John Thomas Brunt
c.1781-1820
Print by Robert Cooper after Wivell. Courtesy British Museum ImagesJohn Thomas Brunt spends his childhood near Oxford Street in London. His father is a tailor and likely to be struggling because of the influx of French tailors to nearby Soho around the time of the Revolution. Young Thomas is apprenticed to a neighbouring shoemaker, whose wife, Mrs Brook, makes a fleeting appearance in the novel.
He is an enthusiastic and loyal conspirator, but it is not known when Brunt is politicised. He is influenced by experience of army officers in France and by the guild, shoemakers being amongst the most active of the time.
The fact that he writes poetry suggests an imaginative, even passionate man. His grandfather - a fictional creation - serves as an inspiration for Brunt, while also expanding the canvas of the novel.
Far from at his best, this is John Thomas Brunt after the death sentence has been passed.
Master Brunt crossed Oxford Street to the market, but nobody had an errand for a drowned rat with a limp, and only asked what breed of mischief had caused all that blood and the damage to his breeches.
Turtle Soup for the King, 14th July, 1789
Oxford Market, Oxford Street, east of Great Portland St., Thomas Hosmer Shepherd, 1850Courtesy British Museum Images
Twenty minutes later, as Walter Brunt reached for the strap, he promised that it gave no grain of pleasure to acknowledge his only son as a fool, whose recklessness was as responsible as any blasted Frenchie for depriving the family of income
Turtle Soup for the King, 14th July, 1789
Soho Tailor, 1789 J. Cooke after Samuel Collings Courtesy British Museum ImagesAs a child, John Thomas Brunt lives with his parents on Union Street (off Oxford St) in London’s West End.
MAP REFERENCES:
Horewood Regency A—Z: p12 Ca
Contemporary London A –Z: p198 1B
Then and now, the site borders on Middlesex Hospital.
In 1819, Union Street runs from Upper Newman St (Now Cleveland St) in the east to Gt Titchfield St in the west. It iss in two sections, with Suffolk St cutting through to Charles Street to the south. The east side of Union Street backs (southwards) on to the garden on Middlesex Hospital. To the west, Union St. Street continues as Riding House Lane.
In 2021 , Union Street and Riding House Lane are now incorporated into Riding House Street, which runs as the historic Union St. but continues beyond Gt Titchfield St over Portland St and into Langham Place.
There is no Suffolk St or Charles St. Middlesex Hospital is bordered by Riding House St to the north, Mortimer St to the south, Nassau St to the west (formerly Suffolk St?) and Cleveland St on the east. (Cleveland St previously Upper Newman St)
Brunt’s creative imagination in the novel leads to an adventure with Tidd and a connection to childhood memories at Billingsgate Hythe.
Thomas Rowlandson, 1810
Courtesy British Museum ImagesIn France, Brunt is reported as using the name Morton. With that in mind, I have named his (fictional) grandfather Grandpa Moreton. The old man’s kindness, his work skills and his bravery with the British army in India all inspire and influence the character of Brunt in the novel. They suggest a bigger world that stimulates the budding poet just as much as the wrongs he observes all around him.
The Fort at Vandavasi today
Battle of Wandiwash, (Jan. 22, 1760), was the decisive battle in the Anglo-French struggle in southern India during the Seven Years War (1756–63)
After the defeat, the British army, led by Irish-born Sir Eyre Coote, push the French into Pondicherry, where, threatened with starvation, they surrender in January 1761.
A jungle in present-day Tamil Nadu
Wandiwash is the Anglicised version of Vandavasi, a town to the south west of Chennai (formerly Madras) in present-day Tamil Nadu.
“Grandpa Moreton’s” precise role in the victory – like that of many working class heroes, including my own English and ANZAC grandfathers at the Somme – is forgotten.
Brunt wished everyone farewell and hurried away to address a meeting in Gee’s Court. His heart was thumping as it never had, at least, not since he first heard the crack of gunfire in France.
Turtle Soup for the King, 1st February, 1820
Brunt’s primary employment in France is repairing and making boots for officers. The close connection with the privileged classes (and a particular incident towards the end of his service) contribute as much as French politics to the building of Brunt’s character in Turtle Soup for the King. It should not be forgotten that his Commander-in-Chief, the Duke of Wellington is a member of the British Cabinet, which Brunt conspires to assassinate..
Details of Brunt’s engagement in France are patchy. He serves - reportedly under the name of Thomas Morton – in (at least) Paris and Cambrai ( then Cambray) the Duke of Wellington’s HQ during the British Army Occupation of France, 1815-1818.
A fellow shoemaker in France and member of the Royal Horse Guards Regiment turns against Brunt to save himself.
Napoleon Bonaparte, 1815, William Dickinson after Baron François Gérard
Courtesy British Museum Images
The Duke of Wellington, 1820, Sir George Hayter
Courtesy British Museum Images
King Louis XVIII, 1814, J.D.E. Canu
Courtesy British Museum ImagesLouis XVIII, (1755-1824) is King of France 1814-1824, except for the so-called Hundred Days. His return to power is skilfully managed by Wellington.
TIME-LINE
17th March, 1815 Louis XVIII flees to Ghent.
20th March, 1815 Napoleon arrives in Paris. (Start of the Hundred Days)
25th March, 1815 Britain, Prussia, Austria and Russia form an alliance against Napoleon.
18th June, 1815 The Battle of Waterloo is the culmination of several military engagements forced by the alliance.
22nd June, 1815 Napoleon abdicates
26th June, 1815 Arriving, on Wellington’s advice, in Cambrai, the French King issues a Proclamation*
8th July, 1815 Louis XVIII returns to Paris. (End of the Hundred Days)
15th July, 1815 Napoleon boards a British warship, arriving 3 months later at Elba.
*The Proclamation of Louis XVIII makes assurances including guarantees for the freedom of the press and religion and equality before the law. The King keeps his promises, but voting rights remain exclusive to wealthy Frenchmen, most of whom have supported Napoleon.
In life and in fiction, John Thomas Brunt is an enthusiastic writer of creative verses. As for many other writers before and since, the journey is often troubled.
Near neighbours of the Tidds, the Brunt family lives at no 4, Fox Court, an over populated alleyway squashed between between Gray’s Inn Lane and Brooke’s Market.
MAP REFERENCES:
Horewood Regency A—Z: p14 Aa
Contemporary London A-Z: p199 1K
1819 - a small cramped courtyard, from which Baldwin’s Market could be accessed
2021 - a glass and steel building, Fox Court is at 14, Grays Inn Rd. The building backs on to Brooke Street (formerly Brook Street) very close / accessible to the market. Interestingly, it now contains HMCTS, Her Majesty’s Court and Tribunal service
Brooke’s Market. Fox Court had an entrance off right. Hole in the Wall Passage was centre left. Author’s snapshot, 2015
Today, Fox Court is an office complex on the winding, tree-lined Gray’s Inn Road (formerly known as Gray’s Inn Lane). Author’s snapshot, 2021
Harry Brunt was saddened, of course, by Ringo’s passing, but supposed it would be easy to find a younger, prettier, even more musical canary on Leather Lane any day.
Turtle Soup for the King, 30th April, 1819.
Leather Lane is hidden from the old Brooke’s Market by this later building.
Author’s snapshot, 2015
Leather Lane Market. Baldwin’s Gardens has an entrance to Hole in the Wall Passage, home of the Tidd family (now Leigh Place).
Author’s snapshot 2015. 
In the novel, shoemakers, Brunt and Tidd form a friendship that is mostly , but not exclusively, constructive.
They both threw back their heads and laughed. They clapped their hands and hugged each other and howled with laughter, because they could not, and they would not weep. Anyone riding along Goodge Street that Tuesday, who gave the pair a second look would presume two lunatics had taken flight from an asylum.
Turtle Soup for the King, 17th May, 1819
These early 19th century workmen (source unknown) are probably American, but they suggest that the Brunts of the story are not the only shoemakers with a liking for caged birds.
One hundred and sixty two witnesses are called during the Cato Street trials. Many are establishment figures, with nothing to lose. Others are former associates, friends and neighbours of the conspirators, whose relationships and custom will undoubtedly suffer as a consequence. The Brunts’ landlady, who appears in Turtle Soup for the King is among them - as is another person, close to Brunt (readers of the novel will know who he is.) Like Robert Adams, this man negotiates his freedom by offering pieces of the jigsaw. Below, an extract from his statement to police about activity in the Brunt apartment.
…the door was just open and he saw a number of poles, like branches of trees just cut and quite rough – he thinks about twenty…he has several different nights heard people at work in that room, generally from 7 to 9 o’clock, hammering and sawing, that there was never in the room when anybody was there, and there was no furniture in the room, nor any table…..there were some men in the back room all evening till about 8 o’clock &they had the table out of Brunt’s room.
About 8 o’clock Tidd came up to Mrs Brunt and she gave him a pike-head and a sword, which were in the cupboard in Brunt’s room and Tidd took it into the next room & they all went away and Deponent saw no more of them that evening and after they were gone a man came to say that if anybody should call, they were to be sent to the White Hart, a public house nearby.
Courtesy National Archives. Transcribed by the author.
St. Sepulchre’s Church today, as seen from the approximate site of the gallows.
Author’s snapshot, May, 2021
The Old Bailey and the entire area behind the gallows was rebuilt by Victorians.
The Shard, just in sight, is a 21st century phenomenon.
Author's snapshots, May, 2021Mrs (Molly) Welch Brunt
b. about 1783
There is little information about Mary Brunt (Molly in the novel). She is reported as “a respectable woman” with the maiden name Welch. She spends time at St Luke’s asylum after receiving news that her husband and older son have been shot by firing squad in France. She has relatives in Derby, including an older son, and the novel invents a Welch cousin in London. Molly is stronger than she imagines.
When the attendant said my husband had come for me, I spat at him and said my darling was dead. But the attendant was a good Christian, Harry, and he took my arm, gave me a clean gown and helped me brush my hair. And there he was; your own dear pa, almost as dazed as myself. He said we had both grown thinner and paler because of the bloody war, but he loved me just the same as when we were married, and whatever the hospital made of it, he had come to fetch me home.
Turtle Soup for the King, 30th April, 1819
St Luke’s Hospital, Old Street Road by J. Gough after the 1814 drawing by Thomas Hosmer Shepherd.
Courtesy British Museum Images.(HARRY MORETON) BRUNT
b.1st May, 1806
The Brunts’ younger son (“Harry” in the novel) is to all intents an only child. He has been to school for longer than either parent, and considers himself, usually with justification, a wise young man. He plays the drum, and in this scene on the rooftops of Spitalfields, enacts a sequence borrowed by the author from Bertolt Brecht.
by “Hercules,” aged 6, 2021 Normally less susceptible than his pa to flights of fancy, Harry Brunt imagined himself ahead of a regiment in some strange and distant land, where the north wind howled across the plains, and he was drumming for the glory of a better England. He beat that drum as if possessed by the air, the spirit and the once supple wrists of the boy-soldier whose instrument he played.
Turtle Soup for the King, 15th August, 1819
Helene Weigel, 1948, in Mother Courage and her Children, written and directed by Bertolt Brecht. One of the greatest anti-war dramas of all time, the original text was a significant inspiration for Turtle Soup for the King.