OUTRAGE AT HASTINGS BY THE RUXLEY GANG—BATTLE ON THE WHITSTABLE-CANTERBURY ROAD—CHURCH-TOWERS AS SMUGGLERS’ CELLARS—THE DRUMMER OF HERSTMONCEUX—EPITAPH AT TANDRIDGE—DEPLORABLE AFFAIR AT HASTINGS—THE INCIDENT OF “THE FOUR BROTHERS”
SUSSEX was again the scene of a barbarous incident, in 1768; and on this occasion seafaring men were the malefactors.
It is still an article of faith with the writers of guide-books who do not make their own inquiries, and thus perpetuate obsolete things, that to call a Hastings fisherman a “Chop-back” will rouse him to fury. But when a modern visitor, primed with such romance as this, timidly approaches one of these broad-shouldered and amply-paunched fisherfolk and suggests “Chop-backs” as a subject of inquiry, I give you my word they only look upon you with a puzzled expression, and don’t understand in the least your meaning.
But in an earlier generation this was a term of great offence to the Hastingers. It arose, according to tradition, from the supposed descent of these fisherfolk from the Norse rovers who used the axe, and cleaved their enemies with them from skull to chine. But the true facts of the case are laid to the account of some of the notorious Ruxley Gang, who in 1768 boarded a Dutch hoy, the _Three Sisters_, in mid-channel, on pretence of trading, and chopped the master, Peter Bootes, down the back with a hatchet. This horrid deed might never have come to light had not these ruffians betrayed themselves by bragging to one another of their cleverness, and dwelling upon the way in which the Dutchman wriggled when they had slashed him on the backbone.
The Government in November of that year sent a detachment of two hundred Inniskilling Dragoons to Hastings, to arrest the men implicated, and a man-o’-war and cutter lay off shore to receive them when they had been taken prisoners. The soldiers had strict orders to keep their mission secret, but the day after their arrival they were called out to arrest rioters who had violently assaulted the Mayor, whom they suspected of laying information against the murderers. The secret of the reason for the soldiers’ coming had evidently in some manner leaked out. Several arrests of rioters were made, and the men implicated in the outrage on the Dutch boat were duly taken into custody.