The great escape that failed

THE LIFE AND TIMES OF PETER NICOL
1807-1864

One of the most audacious attempts to break out of the gaol at Folkingham, near Bourne, during the early 19th century was planned not by a hardened criminal but by a gentleman farmer who came from a society family of the landed gentry.

Peter Nicol, aged 35, originated at Belton Hall, Rutland, where his family lived but decided to go into business on his own and after a failed attempt in Derbyshire, leased agricultural land in Bourne, first at the Red Hall and then at the Abbey House, both grand mansions once occupied by distinguished local families and at that time let to anyone who could afford to take on the lease.

Unfortunately, Nicol was a man who liked the high life and therefore could never pay his bills. As a result, his expenditure always exceeded his income and so he was frequently short of money and eventually he committed the irrevocable sin of forgery to obtain some.

He owed a considerable sum to his bank, the Stamford and Spalding Joint Stock Banking Company, and in the summer of 1843, their agent in Bourne was pressing him to provide further security for his increasing debt and so he agreed to give them a joint promissory note in the sum of £200 [£22,000 at today’s values] which he himself would sign together with his mother-in-law, Mrs Martha Neal, then living at the Abbey House. He put his own signature on the document and took it away to obtain Mrs Neal’s signature, returning with the name Martha Neal added and witnessed by a drover named Smith.

But when the note was presented to Mrs Neal for payment, she denied ever having signed it and condemned the document as being “counterfeited” and as a result, Nicol was arrested and brought before the magistrates on Monday 21st August 1843. Unable to find the £400 bail required, he was remanded in custody to Folkingham Gaol to await a further hearing and produce his witness Smith.

Prison did not suit Nicol and he was soon plotting his escape, assisted by two hardened criminals, James Shotbolt, aged 22, a deserter from the Scots Fusiliers, and John Richardson, aged 28, a repeat offender who was confined for not paying a fine imposed for assault and for robbing other prisoners, offering both men £50 upon his release as a reward for their assistance.

They discovered that it was customary for the governor, Matthew Maile, to leave the gaol on Mondays to attend the magistrates court at Sleaford and in his absence they planned to seize the turnkey and steal his keys. As a result, at noon on Monday 28th August 1843, they saw the governor appear in his boots and greatcoat as though about to leave for Sleaford and then put their plan into action. They waited until the turnkey brought their dinners and once he had entered their cell they set upon him and stole his keys then gagged and bound him, put a towel over his eyes and locked him in a privy.

The escape trio passed through the two prison yards and opened both gates with the stolen keys. Only the main lodge entrance then stood between them and freedom and they were about to open that when the plan went awry in the shape of Edward Maile, the sheriff’s officer from Cambridge, who had arrived unexpectedly to visit his brother, the governor, who had therefore delayed his departure to Sleaford. The two men confronted the escaping prisoners and a violent struggle ensued in which all three received a desperate beating and were forced back into their cell and the turnkey released. They then put Nicol into the black hole reserved for persistent wrongdoers and placed his accomplices in irons before confining them to separate cells.

“Too much praise cannot be given to Mr Maile, the governor, and his brother from Cambridge, for the manly and intrepid way in which they met the prisoners”, reported one newspaper. “It is most certain that had they both gone to Sleaford before the attempt was made that they would have released the whole of the prisoners, 53 in number, and some of them the most desperate characters in that part of the country.”

All three culprits subsequently appeared at the Kesteven Sessions held at the Town Hall, Bourne, on Monday 16th October when they all pleaded guilty to attempting an escape from prison and assaulting the turnkey, William Hill. The court was told in mitigation that Nicol was anxious to obtain his liberty in order to procure bail which he could not do while under confinement and once that had been achieved, it was his intention to surrender himself again.

But the court decided that Nicol was the ringleader and, having moved in better society than either of the other two prisoners, it was his duty to have set them a different example. He was therefore sentenced to three months’ imprisonment and the others were given two months’ each.

Even after his release, Nicol still had the charge of forgery hanging over him and the case was heard at Lincoln Assizes on Saturday 9th March 1844. But by then, it appears that his mother-in-law, Mrs Neal, had been having second thoughts, or perhaps, had been persuaded not to pursue the case because the court was told that no evidence was being offered by the bank relating to the alleged offence after discovering that Mrs Neal had given her daughter, Nicol’s wife, leave to sign her name. The case was therefore dropped and he was discharged.

But Nicol’s problems were still not over and the following May he was declared insolvent and protracted bankruptcy proceedings continued for several years with creditors coming forward to claim money owed, notably William Ann Pochin, then Lord of the Manor of Bourne Abbots, who filed an action to recover arrears of £91 17s. in rent for land and premises at Bourne which he had occupied, no doubt the Abbey House which was still in the family ownership and which Nicol had once leased.

Peter Nicol spent the rest of his life being pursued by creditors and was never fully solvent. He gave up farming and later obtained work as a commercial traveller in wines and spirits, a venture in which he had tried his hand before, albeit unsuccessfully, but died in London on 16th December 1864, aged 57. His abortive escape bid from Folkingham Gaol, however, did become a talking point among prisoners until the gaol closed in 1878 although it is doubtful whether his accomplices ever did get their promised £50 for trying to help him.

See also

The House of Correction