Hawkhurst Gang
One of the more infamous gangs of the early 18th century, they extended their influence from Hawkhurst, their base in Kent, along the South coast, where they successfully raided the Custom House, Poole.
However, many hidden cellars and remote barns could have been used for storage so it is unlikely that tunnels would have been needed at that period when large armed gangs operated openly, often riding through the larger towns in daylight.
[1] In 1740, riding officer Thomas Carswell and a party of dragoons found about 15 cwt (750 kg) of smuggled tea in a barn at Etchingham and were taking it to Hastings in a cart.
After drinking brandy to bolster their courage, they attacked the revenue party at Silver Hill between Hurst Green and Robertsbridge, shooting Carswell dead and capturing the soldiers.
The gang generally operated freely in the area, as when in 1744 they unloaded a considerable amount of contraband from three large cutters at Pevensey, from which the smuggled goods were carried inland by around 500 pack horses.
It was Curtis who led the whipping and beating to death of Richard Hawkins, a farm labourer from Walberton whom they suspected of stealing two bags of the gang's tea.
[5] In October 1747, members of the gang led a successful raid against a government Custom House in Poole in Dorset, which was holding about thirty hundredweight (3,360 lbs) of tea, thirty-nine casks of brandy and rum, and a small bag of coffee captured from the smugglers' ship Three-Brothers in September.
The shipment from Guernsey, worth about £500 (equivalent to £101,472 in 2023), had been organised by the Hawkhurst Gang working with a group from east Hampshire and was intended to be landed at Christchurch Bay, but was captured by a revenue vessel Swift commanded by Captain William Johnson on 22 September 1747.
At a meeting in Charlton Forest Richard Perrin from Chichester, who had gone to Guernsey to buy the goods, made an agreement with the local men to recover the contraband.
He was later called as a witness by the customs service, but he and an elderly revenue officer, William Galley, got lost while travelling to the remote downland village of East Marden to identify Diamond to a Justice of the Peace, Major Battine.
They were given drink until they fell asleep and their documents were discovered, beaten and tied to horses by members of the local gang, then taken north to the Red Lion Inn at Rake.
[11] When the gang attacked on the appointed day, the militia were well enough trained to shoot dead Kingsmill's brother George in the first volley of the Battle of Goudhurst fought around the St. Mary's church.
Arthur Gray was apprehended in 1748 and indicted on charges of felonious assembly with the intention of carrying away goods that customs duty had not been paid – in other words smuggling.
[21] The bodies of Thomas Kingsmill and William Fairall were delivered to the Sheriff of Kent in order that they could be hung up in chains, the former at Goudhurst, the latter at Horsendown Green, where he once lived.
But dying in a few hours after sentence of death was pronounced upon him he thereby escaped the punishment which the heinousness of his complicated crimes deserved and which was the next day most justly inflicted upon his accomplices.
