whom Despard particularly favoured, and the chief of the old settlers, Robert White, sent in a number of accusations against him for cruelty and illegal actions. These accusations had no weight with the House of Assembly of Jamaica, or with Lord Sydney, the secretary of state in charge of the colonies, who dismissed them as frivolous in 1787, but Lord Grenville, Sydney's successor, suspended Despard, whom he ordered to England. He reached England in May 1790, but was kept hanging about the secretary of state's office until 1792, when he was informed that there was no real accusation against him, and that, though his old post was abolished, he would not be forgotten. Nevertheless he obtained no employment, and as he claimed compensation both violently and persistently, he was in the spring of 1798 seized and imprisoned in Coldbath Fields prison without any accusation being made against him. In a few weeks he was released, but on the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act in the autumn of 1798 he was again seized and imprisoned in the House of Industry at Shrewsbury, and in the Tothill Fields bridewell until 1800. He was then a soured and embittered man, and began to form a plot against the government. As a man of sense and education he can never have expected his plot to succeed. According to the evidence given at his trial by spies, Despard's idea was to win over some of the soldiers of the guards, and with their help to seize the Tower and the Bank of England, assassinate the king on his way to open parliament, and stop the mails going out of London. The whole plan is so ridiculous that it cannot be regarded seriously; but the government arrested Despard and forty labouring men and soldiers, who were mostly Irish, at the Oakley Arms, Lambeth, on 16 Nov. 1802. He was tried with twelve of his poor associates before a special commission, consisting of Lord-chief-justice Ellenborough and Justices Le Blanc, Chambré, and Thompson, at the New Sessions House, Horsemonger Lane, on 7 and 9 Feb. 1803. The attorney-general prosecuted, and Serjeant Best defended Despard; but the evidence of the spies was too strong against him, and he was found guilty of high treason and condemned to death. The most interesting evidence given at the trial was that of Lord Nelson as to character, who said, referring to the days of the San Juan expedition: ‘We served together in 1779 on the Spanish main; we were together in the enemies' trenches and slept in the same tent. Colonel Despard was then a loyal man and a brave officer.’ After his condemnation Despard refused to attend chapel or receive the sacrament, and on 21 Feb. 1803 he was drawn on a hurdle to the county gaol at Newington with six of his associates. He delivered a long address on the scaffold in front of the gaol, which was loudly cheered, and was then hanged and his head cut off, the rest of the horrible mutilations prescribed by his sentence being remitted. His remains were handed to his widow, who was present at the execution, and were buried in St. Paul's churchyard, close to the north door of the cathedral.
[Memoirs of Edward Marcus Despard, by James Bannantine, his secretary when king's superintendent at Honduras, &c., 1799, on which are founded the biographies in the Georgian Biography in the Gentleman's Magazine, &c., and that prefixed to the Whole Proceedings on the Trial of Colonel Despard and the other State prisoners before a Special Commission at the New Sessions House, Horsemonger Lane, Southwark, 7 and 9 Feb. 1803, to which are prefixed original and authentic Memoirs of Colonel Despard. The best report of the trial is that taken by James and W. Brodie Gurney in shorthand, and published immediately afterwards.]
DESPARD, JOHN (1745–1829), general, was an elder brother of Edward Marcus Despard, the conspirator [q. v.], and was born in Ireland in 1745. He was gazetted an ensign in the 12th regiment on 12 April 1760, and joined the army serving under Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick in the following July. He first saw service in the battle of Warburg, in which the colours were shot from his hand, and then at the battle of Fellinghausein in the following year, and he was promoted lieutenant on 12 July 1762. In 1763, on the conclusion of the seven years' war, he was placed on half-pay, but re-entered the active army in 1767 as lieutenant in the 7th regiment, the royal fusiliers. In March 1773 he accompanied his regiment to Quebec, but in the following year returned to England on recruiting service. In May 1775 he reached Quebec with the recruits, and was at once ordered to St. John's, where he was besieged by a force of insurgent Americans until 5 Nov., when he was obliged to surrender. In December 1776 he was exchanged and joined Sir William Howe at New York, and he was promoted captain on 25 March 1777. He served the campaign of that year with the light infantry, and was present at the assault of Fort Montgomery, and in June 1778 he was made major of the corps of Loyal Americans, raised by Lord Moira, which he organised. In December 1779 he was appointed deputy adjutant-gene-
