One August night in 1822, long before the asylum and the railway transformed Earlswood, Earlswood Common was the scene of a dramatic encounter between two labourers and a notorious gang of horse thieves. A series of newspaper articles covered the violent episode and its aftermath. They show that early policing could be effective before the creation of county police forces in 1851, with the pursuit being led by the High Constable of Surrey rather than a modern police service.
The New Times and the Morning Herald were among a number of newspapers which reported the same account of the turbulent night of 8 August. At 11pm a gang of horse thieves had stolen three horses belonging to a baker, Mr Leach of Streatham. They rode sixteen miles south at high speed, passing the tollgate at Redhill fifty minutes later, by which time the horses were, ‘shockingly jaded.’ Now they needed fresh horses.
The robbers, five in number, proceeded in their swift career to Earleswood Common, whence they drove twenty more horses into the farm-yard belonging to Mr. Harding. At this time, two labouring men, named William Wood and John Gaston, were returning home on the high road, and hearing a noise in Harding's yard, which they considered arose from the carter trying to catch his horses, and thinking they would be some assistance to him, they went to the gate of the farm-yard, and called out, "John Buckland, is that you?" They received the answer from two of the robbers, of "D—n your eyes, what do you want," and at the same moment they were pounced upon by two fellows, who felled them to the ground with short bludgeons with which they were armed, and commenced beating them till they were nearly lifeless and bleeding profusely from their wounds; one of the ruffians bit off the end of one of Wood's fingers. They were now reinforced by the other three robbers, who rode the stolen horses, and endeavoured to cause the animals to trample on them, but finding they did not succeed, they dismounted, and all five commenced beating the poor fellows till they were nearly dead. One of the villains exclaimed, "let us kill the b-----s." After they had so disabled the men, they unsaddled the three horses they stole from Streatham, placed the saddles on three of the others, and the robbers having mounted a horse each, rode off towards Salford-gate, about a mile further. Wood and Gaston were so dreadfully injured they could not give the least alarm.
Mr Harding was the tenant of Earlswood Farm, close to the southern and eastern edges of Earlswood Common, where Woodhatch Road meets Pendleton Road. Much of its acreage was sold off for early housing and the development of local roads in the second half of the nineteenth century.
Redhill had not developed as a town at the time of this incident but there was a Redhill tollgate on the London to Brighton turnpike road that stood just north of where Redhill later developed, at Frenches Gate.
The gang scattered after their violent spree, three turning back for London but two heading further south through the Salford Tollgate on the route of the modern A23 as far as the Chequers Inn. This was an old coaching inn at the present Horley Roundabout, now renamed the Halt and Pull.
They left Wood and Gaston, dangerously ill at Peteridge Wood, woodland between Earlswood and Reigate, under the care of Mr Steele, the Reigate surgeon.
The horse thieves were rumoured to be a notorious gang who had been released from Brixton House of Correction the previous Saturday, having been locked up for two years. The High Constable Richard Roffey lived in Earlswood and he was quickly on the case. He had a personal interest in as two of his own horses had been stolen.
On the 20 August the capture of the horse stealers was reported in The Globe newspaper.
Mr. Roffey, the high constable of Surrey, has been very industrious in tracing the gang, and the other day succeeded in identifying three of them, named Williams, Wilson, and Browne. After the gang had left Surrey they proceeded to Enfield, where they stole a blood mare belonging to Lord Cadogan, and another from the enclosure of Mr. Leifchild, the auctioneer. Mr. Roffey received information on Wednesday last, that three persons had been stopped at Aylesbury with horses, under suspicious circumstances.
The gang had attracted suspicion after arriving in a state of exhaustion at the Ship Inn at Aylesbury and were detained when they couldn’t give a satisfactory explanation for their behaviour. When arrested the three men present were found to be carrying housebreaking equipment together with 50 sovereigns and a gold watch. The prisoners were transferred to Aylesbury gaol.
The County Herald of 31 August could not resist a touch of sentimentality in describing the reunion of Mr Roffey with one of the horses that had been stolen from him.
‘All the horses detained at Aylesbury on the 7th instant, have been owned, and returned to the gentlemen to whom they belong. An instance of the attachment of which animals are susceptible when well- treated occurred when Mr. Roffey, of Earlswood Common, the owner of the pony stolen, went into the stable where it was kept; for, on his patting it, the poor animal returned his caresses, and evinced by his gestures, a perfect recognition, and the utmost pleasure at the sight of its master.
The story reached its conclusion in the Aylesbury Chronicle of 22 March 1823, which carried a harrowing account of the execution of the three men together with extensive details of their criminal backgrounds.
The ringleader, John Williams (Bankes), had been born to respectable parents at Keymer in Sussex. He worked first as a farmer and later as a blacksmith until the age of nineteen, before taking employment as a steward to a wealthy farmer. It was there, according to the newspaper, that he began a life of crime involving smuggling, house-breaking and the theft of cattle, pigs, poultry and horses. Convicted and sentenced to seven years' transportation, he had returned to England after only four years through the efforts of friends. Later imprisoned in Lewes Gaol for pig stealing, he escaped after bribing a turnkey.
After several further criminal exploits, Williams met two brothers in Bristol, John Cribb (21) and Henry Cribb (25), who were travelling under the aliases Millsom (Wilson) and Brown. Their parents were respectable greengrocers and they claimed to be nephews of a well-known prize fighter. Both brothers were married to sisters, and the newspaper finished its account with a poignant description of their final farewell before execution.
Two centuries later, the events on Earlswood Common remain one of the most dramatic episodes in the area's recorded history. They reveal a very different Surrey, where the isolated commons provided opportunities for organised crime, travel was slow, and local communities were often the first line of defence against determined criminals.
The newspaper accounts also remind us that justice could be swift and unforgiving. Within a matter of months, the men who had terrorised Earlswood were captured, convicted and executed—a stark illustration of both the dangers of rural life and the harsh realities of early nineteenth-century justice.
The New Times, The Globe and The County Herald, 1822
The Aylesbury Chronicle, March 1823