16/05/2026
This Week in the News - May 1826
CRUEL AGGRESSION BY GYPSIES. — A gang of vagrants, calling themselves gypsies, were recently ordered to quit the premises of Mr. Clarke, a very respectable farmer, in the neighbourhood of Minehead, where they had taken up their encampment, and which the gypsies reluctantly complied with. They threatened to be revenged, and accordingly two of the fellows on Monday evening last, the 24th ult. went to Mr. Clarke’s farm yard, and fell in with Mr. Clarke’s son, a lad about twelve years of age, whom they succeeded in decoying from his father’s house, by a promise of giving him money to shew them the way to a neighbouring village called Tivington; under this expectation, the lad accompanied them a short distance from his home, and on entering a bye lane, the miscreants drew a pistol and a dirk, and threatened the lad with instant death if he either made the least noise or disobeyed their commands; the ruffians then gave him a nauseous draught, which they compelled him to swallow; they then took bird-lime, or some other glutinous matter, with which they clung his lips together, and in this condition they marched the poor youth in the direction of Dunster!
After proceeding some distance, they fell in with an accomplice, mounted on a shabby white horse, and they all then consulted how to dispose of the unhappy victim. The two footpads, whose cruelty seemed to know no bounds, proposed to “dispatch him,” but the fellow on the horse said they should not murder him, but they should “lodge him;” they then proceeded on about two miles and a half from the child’s home, to a sequestered part of the road, and fired a pistol at him, at which, through fear, the youth fell senseless to the ground, when his heartless assailants scampered off, leaving him in this pitiable condition. Some men, passing that way, recognised the youth, and restored him to his parents. The youth has not sustained much bodily injury, but his mental depression is great, from the extreme state of alarm in which he had been kept.
One of the villains was a stout fellow, of dark complexion, the other a stripling about 17, and had a spot on his cheek like that of a mole spot. The fellow on the horse was of sallow complexion. Three men, answering the description given of the offenders, were apprehended in this town on Sunday last, and are to be examined this day. It is astonishing in what a state of fear and subserviency the rural population of this and the neighbouring counties are held by the gypsey gangs, to whose application for relief, of whatever description required, the most ready acquiescence is yielded, lest damage should be committed by them in case of refusal. The Act of Parliament gives to Magistrates full power to dislodge such vagabonds wherever they may be found, and we do hope that this additional instance of refined cruelty and malice may be the means of arousing the public to an active extirpation of those nests of brutal banditti. - Taunton Courier.
It is impossible to know from this report alone whether the men involved were genuinely Romani/Gypsy, travellers of another background, or simply labelled that way by others. They may have been but the caution lies in the way the article moves from three alleged offenders to a sweeping condemnation of an entire community.
The “dirk” mentioned was a long thrusting dagger or short sword, originally associated with Scotland but widely understood in the 18th and 19th centuries as a deadly stabbing weapon.
“Bird-lime” was a sticky glue-like substance traditionally used to trap birds by coating branches so that birds became stuck to them. In this account, the attackers are said to have used it, or a similar glutinous material, to stick the boy’s lips together. This may have been intended to stop him crying out for help, but it also added a particularly cruel and theatrical element to the story, something newspapers of the period often emphasised in sensational crime reporting.
I did have a look at the census records from 1841 Minehead area but there were alot of 'Clarkes' farming in the area so its impossible to determine who this family was.
