James Dalton got into the company of thieves as a youngster, picking pockets, breaking shops, and robbing people on the street, in the Smithfield and Old Bailey area.
It is reported that he went on two trips to Bristol, to practice his calling there; and he was convicted and transported (but persuaded the crew to mutiny near Cape Finisterre), was pressed into HMS Hampshire, and was a spectator of the siege of Gibraltar in 1727, and thence returned to London, although this account may be somewhat fanciful.
[8][9] He was arrested in December 1729 and convicted in January 1730 for assaulting Dr Mead near Leather Lane in Holborn, for which he was fined and imprisoned for three years.
The complainant was said to be an affidavit man, or "knight of the post," and made similar complaints against a number of other men; indeed, Waller was convicted of perjury,[11] and he was beaten to death by Edward Dalton, James' brother, and accomplices on 13 June 1732 while he was in the pillory at Seven Dials.
[14][15] His main claim to fame is a fleeting reference in plate 3 of William Hogarth's A Harlot's Progress, painted in 1731, in which his wigbox is being stored above the bed of the female protagonist, Moll Hackabout.