20th April
The Hawkhurst Gang
Kingsmill Leading the Raid at the King’s Customs House. Source: Wikipedia
The Hawkhurst Gang were an eighteenth century group of smugglers, based at Hawkhurst in Kent, and who branched out into fully-fledged banditry. The gang terrorised the south of England from the Isle of Sheppey to Poole in Dorset, unleashing a campaign of extortion, robbery and murder. They seemed immune from the authorities and behaved like an unholy cross between the organised crime of the Mafia and the lawless psychopathy of the American Wild West, extending their murderous activities into piratical raids on towns. The gang infamously broke into the Royal Customs House in Poole in 1747 and relieved it of all the produce and goods they could find there. The gang was led by an unpleasant individual known as Richard Kingsmill, one of three brothers who were the leading lights of the criminal enterprise.
A certain William Sturt, a former soldier, let it be known he was forming an anti-outlaw private militia in Goudhurst in Kent and declared the town a no-go area for the Hawkshead Gang. On this day in 1747, Kingsmill responded by declaring his desperadoes would wipe out the Goudhurst militia and would boil the hearts of four of the townspeople and eat them for his supper for their impudence. Sturt the meantime had trained and armed his volunteers so when the inevitable Hawkshead attack came, he was ready. The gang charged into the town as was their wont, but were met by a concentrated volley of musket fire that devastated the outlaws’ ranks and killed Richard Kingsmill instantly. Three other attackers were slain and many others were wounded or captured. The Hawkshead Gang never recovered and the remaining members were hunted down. The two surviving Kingsmill brothers were eventually hanged at Tyburn. Sturt ended his days as Warden of the Gourdhurst Workhouse.