Smithfield on 30 Oct. which passed off without disturbance, although attended by men in arms. Thistlewood designed simultaneous public meetings in the disaffected parts of the country for 1 Nov., but this course was not approved by either Hunt or Thomas Jonathan Wooller [q. v.], from whom he appears now to have finally separated. The reformers were at this period so nervous about traitors in their midst that even Thistlewood was denounced as a spy (Nottingham meeting, 29 Oct.) Despite, however, increased caution and endeavours to secure secrecy, the government was in receipt of almost daily accounts of the doings of the secret directory of thirteen. In November Thistlewood and his friends grew hopeless as to their chances of successfully setting the revolution on foot in London. They now looked to the north for a commencement. Thistlewood was invited to Manchester at the beginning of December, but lack of funds prevented him from going. No effective support seemed coming from Lancashire; Thistlewood regarded a ‘straightforward revolution’ as hopeless, and concentrated his efforts on his old plan of assassination. One informer not in the secret wrote on 1 Dec.: ‘There is great mystery in Thistlewood's conduct; he seems anxious to disguise his real intentions, and declaims against the more violent members of the party, but is continually with them in private.’ His exact intentions were being reported to the home office by George Edwards, who was one of the secret committee of thirteen, and especially in Thistlewood's confidence. At first an attack on the Houses of Parliament was meditated, but, the number of conspirators being considered insufficient for the purpose, assassination at a cabinet dinner was preferred. A special executive committee of five, of whom Edwards was one, was appointed on 13 Dec.; and the government permitted the plot to mature. From 20 Dec. 1819 to 22 Feb. 1820 Thistlewood appears to have been waiting anxiously for an opportunity; his aim was to assassinate the ministers at dinner, attack Coutts's or Child's bank, set fire to public buildings, and seize the Tower and Mansion House, where a provisional government was to be set up with the cobbler Ings as secretary. About the end of January 1820, wearied with waiting, he took the management of the plot entirely into his own hands, Edwards alone being in his confidence. A proclamation was prepared and drawn up with the assistance of Dr. Watson, who at this time was, fortunately for himself, in prison. In it the appointment of a provisional government and the calling together of a convention of representatives were announced. The death of the king, George III, on 29 Jan. was regarded as especially favourable to the plot, and the announcement of a cabinet dinner at Lord Harrowby's house in Grosvenor Square in the new ‘Times’ of 22 Feb., to which Thistlewood's attention was called by Edwards, found Thistlewood ready to put his scheme into execution. The meeting-place which the conspirators had hitherto attended about twice a day had been at 4 Fox's Court, Gray's Inn Lane, but as a final rendezvous and centre to which arms, bombs, and hand grenades should be brought, a loft over a stable in Cato Street was taken on 21 Feb. Hither they repaired (about twenty-five in number) on the evening of 23 Feb., and, warrants having been issued the same day, the greater number of them were apprehended about 8.30 P.M. They were found in the act of arming preparatory to their start for Lord Harrowby's house. Shots were fired. Thistlewood killed police-officer Smithers with a sword, and escaped immediate capture in the darkness and general confusion. Anonymous information was, however, given as to his whereabouts, and he was taken the next day at 8 White Street, Moorfields. He was again imprisoned in the Tower, and was the first of the gang to be tried before Charles Abbott (afterwards first lord Tenterden) [q. v.] and Sir Robert Dallas [q. v.] and two other judges on the charge of high treason. After three days' trial, 17, 18, and 19 April, during which Edwards was not called as evidence, Thistlewood was found guilty and sentenced to a traitor's death. He was hanged, with four other conspirators, in front of the debtor's door, Newgate, on 1 May 1820. The criminals were publicly decapitated after death, but the quartering of their bodies was not proceeded with. Thistlewood died defiantly, showing the same spirit that he exhibited at the end of his trial when he declaimed ‘Albion is still in the chains of slavery. I quit it without regret. My only sorrow is that the soil should be a theatre for slaves, for cowards, for despots.’
In appearance Thistlewood was about 5 ft. 10 in. high, of sallow complexion and long visage, dark hair and dark hazel eyes with arched eyebrows; he was of slender build, with the appearance of a military man. A lithographed portrait of him is prefixed to the report of the ‘Cato Street Conspiracy,’ published by J. Fairburn, Ludgate Hill, 1820.
