George Lyons

George Lyon (1761 – 22 April 1815) was a gentleman highwayman in England.

Lyon was born in Upholland, near Wigan, Lancashire, to a poor family. His name was George Lyon - not George Lyons as some historians wrongly observe.

Prior to arrest

George Lyon's one major feat as a highwayman was to hold up the Liverpool mail coach. With his accomplices, he planned the robbery at the Legs of Man public house in Wigan. They then persuaded the ostler at the Bull's Head Inn in Upholland to lend them horses for a few hours. They held up the Liverpool mail coach at nearby Tawd Vale on the River Tawd, firing two shots and forcing the driver to pull up so that they could rob the passengers. The gang then returned to the Bull's Head, and when the robbed coach later arrived at the inn, Lyon and his accomplices had an alibi as people had seen them in the pub earlier in the afternoon.

In addition to this robbery, Lyon was a habitual thief, and had been transported to one of the colonies for some years before returning to Upholland.

Local legend suggests Lyon was inept at highway robbery. It is said that he decided to hold up the coach taking the wages to a local coal mine (possibly the Maypole Colliery), but on the day of his intended crime it was pouring with rain. He stood out to stop the coach too early and the rain ruined the gunpowder in his pistol - the coach's driver, perhaps realising this, simply coaxed the horses into a run and soaked Lyon with muddy water as they flew past.

Arrest and execution

George Lyon was 54 when he was executed in Lancaster by hanging for robbery. Sentence was passed on Saturday 8 April 1815 along with two accomplices, Houghton and Bennett.

A fourth accomplice was Edward Ford, who had been working as a painter at Walmsley House, where the last robbery took place and for which Lyon and his accomplices were eventually indicted. Ford had suggested robbing the house to Lyon, and had himself taken part in some 17 previous robberies, but because he turned King's evidence he was spared the capital sentence. The execution of Lyon, Houghton, and Bennett, took place just before noon on Saturday 22 April 1815 - the year of the Battle of Waterloo.

All capital sentences passed that day were commuted, except for the Upholland trio of Lyon, Houghton and Bennett, and two others, Moses Owen for horse stealing, and John Warburton for "highway robbery".

After his death Lyon's body was handed over to Simon Washington, landlord of The Old Dog Inn in Upholland, and a companion, for its return to Upholland for burial (the inn building still stands on Alma Hill in the village). Lyon had not wanted his body left at Lancaster as it would have been handed over to surgeons for dissection as was the normal procedure with the bodies of executed criminals. In a letter to his wife written on 14 April (with the aid of the prison chaplain, the Reverend Cowley), he implored her to arrange for his body to be returned home.

As the cart approached the final part of its journey, a huge crowd was observed moving off from Orrell Post near Upholland in the direction of Gathurst, to observe the return of Lyon's body. When word came through that the cortege was instead passing through nearby Wrightington and heading for the road through Appley Bridge instead, the crowd rushed across the fields from the Gathurst Bridge which still spans the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, to meet the cart at Dangerous Corner, and then followed it in procession through Appley Bridge, and up the climb through Roby Mill, until it eventually reached Parliament Street in Upholland, and the last few hundred yards to The Old Dog Inn, where Lyon's body was laid out in the landlady's best parlour overnight.

Hundreds of people gathered outside the pub the next day, and even climbed onto the roofs of adjoining buildings, to see the coffin as it was taken for burial to St. Thomas's churchyard in Upholland on Sunday 23 April 1815. George Lyon was buried in his mother's (some say his grandmother's) grave, the inscription simply reads "Nanny Lyon, Died 17th April 1804" His name is not recorded on the stone.

The Truth - Documentary Evidence of Lyon's Career

A great deal of the article above has clearly been based on "The Life of George Lyon: The Wigan and UpHolland Highwayman" - an extremely fanciful historical romance written in the 1930s, by Harry Parkes; much of the story (stagecoach robberies etc.) being pure invention. It is known that many of the UpHolland residents the author spoke to invented tales of Lyon's deeds to satisfy his curiosity; as recently as fifteen years ago, an elderly villager remembering Parkes said: " 'he came asking daft questions and he got daft answers.' "

Contrary to Parkes' account, all available documentary evidence suggests that far from being a Robin Hood figure, Lyon was feared and detested by many residents of UpHolland.

Below is an extract (reproduced with the author's consent) from an article on UpHolland churchyard, and the graves therein. All information in this account relating to Lyon was found in the County Record Office, Court Transcripts, and the journal of one of Lyon's fellow villagers:-

"Mention Blackpool, and people immediately think of the tower. Mention Wigan, and the Pier springs to mind. Mention the village of UpHolland, and if it is known at all to 'outsiders,' it will probably be on account of the 'highwayman's grave' to be found in the burial ground of the village's priory church of Saint Thomas the Martyr. This might, in the words of Oscar Wilde, be described as a 'pleasing paradox,' because the highwayman in question was never a highwayman...

"Below the level of the roadway, on the extreme western edge of the church burial ground and directly opposite the White Lion Hotel, lies a flat tombstone, with the single name 'Nanny Lyon' inscribed on its surface. This is believed to be the grave of George Lyon, the UpHolland, highwayman,' and his two accomplices David Bennett and William Houghton, who were all hanged at Lancaster in April 1815, for an offence of burglary at Westwood Hall, Ince, Wigan."

"As their crime did not involve the taking of human life, the criminal code of the day permitted release of their bodies for Christian burial, and they were brought back to UpHolland, in a cart, by the landlord of the village's Old Dog Inn, Simon Washington. He later declared that the devil had followed him every step of the homeward journey. Record of the burial of Lyon and his cronies can be found in the church parish registers."

"Despite the fact Lyon was convicted and executed as a burglar, time and village folklore have bestowed the role of highwayman and local Robin Hood upon him. Unfortunately, no evidence exists to substantiate the many stories of him robbing the rich to feed the poor; existing documentary evidence paints a far more sordid picture."

"In his mid fifties at the time of his execution, Lyon had narrowly escaped hanging almost thirty years earlier, when in 1786, he had been convicted of robbery with violence in the Winstanley district of Wigan. By all accounts, this crime was little more than a 'mugging;' devoid of any derring do, or glamour. On this occasion, the death sentence was commuted to transportation to the colonies for a seven year period. Unusually for the time, and no doubt to the chagrin of many, Lyon returned to this country and the village of his birth at the end of his sentence, and continued his criminal career as a petty thief and burglar until 1815, when Nemesis, in the form of the public hangman overtook him; evidently Napoleon was not the only man to meet his Waterloo in that year."

"Far from being a local folk hero, Lyon was a thorn in the side of his fellow villagers, and if remembered for anything, it should be for siring illegitimate children. On 23rd May 1809, the diarist Ellen Weeton wrote to her friend Mrs Whitehead:-"

"(Up)Holland is, if possible, more licentious and more scandalous than when I lived in it; such numbers of unmarried women have children, many of whom one would have thought had years, discretion, sense and virtue to have guarded them. In two houses near together, there have been in each, a mother and daughter lying in, nearly at the same time; and one man (the notorious George Lyon) reputed to be father to all four!"

"Footpad - yes. Burglar - yes. Petty thief - yes. Serial adulterer and fornicator - definitely. Highwayman - highly unlikely.

© 2003

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Further information:-

The name 'Nanny Lyon' inscribed on the stone of what is believed to be George Lyon's grave, refers to his daughter, "not" his mother or grandmother. She died on 7th April 1804, at the age of 20 years. Her age and date of death can be seen on the gravestone.

An entry in the parish registers dated 10th April 1804 relating to her burial clearly states 'Nanny Lyon - daughter of George'.