Heir to a Dorset estate, who became a highwayman, poet, playwright, lawyer and a physician.
John Clavel was born in 1603 and was the nephew and heir-at-law of a Dorset knight-banneret, Sir William Clavel, who lived in the Manor of Smed-more. When Clavel the younger got into debt, he decided the easiest way out of it was to become a highwayman. So he took to the road and committed many robberies – the first of which was at Gads Hill – using in each case a different disguise and while he held up many a traveller, his speciality was in robbing mail coaches. Besides his disguises he paid good money to many innkeepers who hid and protected him from the authorities.
However, despite his precautions, he was eventually recognised, arrested and sentenced to be hanged in 1626. While imprisoned he made a poetic and rather flattering appeal to the king, which save him from the hangman. But while he had escaped the rope he was still sentenced to imprisonment and since no long term prisons existed at that time, he was committed the Kings Bench Debtors Prison. While incarcerated there he wrote a treatise entitled, "Recantation of an Ill-led Life" subtitled, "A Discovery of the Highway Law". A sort of autobiography, much of it written in verse, which besides giving some account of the life of a highwayman, also detailed the recognition and means of avoiding highway robbery. The treatise seems to have had some success since it was reprinted twice and was effective in gaining him a pardon from the king.
After his release Clavel next wrote a play about financial trickery which was performed on stage and then in 1631 was sent by his uncle to Dublin to act in a property dispute and later on became a lawyer and a physician in Ireland. Towards the end of the 1630s he returned to London and was believed to have died in either 1642 or 1643.
So ended the life of a highwayman, poet, playwright, lawyer and physician.
e and later on became a lawyer and a physician in Ireland. Towards the end of the 1630s he returned to London and was believed to have died in either 1642 or 1643.