By 1854, Isaac had started on his life of petty crime and in June of that year he was convicted of having stolen a quantity of lead piping belonging to Richard Price Esq., on the 19th April previously and was sentenced to six months hard labour.

 

In 1859 Isaac was in trouble again. At the beginning of the year a Mr Roberts of Lower Stanage, was presented with a five guinea silver cup for showing the best bull at a meeting of the Knighton Agricultural Association in the previous October. When Mr Roberts set off for home he put the cup in his overcoat pocket, wrapped in white paper, but some way into his journey, he discovered it was no longer there and presumed it had fallen out somewhere along the way. The road was carefully searched, but there was no sign of the cup and a reward was offered for its recovery. However, as the Shrewsbury Chronicle of the 25th February 1859 reported – “Still no tidings were heard of the missing cup until Friday last, when a man named Isaac Broadhurst, a rag, bone, and small ware dealer, and a well known character in this town, offered it for sale at a silversmith's in Birmingham.”

 

This meant another court appearance for Isaac and the trial was reported in the Hereford Times of the 2nd April 1859. It transpired that one Edward Watts was charged with stealing the silver cup and Isaac Broadhurst was charged with “feloniously receiving the same knowing it to have been stolen.”

 

Mr Richard Roberts, the cup’s rightful owner, told the court – “I live in this county; in the month of October last I had a cup awarded to me; it was given to me with my name engraved upon it; there had been a mistake in the engraving - instead of ‘Knighton and Teme-Side,’ it was engraved ‘Knighton and Freme-Side’; it was a prize for best bull, cow, and offspring; the prisoner Broadhurst had worked for me; the cup was given me on the 13th December; I received it at Knighton, at the Horse and Jockey; I started home down the Knighton and Ludlow road, but when I got home I found I had lost the cup; I had three miles to go from Knighton home; there is a place called Llanshay turn, which I had to pass on my way home; I offered a reward by the town-crier.”

 

The next witness was William Wilding who made the following statement, “I know the prisoner Watts; I remember in February last he came to me in a field where I was draining; he had something in a handkerchief, and he told me he wanted to have a few shillings for it; it was a silver thing, like one of these long glasses with a long neck; it was well and good when he showed it me; it was white outside and red inside; there was some printing on it, deep in like; I said I would have nothing to do with it, and he then tied it up again and put it in his pocket.” Mr Wilding could not tell the court the exact date of this meeting but reckoned it was “seven weeks today.” He also said that Watts had told him he could not write. However another witness, John Pinches, a glazier from Knighton, said that Watts had worked for him and had “kept a true account for me of work done in that time in writing.”

 

George Philip Tandy, the inspector of police for Birmingham was called and stated – “I went on the 17th of February last to the shop of Mr Horton, silversmith, High-street, Birmingham; I there found the prisoner Broadhurst; he had the battered cup I now produce and some silver spoons in the scales; the cup was then flat, but I have had it heated and raised to make out the inscription; where the inscription had been it was much beaten; I asked him if he chose to give any account of how he came by it; he said ‘It's there;’ I replied that is not satisfactory; he said ‘I have had it nine months;’ I told him I did not believe that, and I should take him to the police station; on the road thither he said ‘I have had it about a fortnight; I had it from a man in Knighton, and gave him a jacket and waistcoat for it;’ I asked him the man's name; he replied, ‘I don't know his name - he lives in the town.’” Mr Tandy said he could not say if Broadhurst was a ‘scholar’.

 

The next witness was John Newman, a policeman at Knighton. He stated – “I recollect going to prisoner Watts on the 19th February last; I asked him if he had sold Broadhurst a silver cup; he said he had, for an old coat and waistcoat; I asked him where he had it from; he said he picked it up on the Ludlow-road, near the Llanshay turn; it was wrapped up in a piece of paper, and two other pieces of paper near; I asked him what state it was in when Broadhurst had it; he said it was in the same state as he found it, only he had wiped the dirt off; I then took him into custody.” Mr Newman said he knew both prisoners, but did not know if Watts was a ‘scholar’.

 

The Town Crier of Knighton, Thomas Corbett Davies, said he remembered “proclaiming the loss of the cup near Broadhurst's house; I cried it three times; on one occasion, Broadhurst came and asked me what I was crying, and I told him a silver cup lost in the Ludlow-road.”

 

Mr Roberts was then shown the cup and recognised it as the one he had been presented with. Mr Thomas Allen “made a powerful speech on behalf of the prisoners” but it was to no avail. After the case being summed up by the Judge, the jury only had to have a “short consultation” before they pronounced Watts and Broadhurst guilty. A previous conviction was proved against Isaac and then “the Judge sentenced Broadhurst to 15 months' hard labour for receiving goods after a conviction of felony, and Watts to 9 months' hard labour for larceny.”

 

Isaac didn’t learn his lesson and in January 1863 he was arrested for the theft of wool from a Mr Banks, in Knighton, along with two other men, John Jones and Charles Smith. A report of this appeared in the Hereford Journal of the 23rd January. It transpired that fifty fleeces of wool went missing from Mr Banks’ warehouse. Broadhurst (who, apparently, was also known by the alias of ‘Deerfoot’), Jones and Smith were apprehended in Shrewsbury, after Broadhurst and Jones had sold the fleeces to a woolstapler. The article continued “The wool is supposed to have been carried about half mile by a short cut across the meadows to a bye road leading from Panpunton to Clun, and there put on Smith’s cart, and so conveyed to Shrewsbury by Broadhurst and Jones. Smith was seen in Knighton the whole of the following day, but they were altogether when apprehended in Shrewsbury on Friday last, and the horse and cart still in their possession. Jones is a Ludlow man, and Broadhurst an old offender here, but he has been missing since the middle of December last, when he slipped the Knighton police on their attempting to apprehend him in his own house, on another charge, and got away.” It transpired that when Isaac was arrested, he was searched and four half-sovereigns were found in his watch-pocket. There wasn’t enough evidence to convict Smith, but the Judge committed Jones and Broadhurst for trial. A second charge was then brought against Isaac, that of stealing oats and hay from a James Rea. After hearing the evidence, the Judge committed Isaac for trial on that charge as well.  

 

A report of Isaac Broadhurst’s trial appeared in the Hereford Times of the 28th March 1863. The report stated that “Isaac Broadhurst, labourer, was charged with having, on the 11th of December last, stolen 20lbs of hay and 6 pecks of oats, the property of James Rea.”

 

The first witness was George Tompkins, a bailiff at Monaughty, who stated that “on the morning of the 15th December I was in the rick-yard; I noticed that a portion of hay had been cut, apparently with a hay knife, from a rick; there was a hay knife there; I saw hay littered along the road from the rick along a lane to the turnpike road; in the road I saw marks where a cart had been standing; there was hay littered about; I traced the cart, and hay was occasionally dropped along the road to within about two miles of Knighton; when I got to Knighton I saw a cart standing in the town; there was a dog in it; I went and compared some hay which I had taken from the rick with what was in the cart, and they exactly corresponded, the hay was cut from a course in the rick, but not exactly true; I gave information, and went with the police to a house there.” He added that the hay was two years old and had been damaged by being wet. He was sure that the hay was that which had been stolen.

 

The next witness was Thomas Weale, a policeman who was stationed at Knighton. His evidence was that “on the day in question I went with the last witness to the prisoner's house there; I went in by the front door; I saw the prisoner's wife; I asked her where Isaac was; I saw him at the back of the house; he saw me; he went into the back of a neighbour's house and out at the front, and ran away; he went away at a gentle trot at first, but he found I gained on him; he then mended his pace and escaped, and I saw no more of him till in custody at Shrewsbury.”

 

The next witness was Richard Edwards who kept a toll-gate at Bleddfa, which was on the Penybont Road and 3½ miles from Monaughty. His evidence went as follows. “On the morning of the 15th December, at about a quarter to one, the prisoner passed through my gate; he came in the house and talked; I had known him before he had a horse and cart; it was a light night; he had nothing in the cart; he went on towards Knighton; there were two more persons with him.” He was asked again if there was anything in Isaac’s cart, but said he saw nothing. He claimed to have been standing near enough to the cart to have noticed if it had contained anything.

 

A toll-gate keeper on the Penybont Road named Martha Powell was then questioned. She said, “I recollect one day Mr Rea's bailiff coming to make some inquiries; I know the prisoner very well; I saw him that morning about 4 o'clock; he called “gate”; I know Monaughty, my gate is on the road between there and Knighton; when the prisoner called me I got up and unlocked the gate; I said “Is that you, Isaac Broadhurst?” he said “Yes, it is”; there was another sitting in the cart holding the reins, and with a whip; he (prisoner) paid me himself; he had the cart full of hay, upon which he was lying, and he rose up on his arm to give me the toll.”

 

The next witness was the Superintendent of Police, George Johnson. He said “I know the prisoner; on Sunday night, the 14th Dec., I saw the prisoner at Penybont; it was between 9 and 10 o'clock; his horse and cart was at the door of the public house; he was inside; there was another man with him and he went out and attended to the horse and cart; there was no hay in the cart; I saw no more of them.” On further questioning he said he had seen a bag in the cart but nothing else.

 

The Judge said that there was no evidence to connect the cart with the prisoner as his property, but the policeman, Thomas Weale, was recalled and proved that the horse and cart did belong to Isaac and had been in his possession for some time.

 

The newspaper report then went on – “The bag of hay taken from the cart and a sample from the rick at Monaughty were then handed to the jury for their inspection. Mr Giffard then addressed the jury for the defence, describing the case as one of the most flimsy that was ever brought into court. He argued that the hay was impossible to identify, the only feature which the prisoner had brought forward to prove the hay in the cart was hay taken from the rick was that the hay was that of 1861, and damaged by weather. He would ask them whether a great portion of hay in all parts of the country in that season was not damaged. A ‘Guilty’ verdict was found. A former conviction having been proved against the prisoner, the learned Judge (commenting upon the latter fact) sentenced him to 4 years penal servitude.”

 

Isaac Broadhurst was now about 33 years old, married with 5 children. After spending 2 months and 23 days in Presteigne jail, he was, on the 17th June, sent to Millbank Prison, Middlesex. On the 23rd June he was sent to Pentonville where he spent the next 11 and a half months. On the 1st June 1864 he was sent to Chatham, before finally, on 1st September of the same year, being sent to Portland. His conduct during his incarceration was recorded as ‘indifferent’ to ‘very good’.

 

Isaac was back in trouble in 1867. The Hereford Journal of the 17th August reported –

 

“Knighton, Petty Sessions, Thursday

Isaac Broadhurst was charged by Charles Passey, gamekeeper, with fishing in the Teme, in the lordship of Stanage. The offence being committed out of the county of Radnor, the case was dismissed.”

 

This seems to be the last sighting of Isaac.