Lives of Twelve Bad Men (1894), by Seccombe Thomas (illustrated)

The Scoundrels include: T. Oates DD, Ed Kelly (necromancer), Matthew Hopkins (witchfinder), George Jeffreys (unjust judge), Titus Oates (perjurer), Simon Fraser (Lord Lovat), Colonel Francis Charteris (libertine), Jonathan Wild (thieftaker), James Maclaine (gentleman highwayman), George R Fitzgerald (fighter), Ned (Edward) Kelly (bushranger). Also chapters on Thomas Griffiths Wainewright (poisoner). Extensive index and appendix of authorities... James Hepburn, 1st Duke of Orkney (c. 1534 - 14 April 1578), better known by his inherited title Earl of Bothwell, was a prominent Scottish nobleman in the 16th century, known for his association with and subsequent marriage to Mary, Queen of Scots, as her third and final husband, He was the son of Patrick, Earl of Bothwell, and Agnes Sinclair (d. 1572), daughter of Henry, Lord Sinclair, and was styled The Master of Bothwell from birth. He succeeded his father as Earl of Bothwell and Lord Hailes in 1556. Matthew Hopkins (c. 1620 - 12 August 1647) was an English witch-hunter whose career flourished during the English Civil War. He claimed to hold the office of Witchfinder General, although that title was never bestowed by Parliament. His witch-hunts mainly took place in East Anglia. Titus Oates (15 September 1649 - 12/13 July 1705), also called Titus the Liar, was an English perjurer who fabricated the "Popish Plot", a supposed Catholic conspiracy to kill King Charles II. His father Samuel, a graduate of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, was a minister who moved between the Church of England and the Baptists; he became a Baptist during the Puritan Revolution, [1]:5 rejoining the established church at the Restoration and was rector of All Saints' Church at Hastings in Sussex (1666-74). Oates was educated at Merchant Taylors' School and other schools. At Cambridge University he entered Gonville and Caius College and then St John's College; a less than astute student, he was ejected from both colleges, regarded by his tutor as "a great dunce". On 29 May 1670 he was ordained as a priest of the Church of England. He was vicar of the parish of Bobbing in Kent, 1673-74, and then curate to his father at All Saints', Hastings. During this time Oates was charged with perjury having accused a schoolmaster in Hastings of sodomy. Oates was put in jail, but escaped and fled to London. In 1677 he was appointed as a chaplain of the ship Adventurer in the Royal Navy.He was soon accused of buggery which was a capital offence and spared only because of his clergyman's status...ect.