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unusual facts about Jack Sheppard


Penny gaff

The stories of the 18th-century robber, Jack Sheppard who escaped from prison on numerous occasions, and the gory Red Barn Murder were among the most enduring.


A Just View of the British Stage

The staging of Harlequin Sheppard — a play by John Thurmond based around the exploits of the famed criminal and escape-artist Jack Sheppard — by the three impresarios of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane: Colley Cibber, the actor Barton Booth, and Robert Wilks, in November 1724, spurred Hogarth into immediate action.

James MacLaine

(However as that was written in 1728, when MacLaine was only 4, this cannot be sustained: the preferred claimant for this distinction is Jack Sheppard.) A modern, although fictionalised, portrayal of his life appears in the 1999 film Plunkett & Macleane, where he was played by Jonny Lee Miller.


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