From the Morning Chronicle, 10 October 1823, yet another lesson in the dangers lurking for the unwary on the journey home from the Four Courts:
“THE LOVELY ROSE – A dashing Cyprian, whose charms were quite in accordance with her name, Rose Lovely, was indicted for having robbed William Kelly, a very respectable man of forty years of age.
[Mr Kelly] was walking along the quay, when near the Four Courts he was accosted by the prisoner. Though he had been the most virtuous man in the world for the last twenty years, she revolutionized his whole system and he suffered himself to be led by her to a house in Strand Street…
The next morning he awoke as if out of a trance… on searching his pocket he found about £67 in bank notes and £3 13s in silver all gone… The girl put her finger in a little hole in the pillow and took out all the bank notes, but she denied knowing anything about the silver.
He forgave her… and continued with her the remainder of that day, walking through town with her, and treating her in cake shops… his confidence in her was such that a second bedding took place. In the morning on looking at his breeches he found them disorganised, and the bank notes absent…
The Jury found the prisoner guilty, which appeared to affect the prosecutor considerably, and he stated to the Court that he forgave her… upon a sentence of seven years transportation being pronounced, the prisoner cried most violently and the prosecutor was evidently much affected.“
Rose certainly seems to have had almost supernatural powers!
I hope she got on well in Australia – assuming that her smitten victim did not succeed in getting her released before departure!
Share this:
2 thoughts on “Two Nights with Rose Lovely, 1823”