ABSTRACT
On the first day of September 1846, the poet Elizabeth Barrett, who was at the time making plans for her secret marriage to Robert Browning, stepped out of a shop in Vere Street in London, and into her carriage, only to find that her beloved cocker spaniel, Flush (see Figure 2.1), had been caught up from under the wheels and spirited away by thieves. For the third and last time, Flush had fallen victim to the dog-stealers who made their living from abducting pet dogs and holding them for substantial ransoms. Elizabeth Barrett’s reaction, as twice before, was a mixture of alarm and resignation. There was nothing to be done except to pay the ransom the dog-stealers were sure to demand; she would be informed that an ‘intermediary’ might be able to locate her dog, and, for a price, his recovery might be effected. And if not, she should expect the worst, as the dreadful tradition went in her neighbourhood of one lady who had refused the dog-stealers’ demands, only to find her dog’s head sent to her through the post. Elizabeth Barrett, who would countenance neither her father’s nor Robert Browning’s advice to face down the extortionists, insisted that all must be done to procure Flush’s swift release. And in the end it was she who made the extraordinary journey to the criminal underworld of Whitechapel, to negotiate with a Mr Taylor, the head of the dog-stealing gang, or the banditti, as she called them. It would be five long days before Flush was returned to the Barretts’ home in Wimpole Street, the ‘archfiend’ Taylor (Karlin 1989:306) having extracted six guineas for his release. In all, Flush had cost his mistress some twenty pounds’ ransom. But safe he eventually was, and within a week of his return, Elizabeth Barrett had married Robert Browning. Within another week she had left Wimpole Street for ever, making her way with him to the continent and finally to Italy, and to a new life, a world away from London and its dog-stealing fraternity. 1
