.  That opportunity, they thought, had at last arrived, by the heavy parcel we have already alluded to, from Sir William Forbes & Co.  They therefore determined to accomplish the robbery - neck or nothing - neck or every­thing, on this subsequent Saturday night, or very early on Sunday morning.  Hence they settled their lodging bills with Mrs. Stewart at the Broomielaw, on Saturday evening, and bade her good bye.  With their dark-lanterns, ready keys, and practised hands, they soon found their way back again into the more precious Safes and coffers of the Bank.  They now rifled them most completely - taking away everything but the copper money; and even on some of it they had laid their daring hands.  Never was robbery so coolly and daringly perpetrated in this kingdom.

            We may now therefore view, if we can, these three daring robbers, all safely and snugly arrived in London, with some £30,000 or £40,000 of good genuine Scotch bank notes to dispose of, without speaking of the gold and silver, seldom difficult to be disposed of any where at any time.  Huffey White's wife, in London, was perfectly overwhelmed with joy, when she beheld her husband for the first time after his daring escape from the Hulks, entering her lodgings about three o'clock of the morning, and making her acquainted with this run of tremendous good fortune.  He at once gave her a £10 or £20 Bank of England note to procure some necessaries; and told her, that with his share of the vast booty, he intended to sail to America, but if she would not accompany him, he would settle upon her £50 per annum - not bad for a robber's wife, certainly.  Harry French, the other confe­derate, had also formed the resolution of going to America with his share of the booty.  Mr. McCoul signified that he did not know very well what to do; but probably he would reside in some remote corner or other of England, as a gentleman living on his means, and perhaps forming other schemes of Bank robbery.  Those, undoubtedly, from their statements, appeared to be the resolutions and arrangements of this gang.

            Huffey White's wife, rejoicing in the great good for­tune of her husband, but still concerned for his personal safety, proposed or cordially went in with the arrange­ment, that they should sojourn for a short period in the house of Mr. Scoltcock, with whom and his wife she had always been on the best of terms.  She had then no idea that Mr. Scoltcock had been making the skeleton keys for Glasgow, or receiving any parcels from Glasgow, otherwise she might have fancied that his house was not the very safest place for them.  But to it they went.  In it the gang had all joyously assembled, and it was most agreeably arranged that they should have "a good supper" over the division of the spoil that evening, in Scoltcock's house.  His wife got a £20 Bank of England note to provide for the vivers.  Mr. McCoul went away to the place where he had carefully secured the chief bulk of the booty, but he faithfully promised to return with his friend, Mr. French, at the supper time.

The Capture.     

            The reeking roasted goose, broiled harm, and chickens, dumplings, new potatoes, and green peas, grapes, straw­berries, and cucumbers, yea, every delicacy of the season, were now all ready, and placed on the table, in Mr. Scoltcock's snug house, with jugs of ale, pots of double stout, gin, rum, brandy and wine, beyond compare.  The banquet, in short, was sumptuous in the highest degree, for this precious company, and only awaited the arrival of the two important guests, Messrs. McCoul and French.  Rap-tap! came to the door, and the blacksmith's wife rose from her cushioned seat, and was beginning from her inner chamber to scold the anticipated guests for detaining them so long from the ready supper, when lo! who should enter, swift as arrows, but Lavender and Vickery, the two Bow Street police-officers, with an attendant retinue of assistants.  The scene at that instant must be left to the imagination of our readers.  We simply narrate the real facts.  And here it is superfluous for us to observe, that the London police officers immediately recognised Huffey White, and made him their prisoner.  The sup­per arrangements were, of course, thrown into a state of indescribable confusion.  Huffey found himself help­less; but he made a desperate attempt to dash through one of the windows; - they overpowered him, and manacled him at once with their patent handcuffs, well knowing what a dangerous character he was.  They then searched him from head to foot, and discovered upon his person abundant evidence of the Glasgow (Paisley) Bank robbery.  In one of the departments of the blacksmith's house, they also discovered the very box which had been sent up from Glasgow, with a plan of the skeleton keys, besides several letters from McCoul, addressed to Mr. Scoltcock, directing some secret altera­tions to be made; and on this, the whole of the inmates, consisting of Scoltock and his wife, and Huffey and his wife, and one or two other chosen friends, were taken away as prisoners, and lodged for the night in Horsemonger-lane Jail.  The evidence was thus pretty complete.  But where was the chief actor, Mr. McCoul, and his other guilty associate, Mr. French?  Where were the parcels containing the bank notes?  They had Huffey in durance; but where was the treasure?  Like the fox near his trap, but scenting from afar, Mr. McCoul, and his friend Harry French, wheeled about from Scoltcock's house and nestled for the night in a snug den in the neighbourhood of Horsemonger-lane Jail: and soon afterwards negotia­tions were opened up with the London police officers for the release of the prisoners - for thieves even can enter on their negotiations - and it was proposed that if the Bank officers would grant a free pardon to Huffey White, and get him released from prison with the others, and allowed to go at large, the Bank would receive back on his account, the sum of  £12,000 in name of ransom money.  It may seem strange to be told now, that such a proposal was actually made, entertained, and positively accepted in the city of London, at the period referred to.  It was virtually a compounding of felony; and this very case, with others which occurred, led to a most wise, but stringent alteration of the law, whereby it was made a high crime or misdemeanour, to compound with felons under any circumstances; and this is the state of the law now.  But at the period referred to, strange to say, Mr. Huffey White, on the payment of that £12,000, absolutely received his free pardon.  Mr. Scoltcock and his wife, and Huffey and his wife, were liberated from prison; and shortly thereafter, Mr. Likly, in company with his agent, Mr. Walkinshaw, returned to Glasgow, rejoicing probably, that they had been so successful in this the first part of their negotiations in London.

            One might suppose, that with such an hairbreadth escape attending him, Huffey White, in particular, would take precious care of his hand now, - and not risk his neck in such jeopardy again.  He despised, poor fool, the admonitions of his really loving wife, - and like a har­dened miscreant, he formed a fresh plan for the robbery of the London and Leeds Mail.  He was within a few months afterwards, caught in the very act of that rob­bery, tried and convicted, and sentenced to be executed; and he was executed accordingly at Northampton, with the character ascribed to him, of being one of the boldest and greatest robbers of his day, in all England

The Escape of McCoul.

            But what became still of Mr. McCoul and the other?  And what became of their share of the plunder in con­nection with the Glasgow robbery?  We have disposed of Huffey himself, effectually, and for ever.  But we must bring his wife again upon the tapis, in connection with the extraordinary statements we are now about to make.  It begins, we almost think, to look like a sort of romance now; but the grave reality of it, we can truly aver, is beyond all dispute.

            Mr. James Moffat, alias McCoul, the far more accom­plished but daring robber, had eluded the grasp of the London police officers for many months; but at last, he too was caught by Lavender and Vickery.  His associate, however, Mr. French, was never heard of.  Some conjec­tured, and others believed, that McCoul had poisoned or dispatched him, and purloined his large share of the booty; while others thought he had escaped to America.  Be that as it may, we can trace him no longer on the scene; and therefore we are now to speak about Mr. Moffat alias Mr. McCoul, himself, more particularly.

The Capture of McCoul.

                When he was captured by the police officers in London, he had nothing but gold and Bank of England notes in his possession; not a particle ostensibly belonging to the Paisley Union Bank, or any other bank in Scotland.  He at first stoutly denied that he had ever been in Scot­land, - he emphatically denied that he had ever been in Glasgow; and of course, he equally denied that he had ever occupied lodgings in the house of Mrs. Stewart, at the Broomielaw, - that he knew nothing whatever about Ingram Street, or the Paisley Union Bank.  In short, he declared that he was wholly innocent of this Bank robbery.

            Therefore, he was reprimanded for a time, as they call it in England; and it now became necessary to send up witnesses from Scotland to identify him if they could, in presence of the Lord Mayor, or Magistrates of London.  That was easily done.  David Clacher, the wright, and Alex. Leith, the chaise-hirer in Glasgow, with the innkeeper at Darlington, were dispatched to London; and on their arrival thither, and seeing Mr. McCoul in the Bow Street police office, they hailed, him at once, without much hesitation, as their transient, but now captured friend.  He disdained to make the slightest recognition of them, averring that he had never seen them in all his life.

          Anticipating this seizure and arrest of McCoul in London, old Mr. John Bennet, the once vigilant Procurator Fiscal of Glasgow, applied pro forma to the Magistrates of Glasgow for a warrant to "secure" the person of the said James Moffat, alias McCoul, as "guilty, accessory, art and part, of the foresaid theft, bank robbery, and housebreaking, and to imprison him within the Tollbooth of Glasgow, therein to be detained, till liberated in due course of law."

                 It is singular to observe, that this warrant of the Magistrates of Glasgow, was not committed to the hands of any of their own officers in Glasgow, but was specially entrusted to Mr. Archibald Campbell, the then well known and celebrated criminal officer of the Sheriff and Magistrates of Edinburgh, who went up with it expressly to London, and saluted Mr. McCoul for the first time; but he afterwards became much better acquainted with him, as the extraordinary sequel will show.

            The identity of Mr. McCoul being thus clearly estab­lished in London, the Lord Mayor, without hesitation, indorsed the Glasgow warrant, committing it to the special charge of his own officer, Mr. Wood, a most faithful London officer he was, who with the above Mr. Archibald Campbell from Edinburgh, were enjoined to chain Mr. McCoul both by the arms and legs, and to bring him by the mail coach safely down to, and land him in, the Tollbooth of Glasgow.

                They all arrived in this city on the morning of Friday, the 10th of April, 1812; and in the Jail books of Glas­gow of that date, Mr. McCoul was duly entered, as any­body who doubts our story, may see at this day.

The Release of McCoul.

                    After being in Jail for some weeks, and no active pro­ceedings against him being taken - whether from the want of other evidence or not, we shall not at this stage say - he sought the advice of two most respectable legal firms then in this city, whose successors are still extant; and they thought they had discovered some flaw or other in the original warrant of commitment, which, if sus­tained by the Court, would entitle him to be discharged from prison.  They therefore presented a bill of suspen­sion and liberation, in the name of McCoul, to the Lords of Justiciary in Edinburgh; and on advising this suspen­sion, the Lords actually adopted the views of Mr. McCoul's legal agents in Glasgow, and granted warrant for his immediate liberation from Glasgow Jail.  This was done on the 2d of July, 1812, on which day he left the Jail of Glasgow rejoicing.

                 Emboldened by this legal success, he returned to London, defying warrants of any kind; for he had the Justiciary written extract warrant of liberation in his possession, which was entitled to faith, as he was advised, over the three kingdoms.

                  After the lapse of three years, thinking that everything about him had been forgotten, he returned again to Scot­land, with an elegant female, whom he palms off as his wife; and they take handsome lodgings at Portobello, in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh, where, with a retinue of servants, horses, and carriages, they lived for a time like people of the first rank.  They were promptly and liberally paying for their entertainments with ready money, in the shape of £20 notes of the Bank of Scot­land, and other banks; but with none at this time of the Paisley Union Bank; and against those other eminent and enviable bank notes, no sort of suspicion was then in any quarter entertained.  With the facility thus given to them by the interchange of those notes in Scotland, which, there cannot be the least doubt, induced McCoul to return hither away from the eye of the old London detectives, he encroached so much on his success, that he even frequented with his supposed wife, the Theatre Royal, and some of the most fashionable hotels in Edinburgh, and passed others of his £20 notes with the greatest alacrity, adding to his bills of fare, a handsome douceur to the waiters, and receiving back the difference on his large notes with admirable politeness and compo­sure, more so, perhaps, than would have been displayed by the most distinguished visitors of our land.

                   It was his cunning drift, of course, to get all the stolen, notes disposed of as easily and conveniently as possible, within this part of Scotland, without the aid of foreign money-changers or resetters, or the payment to them of their exorbitant charges.  He chose rather a new scene for his work now.  He went down to Leith, and presented himself to one of the Branches of the British Linen and Commercial Banks there, taking out with the greatest nonchalance from his pocket, a large parcel of genuine notes of the Bank of Scotland, and requested an order for a corresponding amount, either on the Bank of England, or that bank's own agents in London, which was, of course, immediately complied with.  On another day, he came equally confident with another parcel of the notes of Sir William Forbes & Co., for a very large sum, and asked for a similar draft on London for the amount, which he of course, again, most easily obtained.  He tried his hand a third time with a parcel of notes of Sir Wm. Forbes & Co., amounting to £1900, including some £800 notes, tied together, of the Paisley Union Bank!  He was now plunging unwittingly into the very vortex of the robbery.  The bank tellers were rather surprised at this last display, for they began to talk and remember of the robbery that had occurred in Glasgow, three or four years previously.  They therefore bade him sit down for a little, while they secretly sent for an expert police officer of the name of Denovan, who, after getting an " inkling" of what had occurred, came boldly forward and taxed him at once with palming off the stolen notes of the Paisley Union Bank, &c.  It is a strange fact, but true, that Mr. McCoul, who at first stood mute, but looked astonished and indignant at this charge, on recovering his self possession, had the assurance to say, that if the Bank people would give him the promise that these were really part of the stolen notes of the Paisley Bank, he would in the meanwhile give them up, rather than be troubled in the matter; and with an increasing degree of bolder assurance, he positively requested the Leith Bank people to retain the notes till he made some farther inquiry for his own satisfaction on the subject; after doing which, he would return to the Bank at Leith, and learn or communicate the result in a day or two afterwards.  He gave his address at Portobello, - all right.  On this plausible offer and bold pretext, he was actually allowed to make his exit from the Leith Bank, not exactly like a bird of Paradise, but rather like a bird of passage, " now upon the wing."  It is needless to say, that he never re­turned to that Bank again.

                Scotland, he doubtless thought, was now becoming rather hot for him; so he packed up his trunks at Portobello, with all expedition, and fled with his dulcina by a circuitous route back again to London, taking especial care to have the authenticated extract warrant of the Lords of Justiciary in his favour, wrapped up and carefully secured in his breast pocket.  It was more precious to him than gold or notes, he then thought, to any amount at that time.  But what does this gentleman Mr McCoul, after safely getting to London, next do?   Why he goes boldly to an attorney's office to take legal advice about the money he had left in Scotland, viz., the £1800, contained in the parcel of Sir Wm. Forbes & Co.'s note, and the £800 of the Paisley Union as before stated.  He is advised both by London attorneys, and London counsel learned in the law, that " possession of moveable, pre­sumes property" - " that a fortiori possession of bank notes, presumes the lawful right thereto in the hands of the possessor," which can only be destroyed by positive proof to the contrary, such as that the possessor had knowingly and wilfully obtained them by fraud; and since there was no proof of that description against Mr. McCoul: on the contrary, as he set up the statement that he had gained the notes by horse-racing with strangers on the Sands of Musselburgh and Portobello, and other places, he must therefore be regarded as the bona fide holder of them.  On that most plausible plea - sometimes irrefragable in law - his London attorney, as by him advised, wrote a letter to the Manager of the Bank at Leith, and also to the Manager of the Bank in Glasgow, demanding restitu­tion of the £1800 sterling!  The Banks, of course, are astonished at the effrontery of such a letter, with such a demand, and pay no attention to it, nor to another one from the same channel, threatening now an action at law, to compel restitution of the money!  And in this situa­tion of matters, what does Mr. McCoul himself next do?  Why, he comes boldly down again from London to Edin­burgh.  He takes up his abode in the city of Edinburgh - not for the purpose of passing away any more of the stolen notes through his own hands, but for the ingenious purpose of establishing his right to a "jurisdiction" in Scotland, whereby he might prosecute an action in his own name, before the Lords of Council and Session, against the Paisley Union Bank Company, for payment to him of the above sum, with interest and expenses!!

McCoul's Legal Action Against the Bank..

                          It may seem incredible, but it is the fact, that such an action was absolutely raised.  And it may seem equally incredible, but it is also the fact, that such action led to the most extraordinary results that ever took place in any of our Courts in Scotland.  We are much mistaken, indeed, if we do not astonish the whole of our readers with what follows.

                Not only did he raise his action for £1800, but lie demanded "damages" to a large amount, from the Paisley Union Bank Company, in consequence of what he was pleased to call their "illegal and unwarrantable imprison­ment of him in the Jail of Glasgow," which, he con­tended, was sufficiently proved by the extracted warrant of liberation of the Lords of Justiciary in his favour, as before set forth.

               He was well aware, before the action was raised, that his early companion and associate in crime at Glasgow, viz., Huffey White, had been executed, for another crime, in England; and, therefore, that he had nothing to fear from Huffey, any more than from poor Harry French, whom, it was alleged, he had despatched by his own instrumentality long ago.  He learns that Mr. Likly, the Manager of the Bank, who went in pursuit of him to London, is dead; that his old landlady at the Broomielaw is also dead, and that Alexander Leith has removed from his old premises in George's Street.  This notable: pursuer therefore thinks that he is pretty snug and safe, armed at all legal points, in his great action against the Paisley Union Bank: and the Bank, brooding over their previous loss, begin for the first time to get rather afraid of the issue of it.  They are driven, of course, to the necessity of defending themselves in the action; other­wise decree would go forth against them for the large amount demanded by Mr. McCoul.  They refer in their defence to the robbery.  He has the unblushing effrontery to deny it.  He has the unparalleled effrontery to insinu­ate that if there was any robbery at all, it was the persons connected with the Bank that did it themselves!!  He goes on in this way from month to month, and from year to year, with his great suit, or process, in the Court of Session - or rather there are two or three huge law pleas going on at the same time - McCoul versus the Bank, and the Bank versus McCoul, et e contra; for it is singular to remark that the Bank were actually advised to bring an action against Mr. McCoul for £15,000, as his supposed share of the plunder.  These actions were joined together, ob contingentiam, as the lawyers say.  What marvellous proceedings these were to be sure!  Wholly unprecedented we venture to repeat, in the annals of litigation in this kingdom ; yet they were pleading away at this rate on both sides, through all the old, slow, and expensive stages of the Court of Session, for a period of fully more than five long years, when at last both, or all of these processes were remitted to the Jury Court for trial, which Court, we may remark, had then only been inaugurated for the first time in Scotland, under the auspices of the Right Honourable William Adam, Lord Chief Commissioner. The cases, thus so long and keenly litigated, were set down for trial before his Lordship, and a Jury, at Edinburgh, 11th May, 1830.  It was arranged that the Civil Suit, at the instance of the Bank against, McCoul, concluding for the £15,000, should be tried first, because that case would be decisive of the other one at his instance, for restitution of the £1800, and his damages.  The Counsel for the Bank, in these interesting cases, were Francis Jeffrey and Henry Cockburn.  The Counsel for Mr. McCoul were John Peter Grant, M.P., afterwards the Right Honourable Sir John Peter Grant, Lord Chief-Justice of India, Mr Archibald Alison, and Duncan McNeil, the present Right Honourable Lord President of the Court of Session, and First Magistrate of Scotland.  What a galaxy of talent on both sides of that bar whetted for the important issue !

The Bank's Legal Action Against McCoul.

                The Bank, of course, led their evidence.  They clearly proved  the robbery to  the extent of nearly £50,000.  When Mr. Hamilton, the Bank Teller, was giving his evi­dence on that head, and speaking to the description of the notes as he last saw them in the Bank safe imme­diately before the robbery, Mr. McCoul, who was present in the Court, had the impudence, irrespective of his Counsel, to put some most improper questions to Mr. Hamilton, which raised the disapprobation of the Lord Chief-Commissioner.  "Mr. Moffat," said his Lordship, "Mr. Moffat you must not interfere in that way;" where­upon Mr. Jeffrey, the sharp and glowing Counsel for the Bank, gave him this deg - "Mr. Moffat," said Mr. Jeffrey, with his flashing eyes and indignant tones, "Mr. Moffat, I tell you what, sir - you had better go round to your own side of the bar;" and with that significant salute, Mr. Moffat, or McCoul, sat down silenced.  The evidence pro­ceeded.  Step by step the most conclusive evidence came out against him.  David Clacher, the wright; Alexander Leith, the chaise hirer; the tavern keeper in Edinburgh; the innkeeper at Darlington, with others had all been examined and interrogated; and the Council for the Bank at last proceeded to call and put into the witness box a young girl, who we must now for the first time introduce to our readers, viz., Margaret McAulay, a niece of Mrs. Stewart, the dead landlady at the Broomielaw, in whose house it will be remembered the robbers had lodged.  She had occasionally served them under her aunt while there, and it was thought she would now be able most positively to identify the prisoner, or defender, Mr. McCoul, who first denied upon the record that he had ever been in Glasgow before the robbery at all.  She be­came, therefore, one of the most important witnesses at this concluding stage of the case.  Seeing her approach the box, Mr. McCoul attempted, on some pretence or other, to slink out of the crowded court; but he was brought back and directly confronted with her.  The honest girl, without hesitation, swore to him most pointedly; she had no doubt whatever about his identity, that he was one of the three who stayed in her aunt's house at Glas­gow, for a period of nearly two months; and this, with the attempt he had just made to leave the Court, made a profound sensation both on the Court and the Jury, and all who saw it.  Suffice it to say, that after the discharge of some most eloquent speeches, pro and con, the Jury unanimously returned a verdict in favour of the Bank and against McCoul.

Guilty - or Not!

                Immediately on the verdict being given, Mr. McCoul, the now discomfited pursuer, or defender, attempted again to leave the Court and get away; and he did get away out of the Court for a short period, but the officers of justice were directed to keep their eyes sharply upon him; and within a few hours afterwards the Lord Advocate of Scotland, from the startling nature of the evidence disclosed in the Civil suit, had his Criminal warrant made ready for the commitment of Mr. McCoul to prison, accused of the original robbery.  The previous extract warrant of liberation on which Mr. McCoul had so long confidently relied, became now like a rope of sand, utterly useless to him at last.  The Lord Advocate, in himself, is the most powerful warrant of any in all Scotland.  He can commit, and re-commit, at pleasure, always under the control of the Court.  So Mr. James Moffat, alias McCoul, was speedily "Indicted" at the instance of the Lord Advocate, to stand trial before the Lord Justice-General and Lord Justice-Clerk and Lord Commissioners of Justiciary, for the Capital Grime of Bank Robbery, as aforesaid; and his trial fixed to take place, at Edin­burgh, on the 19th day of June, 1820.  It forms another separate and most astonishing case, and we hope we are not fatiguing our readers by giving it, as we now pro­pose to do.

                The cool impudence, the daring effrontery, of Mr. Moffat, alias McCoul, in the Civil Court, before the Lord Chief-Commissioner and Jury, did not avail him much in the Criminal tribunal before which he was now to appear.  He came, however, to the bar of the High Court, in custody of the Edinburgh jailer and turnkeys, with a bold and defiant look, at ten o'clock, on the morning of the day mentioned, viz., Monday, 19th June, 1820.  The Court, as might have been expected, was crowded to ex­cess.  On the bench were the Lord Justice-Clerk, Boyle; with Lords Hermand, Succoth, and Meadowbank.  There appeared for the Crown, Mr. Solicitor-General "Wedderburn; with Mr. Hope, afterwards Justice-Clerk; and Mr. Henry Home Drummond, of Blairdrummond, Advocate-Depute.  There appeared for the prisoner, Mr. Menzies, afterwards Lord Chief-Justice of Ceylon; with Mr. McNeill, the present noble head of the Court; and it is most pleasant for us, in common, as we are sure it is, with all the people in Scotland, to recognise him now in that most dignified capacity.

            It was then mooted that the prisoner's most able Counsel - Menzies and McNeill, then young men, not long at the bar - were to take objections to the indictment against the panel, in which, if they succeeded, he might still hope to escape.  The chief objection, we remember, was, that the criminal letters, or indictment, had not been served on the prisoner in presence of two attesting wit­nesses; and there were other objections which we need not describe.  Long and eloquent arguments were raised on both sides of the bar.  The Court at first seemed much struck with some of them.  They complimented Mr. McNeill on what they were pleased truly to term his “masterly arguments."  They intimated that they re­quired time to deliberate carefully over them; therefore the case was adjourned till Thursday.  On that day the Judges again met, but they repelled the objections taken by the prisoner's Counsel; sustained the indictment as relevant to infer the pains of law; and ordered the trial peremptorily to proceed on the following Monday morn­ing, at 10 o'clock.

Key Witnesses and Evidence Against McCoul

                It was now neck or nothing - life or death, for James Moffat, alias McCoul.  Long before the hour of trial the Parliament Square was again crowded; and when the doors of the Court were opened, the rush for admission was almost terrific.  All the witnesses for the Crown were duly marshalled.  They had been kept in safe custody for some days previous, as when the case was first called, and the above objections taken, it was found that a most material witness for the Crown was somehow or other absent; and it was feared, or surmised, that the case for the Crown might, after all, break down by that continued absence.

               Now all was ripe and ready for action.  In a bold tone the prisoner pled, “Not Guilty."  His declarations were first put in and admitted.  In these he had the assurance still to deny that he had ever been in Glasgow pre­vious to the Bank robbery of 14th July, 1811.  The robbery itself was again most clearly established by the evidence of Mr. Hamilton, the Bank accountant; by Mr. Hodgert, another of the tellers; and by old John Robert­son, the Bank porter.  Then the Counsel for the Crown followed this up by the clear evidence of the young woman lately referred to, viz., Margaret McAulay, who again identified the prisoner as being one of the very men who had lodged in her aunt's house, in Glasgow, for the period already stated.  This was fatal to his declaration of ever having been in Glasgow prior to the robbery.  Then Mr. David Clacher, the wright, who had viewed the three robbers behind the wall opposite the Bank, early on the Sunday morning of the robbery, arranging their parcels, recognised the prisoner as one of the three on that occasion.  He, the witness, had no doubt about him.  Then Mr. Alexander Leith, our old friend the chaise hirer, also identified the prisoner as being one of the three who came to him and hired his chaise for Airdrie, between five and six of that Sunday morning, and going away in it with their parcels.  Mr. Leith stated that while the chaise was making ready, they swallowed in his house, for he had the license, two gills of the best Jamaica rum, with two bowls of milk, besides bread and cheese in plenty.  This was their morning's breakfast, with the fruits of the robbery in their possession, amounting to many thousands of pounds sterling.  Then the different post boys, or chaise drivers, who rode to Edinburgh; besides the innkeeper in Rose Street, where they got their hurried dinner on Sunday, and drank a bottle of wine over it, all identified the prisoner, Mr. McCoul.  Mr. Boniface, at Darlington, who had innocently enough exchanged two of the twenty pound notes, also identified the prisoner at the bar.  This our readers may think might be deemed pretty conclusive, and perfectly sufficient evidence in any case.  But the Bank, in unison with the Crown lawyers, had determined to leave no stone unturned to obtain a sure conviction against the audacious prisoner.  Another important witness, there­fore, was called - no other than Mrs. White, the widow of Huffey White, his socius criminus, who had disgorged £10,000 or £12,000 to save his neck, when taken in Lon­don, and was set free; but was afterwards captured and executed, as we have already stated, for another most daring robbery, viz., the robbery of the London and Leeds mail coach.  She had disappeared from Court at the pre­vious diet - some thought she had been kidnapped by Mr. McCoul's agents - but she was now safely brought into Court by one of the macers, and all eyes were intensely directed toward her; and no wonder, for hers, indeed, was a most pitiable and remarkable life.  She - clad in deed mourning - calmly described the unex­pected arrival of her ill-fated husband from Glasgow in London, on Wednesday morning after the robbery - the candid account he apparently gave of it to her in perfect confidence - the great booty he expected from the hands of Mr. McCoul - the supper on the head of it, prepared for the banditti, in Scoltcock's house; who, it may also be remembered, had made, on the prisoner's special employment, the false keys for entering the Bank in Glasgow, on which we need not further dwell - with the sudden entrance of the Bow Street police officers - the seizure of the petrified husband - the escape of McCoul, or rather his non-appearance in Scoltcock's house when the officers took possession of it, all as previously narrated.  This witness, Mrs. White, from her position, and the singu­lar nature of her evidence, became a most terrible witness against Mr. McCoul, the prisoner at the bar.  But an important point was here raised by the prisoner's acute Counsel, viz., that this was not legal evidence to touch the accused, because Mrs. White's husband, on whose state­ment, or information, she mainly relied, was an infamous person, capitally convicted, and, therefore, that the Court could not receive such evidence.  The Court reserved the point, but received the evidence, cum nota, that is, for what it was worth, in the estimation of the Jury.  But, at last, a far more important witness than Huffey White's widow was called into the box.  This was Mr. John Scoltcock himself, the famous London blacksmith, of whom we have been narrating so much.  When the prisoner at the bar beheld him, as he steadily held up his right hand and took the oath, Mr. McCoul, for the first time in all his long experience, quivered and quailed, and nearly fainted.  This remarkable and important witness, guilty in many respects though he was, went on minutely to describe how he originally formed the acquaintance of Huffey White, Harry French, and the prisoner at the bar - how he was prevailed on by the prisoner to make an assort­ment of skeleton keys, blanks, pick-locks, punches, files, and other implements of house-breaking - how the prisoner corresponded with him by letters, from Glasgow, about some of the keys, and sent plans of the Paisley Bank, with some of the drawers and safes therein - how, when some of the skeleton keys did not exactly fit, Mr. McCoul himself came up to London, with wax figures and wooden models of some of the key holes of the Bank, to enable him, the witness, "to do the needful" - and how, after the robbery was accomplished, they came to his house in Tower Street, London, rejoicing over their spoil - their vast fortune, as they called it, in Glasgow - and promised to reward the witness himself handsomely, after he, Mr. McCoul, had "smashed,'' that is, converted, the Scotch notes into genuine gold; a promise, however, which the prisoner at the bar and his associates failed to perform.  They were " nick't," he said, in the very act of rewarding him, if the supper in his own house, on that fatal evening, had been safely digested!

            This, on the part of Mr. Scoltcock, who, some may think, should also have been an arraigned prisoner at the bar, was direct, special, and clenching evidence against the panel, Mr. McCoul.  His head was now drooping very low.  But another important witness from London was next called, viz., Mr. Wooler, a money changer, or trafficker in foreign and domestic notes.  He deponed to the fact, that the prisoner had actually proposed to deal with him for the disposal, at least, of some £14,000 or £15,000 of “Scotch Bank Notes," but that the proposal somehow was broken off.  It was utterly in vain for the prisoner to rebut this fresh, strong body of evidence by showing that, either by horse-racing, or any other contriv­ance, he had amassed such an enormous amount of Scotch notes, especially of the Union Bank of Paisley. Finally, the famous London police officers, so often referred to, viz., Lavender and Vickery, were called.  They gave, a short, but interesting, description of their searches in London in quest of the three robbers, ending by the catastrophe of that rare supper in London, which led to such aston­ishing results.

The Verdict; the Execution and Death.

                It was now drawing to midnight, when all the extra­ordinary evidence, on this extraordinary trial, was at last concluded.  The elaborate speeches of the learned and ingenious Counsel on both sides of the bar were then de­livered, with what effect may soon be seen.  The Lord Justice-Clerk, at broad daylight in the morning - for the Court had never once adjourned except for a few minutes to take some necessary refreshments - delivered his emphatic charge to the Jury.  The Jury, without retir­ing from their box, announced their verdict, unanimously finding the prisoner guilty of the capital crime, as charged in the indictment.  He was, with great solemnity, decerned and adjudged to be executed at Edinburgh, on Wednesday the 26th of July following, between the hours of eight and ten of the forenoon.  On hearing his sen­tence, which left little or no hope of mercy to him in this world, he became tremulous and deadly pale.  All his previous defiant looks either forsook or deserted him, or left him utterly prostrate; and it is a remarkable fact, that when the turn-keys visited him in his condemned cell soon afterwards, they could scarcely recognise him as being the same man, for the fine jet black hair of his head had become all of a sudden nearly grey.  Let physiologists, or other scientific doctors, descant on this as they may, the fact is perfectly true.  His fancied wife, or mistress, had been all this while hovering about Edin­burgh.  It was thought that with the sentence of death passed upon him, he would have made confessions, or re­velations, about many of the missing notes, or of other great robberies and crimes in which it was supposed he had been connected, including the robbery and murder, in Edinburgh, of poor William Begbie, the messenger of the Bank of Scotland. (McKenzie is mistaken here as Begbie was the Porter for the British Linen Company.) Great and unknown exertions were undoubtedly made for McCoul in influential quarters; for on the morning of Sunday, the 16th of July, a “respite" came down, from King George the Fourth, to the Lord Provost of Edinburgh, to postpone his execution for one month.  That month had nearly elapsed when another respite came down to him for another month.  That second month had also nearly elapsed when a third re­spite arrived, extending it "during the King's pleasure."  This was a most marvellous and tantalizing line of pro­cedure certainly, wholly unexampled in regard to the sacred exercise of the royal authority, in the criminal annals of Scotland.  It could only be defended, if de­fended at all, on the supposition that the condemned prisoner - now the wretched man - had some important revelations to make, about the remainder of the stolen notes, and other things.  None such were made by him.  His mistress, losing all regard for him, held them secreted in another place; she haughtily resolved to do nothing more for the condemned prisoner, and perhaps this is too often the way with the recipients of crime, after they have their wages of iniquity secure in their own pockets.  She now began to upraid the wretched culprit as a great villain, "richly deserving of the gallows;" and in that respect she had her wishes now very soon gratified, for the next de­spatch from the Secretary of State's office brought with it the imperious command to Execute James Moffat, or McCoul, on a day then named, in conformity with the terms of his original sentence.  Two or three days previous to the final day now fixed for execution in Edinburgh, viz., towards the 22nd of December, 1820, Mr. McCoul contrived to end his own life, by his own hand, by swallowing arsenic, or other poison, which had been secretly conveyed to him in prison, but by whom never known.  And thus termi­nates the trial and fate of Mr. James Moffat, alias McCoul, with which we have been so long troubling our readers. We leave them to judge whether we have created any fresh interest in it or not.

The Twist.

            But, in truth, the remarkable story is not yet finished. Another phase occurs about it which will probably startle some of them not a little.  Ten or twelve years after the above tragical termination of McCoul himself, in the con­demned prison of Edinburgh, an apparently respectable English traveller, from London, came to transact some business in Glasgow, as also in Edinburgh.  He opened up an account, and made a deposit in one of the Edin­burgh banks, for a sum of, £750 sterling, giving in satisfac­tion thereof, a similar quantity of genuine notes of the Paisley Union Bank.  Some of these notes were soon re­cognised by the Bank teller who handled them, as being part and portion of the old stolen notes of the Paisley Union Bank in Glasgow.  The traveller, on being ques­tioned, gave a candid statement of the way and manner he had received them in London.  He remembered per­fectly the name and designation and place of residence of the party who had so given him these notes in London.  He offered to remain in custody till the Bank in Edin­burgh satisfied themselves of his innocence on that point.  The Bank in Edinburgh immediately apprised the surviv­ing members of the Paisley Union Bank in Glasgow of the occurrence.  They sent for Mr. Henry Miller, a very famous officer - we are glad to say, still active and alive, who is the manager, at this moment, of the City of Glas­gow Guardian Society for the Protection of Trade, and to him, we think, we may confidently refer for confirmation of a considerable portion of the strange facts we are, now to relate.  The Bank, after a confidential interview with Mr. Miller, immediately despatched him to London.  On arriving there, he went, in the first instance, to old Mr. Vickery, the once famous police officer, who, having closed all his troubles, cares, and sorrows, with thieves and robbers, and all other culprits, great and small, was enjoying his calm and peaceful retreat in the vicinity of London.  Mr. Vickery was very glad to see his young, active friend, from Scotland.  The old gentleman, for he was a gentleman "to the manner born," chatted over some of his exploits, and his eyes glistened with anima­tion at the stories brought to mind about Huffey White and James McCoul, and the Paisley Bank robberies in Glasgow; and he gave Mr. Miller some important hints, as a "brother chief," in regard to the object of his journey, or the further prosecution of his inquiries in the metropolis.  After the colloquy with the renowned Mr Vickery, Mr. Miller proceeded, without loss of time, to Sir Richard Hall, the then active magistrate of the Bow Street Police Station.  Sir Richard also received him very agreeably on his important mission, and went heartily into the ex­plained business.  A warrant was speedily made out, or some authority was given, for immediate search and seizure, in the house of a well known gentleman, doing business in a certain way, on a pretty large scale, in the city of London; and who had a splendid residence out of London, with his carriage, and retinue of servants, &c., but as he is still alive, we may well refrain, in the mean­time, giving his name in this "delicate investigation," especially as we have no desire to injure him in the slight­est degree.  With the aid of a Bow Street police-officer, placed at his disposal by Sir Richard Hall, Mr. Henry Miller started on his important mission to the country house of the aforesaid gentleman, and reached it at an early, but not inconvenient, hour of the following morn­ing, ready to catch him, and make a careful search, or ex­amination of him, in his premises, ere he started, as he pretty regularly did, for his business in the city, or the Royal Exchange of London, in the forenoon.  Mr. Miller found the above gentleman quietly walking in his pleasant garden that morning, and examining his beautiful flowers.  He at once told him the rather unpleasant purpose of this visit; but not put about in the least degree by it, he rather smiled, and told, to the astonishment of Mr. Miller himself, that he had been apprised of it already.  He, therefore, in a tone of the most perfect confidence, desired Mr. Miller and assistant to search his premises in any way they pleased; but, at the same time, he warned them that if they went beyond their prescribed limits, he would make them responsible, though it should cost him thou­sands of Bank of England money.  He offered to meet them, in the course of the same day, at Mr. Miller's hotel in London, which was Gerald's Hall, off Cheapside Street, and to communicate to Mr. Miller, without breach of con­fidence, all the information in his power.  With this offer, apparently so frankly and sincerely made, Mr. Miller at once acceded, nor had he any reason to regret doing so, as the sequel will soon show.  True to his word, the gentlemen referred to, accompanied by an eminent attorney, met Mr. Miller in the above place; again warn­ing him a second time, that if he proceeded any farther, or published, or propagated, any statement whatever im­plicating him with the robbery, he would bring his action at law against him (Miller), and all concerned.  This was somewhat like Mr. McCoul in embryo, if we may call it, with his actions against the Paisley Union Bank Secretary.  Mr. Miller, however, responded with tact and civility in this strange encounter; and the short and the long of it was, that negotiations, in the most amiable, or friendly spirit, were soon opened up, about the "restitu­tion" of the remaining bank notes!

                Mrs. McCoul, now passing by the name of Mrs. Reynolds, had been living, richly and luxuriantly enough, since the death of her first husband in Edinburgh Jail, if husband he really was, in some freehold property - which she had purchased, there is little reason to doubt, with some of the spoils - in the neighbourhood of Gerald's Square, almost in the very heart of the city of London.  On the day after the above interview with the gentleman referred to, and his attorney, two other persons called on Mr. Miller, at his hotel, and, after exchanging some common-place civilities, requested to know the amount of "reward" that would be given if the remainder of the Paisley notes were quietly put into his possession. "Not one sixpence," answered Mr Miller, "though £10,000 of those notes were at that moment counted over to him,"  They stared with some surprise at each other.  They then commenced to ask him whether he had any inven­tory, or list, or numbers of the stolen notes, to prove them.  This, on their part, was a natural enough ques­tion.  Mr. Miller at once perceived its importance.  He answered it dexterously, but candidly. "I have," said he, "no inventory beside me this moment, but I can easily get it in a very short time; and if they would just have the goodness to wait upon him again, at the same place and hour, on the following day, he would then show it to them, with the precise numbers of the notes, and all about it."  They agreed to do this.  Mr. Miller, in truth, had no such, inventory in his possession; but, after they went away, he sat down, or rather he sat up all night, manufacturing an inventory out of his own brain.  He saw they were illiterate people, and could not read running numbers on any paper; but he did not allow them to go away, or slip from his fingers, without setting a careful watch on their motions, in order that he might pounce upon them in their own rendezvous, and search there, with the Lon­don police, if other things failed.  It has oftimes been stated that there is occasionally some honesty even amongst thieves, or their associates.  So the parties, true to their word, returned to Mr. Miller on the following day.  He at once presented them his own concocted in­ventory; telling them, besides, that all the numbers of the missing (stolen) notes were then perfectly well known to all the bankers in London, and to every banker in the kingdom; and that it was impossible any more of the Paisley Union Bank notes could be vended, without de­tection, followed by condign, or capital punishment.  They knit their brows, and again pressed him for some "reward!'  He was firm and resolute on that point, and would give nothing—no, not so much as one sovereign. They finally left him, but he, with his detectives, had them in his eye all the while.  He was now prepared, right seriously, to make capture of them, and arranging his plans for the following day; but this was rendered unnecessary, by the following unex­pected and extraordinary incident which now took place.  Towards midnight of that same evening, or very early on the following morning, there came to him, to his address at the above hotel, a huge sealed package, actually containing the remainder of the Paisley Union Bank notes, to a large amount!  No conditions were attached to it of any kind; no questions were asked, and none were given in reply.  The parcel itself, after what had just occurred, signifi­cantly enough told its own tale; and, therefore, rejoicing with it in his sure possession, Henry Miller expeditiously returned with it to Glasgow, and soon placed it in the hands of his clients, who had engaged him to go to Lon­don.  These gentlemen were, of course, most exceedingly surprised and delighted with the result; and we do not think we are guilty of any great breach of confidence when we state that they rewarded Mr. Miller, for his trouble, with a sum of five hundred guineas.  His use­ful and diversified career in this city, is happily not yet terminated; and we hope he will long continue to be a terror to evil doers, and a praise and protection to such as do well.  In any event, we feel persuaded that he will not charge us with exaggeration in any part of this story, which might be interwoven with some of the remarkable criminal annals of Scotland: and, as such, we present it to our readers with all fidelity.