Latest / Ridiculous History / Susanna Caroline Matilda: The Colonial Grifter Princess

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Susanna Caroline Matilda: The Colonial Grifter Princess · Ridiculous History

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Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Welcome
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Speaker 1: to the show, Ridiculous Historians. Thank you so much for
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Speaker 1: tuning in. Casey, can we get a little sort of
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Speaker 1: you know, generically Colonial times music in the background. Perfect,
0:43
Speaker 1: We've got a pitch for you today, folks. Have you
0:45
Speaker 1: ever thought about changing your identity? Have you ever felt
0:50
Speaker 1: that you should break free of the bonds of your
0:53
Speaker 1: previous life and become someone else entirely? That's a question
0:58
Speaker 1: we're addressing today. I'm Ben, my co host Noel is
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Speaker 1: off on adventures. However, we have a very special episode
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Speaker 1: for you today with a very special guest. Are returning
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Speaker 1: friend of the show. Thanks for classing up the place
1:14
Speaker 1: yet again, Christopher haci Otis. Hey, thanks for having me. Guys.
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Speaker 1: I I can't promise I can fill Noel's chair, um,
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Speaker 1: but I will do my darnist. I am incredibly excited
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Speaker 1: about this. We didn't we We've teased your return for
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Speaker 1: Thank you very high. You know, we asked, we asked
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1:43
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1:48
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1:51
Speaker 1: to have you. Thank you so much. I know you've
1:53
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Speaker 1: So in the meantime, I've just got, you know, time
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Speaker 1: me super joyful. Oh thank you. Also, of course, we
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Speaker 1: are not diving into Ridiculous History alone. We are joined
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Speaker 1: as always with our super producer, Casey Pegram give it
3:25
Speaker 1: up for him, folks, Casey, I don't know why I
3:29
Speaker 1: stopped like you are also going to put it in
3:31
Speaker 1: a plause que. But Christopher has just given us a delightful, tantalizing,
3:37
Speaker 1: I would say, exclusive teaser, because this is the first
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Speaker 1: time we've talked about some of these projects on air. Yeah, yeah,
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Speaker 1: on this show. Yeah, that's right, and so we'll say
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Speaker 1: no more. Uh, you pay for the whole seat, you
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Speaker 1: only need the edge. Check back in in a month
3:51
Speaker 1: or so and we may have we may have some
3:54
Speaker 1: new news for you. However, Christopher, you noticed at the
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Speaker 1: very top of the show we set up the concept
4:03
Speaker 1: of changing one's identity. Have you ever have you ever
4:06
Speaker 1: thought about this? I remember when I was in college,
4:10
Speaker 1: I was at a rock and roll club and someone
4:14
Speaker 1: had taped on the wall of one of the restrooms,
4:17
Speaker 1: you know, over all the terrible band stickers and the
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Speaker 1: graffiti and the cigarette burns and the scars scratched into
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Speaker 1: the wall, someone had taped something that said, reinvent yourself,
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Speaker 1: start a new life. And it was basically not quite
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Speaker 1: an anarchist cookbook, but directions on how to access a
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Speaker 1: manifesto on how to essentially fake your own death and
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Speaker 1: season new identity. And there was some sort of Narro
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Speaker 1: dou Well who is going around spreading these pamphlets around
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Speaker 1: rock and roll clubs in the late nineties and early
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Speaker 1: two thousand's. Um. So, I don't know how many how
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Speaker 1: many people out there are living under assumed identities. You know,
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Speaker 1: we can't all be Don draper Um. But if there
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Speaker 1: is anywhere that's prime for reinvention and developing a new
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Speaker 1: persona and and reinventing yourself, I mean, I think the
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Speaker 1: United States of America is like, that's one of the
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Speaker 1: hot beds for it, right, That's one of the things
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Speaker 1: that we do. We burst forth from the shackles of
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Speaker 1: our our past. We reinvent ourselves. We set aside our
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Speaker 1: family histories, we invent new family histories. We just present
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Speaker 1: ourselves as we hope to be. And a lot of
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Speaker 1: times people just kind of buy it. That's true, that's
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Speaker 1: so true. The word of the day I'll introduce here
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Speaker 1: is a pseudo side. That's the technical term for faking
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Speaker 1: one's death or attempting to do so. Uh. And today's
5:41
Speaker 1: episode hinges on Yeah, just as you said it, Man,
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Speaker 1: hinges on a fundamentally American idea. We have a somewhat
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Speaker 1: romanticized or idealized concept of this, of this purposeful reinvention,
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Speaker 1: this resurrection, rebirth by design, but we don't often talk
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Speaker 1: about the real life cases, uh, you know, in which
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Speaker 1: these sorts of tropes occur. And today's story is about
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Speaker 1: a person who did just that, who reinvented herself. And
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Speaker 1: that's the sort of thing that normally is it's praised
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Speaker 1: right to come from humble beginnings to set yourself up
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Speaker 1: to a life that's that's grander than anything you could
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Speaker 1: have imagined or that your parents could have set out
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Speaker 1: for you. Normally, it's a good thing. Is that the
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Speaker 1: case here? Well, let's let's dig into it. How about that.
6:38
Speaker 1: Let's let's let's dig into it, and then maybe at
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Speaker 1: the end you and I can make the call, and
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Speaker 1: fellow listeners please chime in and let us know what
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Speaker 1: your take is after you hear the entirety of the story,
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Speaker 1: because it's important to hear the entirety of this particular tale.
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Speaker 1: Our story today begins with a woman named Sarah Wilson.
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Speaker 1: She was born in a Stafford village in seventeen fifty four,
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Speaker 1: and she was relatively well off, not not super destitute,
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Speaker 1: because her father was a professional and he's a bailiff. However,
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Speaker 1: they did have money problems, and the money problems were
7:18
Speaker 1: such that at the age of sixteen, Sarah is sent
7:22
Speaker 1: away from home and she is sent to London to
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Speaker 1: look for employment. This was not terribly uncommon during this time. No,
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Speaker 1: it's not. She came from humble beginnings and you know
7:34
Speaker 1: it's this West Midlands region of England, it's not super industrialized.
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Speaker 1: She's looking for more opportunity, like many people do. She
7:41
Speaker 1: heads to the big city. There are some suggestions maybe
7:44
Speaker 1: she wasn't just looking for money. Maybe she was off
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Speaker 1: to seek her own ideas of fortune and fame and
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Speaker 1: kind of build a name for herself, whatever that might mean.
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Speaker 1: But she does head to London and within a few
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Speaker 1: weeks she finds work. She's working as a made for
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Speaker 1: a woman named Caroline Vernon. And Caroline Vernon was a
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Speaker 1: lady in waiting for Queen Charlotte, now Queen Charlotte, Queen
8:09
Speaker 1: of England, but born in Germany. Spoke German German accent
8:14
Speaker 1: when she's speaking English. Uh. You know, this is the
8:16
Speaker 1: sort of thing where, looking back three four or five
8:19
Speaker 1: hundred years from especially the vantage point of the United States,
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Speaker 1: where royalty is a bit of a novelty, we don't
8:25
Speaker 1: realize how little national borders and family lineage criss crossed,
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Speaker 1: and one may or may not have informed the other.
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Speaker 1: So you have German nationals who are actually the King
8:38
Speaker 1: of England. You have people from Austria ruling Greece. You
8:41
Speaker 1: have the mix of whatever blend of Austro Hungarian Habsburg
8:47
Speaker 1: that situation ruling over bits and pieces of Europe. Um.
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Speaker 1: So it's it's it's sort of like a dual layer
8:54
Speaker 1: in Europe. And it's I always like to think that
8:57
Speaker 1: the movies just get it wrong because everyone's speaking with
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Speaker 1: the same accent, wether it's an accurate accent or not,
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Speaker 1: it's generally somewhat uniform, whereas um, that's maybe not the
9:05
Speaker 1: case then. But I'm I've fallen down a rabbit hole
9:08
Speaker 1: of just talking about historical specificity. I think it's a
9:11
Speaker 1: great point, though, and you've picked the right show to
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Speaker 1: do this on because it may be difficult for many
9:17
Speaker 1: of us in twenty nine and these our modern days.
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Speaker 1: Two understand that it was normal for the rulers of
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Speaker 1: a country to be completely foreign in most what we
9:32
Speaker 1: would consider completely foreign in today's terms, uh, and being
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Speaker 1: quote unquote qualified for their position entirely due to their ancestry.
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Speaker 1: And that's that's what happens. There's a feedback loop around
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Speaker 1: this time, uh and the centuries preceding it, wherein you know,
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Speaker 1: if you are a member of a powerful family, you
9:53
Speaker 1: want your children to only marry members of other powerful families,
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Speaker 1: and so things get mixed. I'm not making an in
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Speaker 1: breeding joke. I'm just saying that's how the thrones end
10:02
Speaker 1: up being collected and consolidated and passed around. Yeah, that's
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Speaker 1: absolutely true. And I will say that that this discussion
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Speaker 1: of languages and accents does come into play a little
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Speaker 1: later on in Sarah Wilson's story. Yes, nice foreshadowing. Yes, okay,
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Speaker 1: So Sarah quickly ingratiates herself. She is a a people person,
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Speaker 1: a slick talker. At this point she is playing the
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Speaker 1: role of the perfect maid as far as Lady in
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Speaker 1: Waiting Caroline Vernon is concerned. Yeah, and she's working at
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Speaker 1: the Queen's House, which if you or I were to
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Speaker 1: go to London, or any of the listeners wanted to
10:42
Speaker 1: go to London and go check out the Queen's House,
10:44
Speaker 1: you can't find it because what's now there is bucking
10:48
Speaker 1: In Palace, a little larger, a little more grand, but
10:51
Speaker 1: that original Queen's House. But but that's the region of
10:54
Speaker 1: London we're talking about. It's still you know, that the
10:56
Speaker 1: seat of royal power, right, quite prestigious. Yes, And at
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Speaker 1: the Queen's House, whereas you said, Christopher, Buckingham Palace now stands.
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Speaker 1: Sarah frequently saw the actual Queen, the wife of King
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Speaker 1: George the Third, and she quickly, in addition to ingratiating
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Speaker 1: herself with the upper crust of this of this community,
11:20
Speaker 1: she also familiarize herself intimately with the scuttle but the gossip,
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Speaker 1: the things that only the maids and the butlers and
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Speaker 1: what Downton Abbey would call the downstairs people were aware of.
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Speaker 1: And this got to her. You know what I mean,
11:38
Speaker 1: because we know, we know how human psychology works has
11:41
Speaker 1: not changed for many thousands of years. Happiness is often
11:46
Speaker 1: defining comparative terms. So she is, she's smart, she's quick witted.
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Speaker 1: She has escaped her small town and done more than
11:54
Speaker 1: many people in her town would have done. But then
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Speaker 1: she looks around and she sees you of this opulence
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Speaker 1: and these lives of leisure, and she says, I'm paraphrasing here,
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Speaker 1: Why not me Where they got that? I ain't got
12:08
Speaker 1: That's right, Yeah, I want to get me some of that. Right.
12:11
Speaker 1: That's that's a quote exactly. I think that was on
12:14
Speaker 1: some plaque somewhere in some dusty tone. Um. But yeah,
12:18
Speaker 1: that's the thing, says Sarah Wilson. Being around royalty, knowing royalty,
12:24
Speaker 1: knowing the comings and goings of royalty. That wasn't enough
12:27
Speaker 1: for her. She wanted to get a piece of the action,
12:31
Speaker 1: have a slice for herself, carve out a little nook
12:34
Speaker 1: in that world. Or maybe she just wanted the things
12:38
Speaker 1: that she knew she would never ever have on her own.
12:42
Speaker 1: And I mean, this is such a stratified culture at
12:45
Speaker 1: the time. It still is in many ways. But when
12:49
Speaker 1: you come from completely humble backgrounds and you are spending
12:52
Speaker 1: your day around someone who is wearing let's say, a
12:56
Speaker 1: ring or a crown, or today a pair of sneakers,
13:00
Speaker 1: or you know, you drive a car that is essentially
13:04
Speaker 1: worth what your family could make in a decade, and
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Speaker 1: this is just a trinket to this person. That wealth
13:12
Speaker 1: imbalance creates tension, and most people in the world can
13:16
Speaker 1: handle that. Some people can't. And Sarah Wilson was one
13:19
Speaker 1: of those people. So there was a night when she
13:23
Speaker 1: was by herself in the in the Queen's room, she
13:25
Speaker 1: snuck into a closet, breaks into this cabinet, and she
13:28
Speaker 1: takes some jewelry, some dresses, a ring, and a little
13:32
Speaker 1: miniature portrait of Queen Charlotte. So it's like, you know,
13:36
Speaker 1: we don't have an image of what it looks like,
13:38
Speaker 1: but I imagine it's one of those little sort of
13:40
Speaker 1: um cameo portraits and maybe a little silhouette um just
13:44
Speaker 1: something that would be a keepsake, something that a family
13:47
Speaker 1: member of Queen Charlotte would keep and would uh you know,
13:50
Speaker 1: would refer to lovingly remember their relative. So she takes
13:55
Speaker 1: all these things for herself. Yeah, and she thinks it's
13:58
Speaker 1: no big deal. One's going to find out for Pete's sake.
14:02
Speaker 1: This is the Queen of England, right, She's got countless dresses,
14:08
Speaker 1: countless rings. But the thing is they were not countless.
14:13
Speaker 1: They were they were counted, accounted frequently. As is the
14:17
Speaker 1: case with sometimes people of immense wealth, they also are
14:22
Speaker 1: immensely focused on the things that make them wealthy. And
14:25
Speaker 1: so Queen Charlotte was no different. She kept fastidious inventory
14:29
Speaker 1: of her inventory. She knew what she had, and she
14:33
Speaker 1: knew when something was missing. So very very very soon
14:37
Speaker 1: after Sarah took these items, they're noticed missing. So the
14:42
Speaker 1: Queen says, all right, we don't know who did this.
14:45
Speaker 1: I need someone to keep an eye on. I thought
14:47
Speaker 1: that was quite clever too. Yeah, I mean, you don't
14:51
Speaker 1: want to just go off and start accusing people willy nilly.
14:54
Speaker 1: That might fly with some royals. Not Queen Charlotte. Not
14:58
Speaker 1: Queen Charlotte. No, she said, up a surveillance operation and
15:04
Speaker 1: think about how many servants must exist in a royal household,
15:08
Speaker 1: so there's clearly going to be um several factions, and
15:12
Speaker 1: there's also going to be some servants that she trust
15:17
Speaker 1: completely and then some that are you know, still a
15:20
Speaker 1: little green, and then some that she doesn't really interact with.
15:24
Speaker 1: So we can only imagine that she goes to one
15:28
Speaker 1: of the servants she legitimately trust someone, someone or some
15:31
Speaker 1: people with whom she spent years and years, right, and
15:35
Speaker 1: she asked these people to watch not just the room,
15:39
Speaker 1: but this particular closet. And this is where Sarah Wilson
15:44
Speaker 1: makes her first error. Yeah, I mean the criminal returning
15:48
Speaker 1: to the scene of the crime. It's a trope in
15:51
Speaker 1: crime fiction, but that's because it happens. That's human nature.
15:55
Speaker 1: You know, maybe your prime criminal would go for the
15:58
Speaker 1: big score and then never touched that room again, never
16:01
Speaker 1: go back. But Sarah was not a professional criminal. She
16:05
Speaker 1: knew she got away with something once, so she went
16:08
Speaker 1: back to the well again, or in this case, the cabinet. Yes,
16:13
Speaker 1: but this time you know that that law and order
16:15
Speaker 1: style stake out whatever was going on. It worked, and
16:19
Speaker 1: Sarah Wilson was caught in the act of trying to
16:21
Speaker 1: rob Queen Charlotte once again. So this is very very
16:27
Speaker 1: very bad news. The way the laws work at the time,
16:31
Speaker 1: Sarah Wilson is charged with theft and violation of the
16:36
Speaker 1: royal privacy. And that's serious. That is serious. Yeah, that
16:40
Speaker 1: is seriously how serious, more so than more so than theft,
16:45
Speaker 1: violation of the royal privacy carries with it the death sentences. Yes,
16:52
Speaker 1: so she receives the death sentence, and her original employer,
16:58
Speaker 1: Lady in Waiting Vernon, has not given up on her.
17:01
Speaker 1: That's Caroline Vernon, right, Yes, that is Lady Carrot, Lady
17:04
Speaker 1: in waiting, Caroline Vernon, and Caroline takes it upon herself
17:08
Speaker 1: to personally plead to Queen Charlotte please spare Sarah. She's
17:14
Speaker 1: made a mistake, but she maybe is a good girl.
17:17
Speaker 1: She comes from a good background. She's I like her,
17:21
Speaker 1: and she's so young, right, she's what how sixteen seventeen
17:26
Speaker 1: at this age, So her please work somewhat and her punishment,
17:32
Speaker 1: the death sentence is commuted to what they called transportation.
17:37
Speaker 1: That sounds nice, it does, it does. So she was
17:40
Speaker 1: just on subways. Yeah, so where they transport her. They
17:43
Speaker 1: transported her transportation. We should say it was didn't mean
17:48
Speaker 1: the same thing it means today. Transportation was forcible exile.
17:53
Speaker 1: It's deportation. Gott be the closest analog we have today, right,
17:56
Speaker 1: So in July of seventeen seventy one, she is placed
18:01
Speaker 1: on a prison ship and sent to Baltimore, Maryland. It's
18:06
Speaker 1: a long transportation, she's a long ride. It is long.
18:10
Speaker 1: You wouldn't want to put the Uber bill for that. However,
18:14
Speaker 1: things get worse because when she arrives in the what
18:18
Speaker 1: would become the United States. So this is one who
18:21
Speaker 1: were five years before everything kind of comes together still
18:25
Speaker 1: just colonies colonies, yep. And she is not put in prison,
18:31
Speaker 1: she has not given um some sort of state level
18:34
Speaker 1: employment or colonial level employment. She is put up for
18:38
Speaker 1: auction and sold as a slave. So she can't just
18:42
Speaker 1: kind of do her own thing in the United States
18:44
Speaker 1: or in what would become the United States. She's just
18:47
Speaker 1: in Maryland, transported there against her will, although maybe willingly
18:51
Speaker 1: because it's otherwise. The other option is to be put
18:54
Speaker 1: to death. But then she's just in servitude. Yeah, that's that.
18:58
Speaker 1: It's looking grim before Sarah. At this point, she is
19:02
Speaker 1: sold to a fellow named w Duval. He is a
19:06
Speaker 1: planter from Bush Creek, Frederick County. Do you know what
19:10
Speaker 1: what she was doing for Mr Duval? I have not
19:13
Speaker 1: seen too much detail about that. That makes sense that
19:16
Speaker 1: because I think she she wasn't with him for long, right, right, right?
19:21
Speaker 1: She wasn't with him for long. And at this case,
19:24
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's an unpleasant thing to imagine, but
19:28
Speaker 1: physical abuse was prevalent with people who were enslaved in
19:34
Speaker 1: this manner slavery in general. So while we do not
19:38
Speaker 1: have confirmed records of what happened during her time there,
19:43
Speaker 1: we know that she did not spend very long there
19:46
Speaker 1: at all. As you said, Christopher, she sought to improve
19:49
Speaker 1: her situation almost immediately, right she escapes to Virginia lickety split,
19:55
Speaker 1: and she doesn't just go with the clothes on her back.
19:58
Speaker 1: This is the weirdest part of this. Yeah, I this
20:01
Speaker 1: this is the sort of thing where our lack of
20:03
Speaker 1: a time machine is just really a bummer, because I
20:07
Speaker 1: I want to know the details of how this exactly happened.
20:10
Speaker 1: When she escapes, she still has in her possession, which
20:14
Speaker 1: means she brought over with her on her transportation from Britain.
20:19
Speaker 1: She still had one of the rings she stole. She
20:22
Speaker 1: still had some dresses, and she still had that miniature
20:25
Speaker 1: portrait of Queen Charlotte, which how how how do you
20:27
Speaker 1: have that? I don't I don't know. I mean, we
20:30
Speaker 1: like to think that systems of power are in place
20:33
Speaker 1: and everyone does everything perfectly, but as anyone who has
20:36
Speaker 1: ever dealt with let's say, um, the police, or the
20:40
Speaker 1: local county clerk or the town collector. Who. Yeah, sometimes
20:45
Speaker 1: people who are supposed to be doing their jobs, um,
20:47
Speaker 1: you know, they check the wrong box, they forget a comma,
20:51
Speaker 1: and then when you go back to renew, they say, wait,
20:53
Speaker 1: you're not even in our system. And you say, but
20:55
Speaker 1: I was in your system. I had a hyphen in
20:57
Speaker 1: my name and you took it out and they don't
20:59
Speaker 1: know what you're talking king about. And then all of
21:00
Speaker 1: a sudden you say, I had a thing of Queen
21:03
Speaker 1: Charlotte and where is her? And no, I promised this
21:05
Speaker 1: dress is mine. And I think that's probably how it happened.
21:08
Speaker 1: And the romantic in me, you know, the fan of
21:10
Speaker 1: fiction at least, has this this cinematic moment stuck in
21:15
Speaker 1: my head, which almost certainly didn't happen. Wherein the queen says,
21:18
Speaker 1: and take these garments with you. Take them. Hence they
21:22
Speaker 1: are soiled. You know they've been touched by the poor
21:26
Speaker 1: if yes, they've been touched by the boar, which should
21:29
Speaker 1: also be a crime. So at this point, though, we
21:37
Speaker 1: although we're gonna be with her for the rest of
21:41
Speaker 1: this story, we kind of say goodbye to Sarah Wilson.
21:44
Speaker 1: We do. We say goodbye to Sarah Wilson, and we
21:46
Speaker 1: say hello to Princess Susannah Caroline Matilda, sister of Queen Charlotte,
21:52
Speaker 1: forced into exile in the colonies following a very enigmatic
21:58
Speaker 1: family scandal. You don't want to talk about it's it's
22:01
Speaker 1: too hard, it's impolite. Now, it's it's royalty. It's not
22:06
Speaker 1: the sort of thing you bring up with a polite
22:08
Speaker 1: dinner conversation in Virginia when you are a princess, when
22:13
Speaker 1: you are a princess. And also it would be violating
22:16
Speaker 1: the privacy of the royal family, and who would want
22:19
Speaker 1: to do that. That's a crime that terrible. So this
22:23
Speaker 1: is this is strange. First off, the hutsball alone, you know,
22:27
Speaker 1: congratulations to Princess Susannah Caroline Matilda. This is the kind
22:33
Speaker 1: of con that is difficult to pull off. However, she
22:39
Speaker 1: has several powerful things working to her advantage. First, as
22:44
Speaker 1: you mentioned, Christopher, she has all this stuff. Probably the
22:48
Speaker 1: most powerful or most impactful of the material possession she
22:51
Speaker 1: has for her new identity will be that miniature portrait
22:55
Speaker 1: because of the sentimental value you mentioned earlier. But also,
22:59
Speaker 1: and equally as a important here, she has intimate knowledge
23:04
Speaker 1: of life in the royal court. Yeah, she's on the
23:08
Speaker 1: other side of an ocean, but she can still talk
23:11
Speaker 1: to people about the goings on at the Queen's house,
23:15
Speaker 1: who's speaking with whom, and who's falling out with whom,
23:18
Speaker 1: and how things are going upstairs and downstairs, and you
23:22
Speaker 1: know she's she's presenting herself as Susannah Caroline Matilda, which
23:26
Speaker 1: I should also add of Mecklenburg Strelitz. Oh yes, yes,
23:30
Speaker 1: very important. Yeah. The Mecklenburg Strelitz is a a Northern
23:33
Speaker 1: German dynasty sort of who you know, Queen Charlotte was
23:37
Speaker 1: part of that family and they've had um their bloodline
23:40
Speaker 1: influencing royalty throughout Europe. But as the former Sarah Wilson
23:45
Speaker 1: is presenting herself as as Susannah Caroline Matilda Princess. You know,
23:50
Speaker 1: she she really harnesses, I think a bit of nostalgia
23:53
Speaker 1: for what's going on back to because again, a lot
23:56
Speaker 1: of the people living in the United States or what
23:58
Speaker 1: would become the United States still think of themselves as
24:02
Speaker 1: British subjects, as as you know, not as American citizens.
24:07
Speaker 1: To them, the stories of the Queen, stories of the King,
24:10
Speaker 1: stories of what's happening in London, those to them are
24:14
Speaker 1: stories from home. And so there is that nostalgia and
24:19
Speaker 1: that that yearning. And apparently Princess Susannah really had an
24:24
Speaker 1: easier in with with some of the older generation in Virginia,
24:28
Speaker 1: the ones who still thought of themselves as British, as English,
24:31
Speaker 1: and you know, she could tell them what was going
24:34
Speaker 1: on and kind of let them relive there and maybe
24:37
Speaker 1: the it's been decades since they were back home. And
24:40
Speaker 1: there's also this there's also this interesting mechanism that could
24:44
Speaker 1: occur whenever you're working with nostalgia, which is she could
24:49
Speaker 1: mention a name or a title that these people, especially
24:54
Speaker 1: the Old Guard, would have been familiar with, and then
24:58
Speaker 1: let then fill in the blame based on the scant
25:01
Speaker 1: information she actually had. And when she does that, they
25:06
Speaker 1: would feel that they were learning something new, but just
25:09
Speaker 1: as importantly, they would feel that they were displaying their knowledge,
25:12
Speaker 1: and therefore they were still people with their what do
25:16
Speaker 1: we say, with their ear to the wind, their eyes peeled,
25:19
Speaker 1: their tone nails to the grindstone something that, yes, their
25:25
Speaker 1: their fingers and the toneails on the pulse, so they
25:28
Speaker 1: would still feel relevant. Having this knowledge, we can also,
25:33
Speaker 1: I think reasonably assume that even for the people who
25:37
Speaker 1: were not the older generation, there was tremendous social cash
25:43
Speaker 1: to be had in hosting not just a member of
25:48
Speaker 1: English aristocracy, but uh, the sibling of the queen and
25:54
Speaker 1: you know already again seventeen seventy one, seventeen seventy two,
25:59
Speaker 1: as you said, just a few years out from the
26:02
Speaker 1: revolutionary war as we call it in this country. And
26:06
Speaker 1: this also plays into displays of loyalism. Well that's the thing. So,
26:13
Speaker 1: you know, Princess Susannah is telling people she's been sent
26:17
Speaker 1: to the colonies because of some falling out back home.
26:19
Speaker 1: She can't get into the details, but she will soon
26:23
Speaker 1: be restored to her rightful position back home, and that's
26:27
Speaker 1: you know. So she's at these dinner parties, at these salons,
26:29
Speaker 1: at these social events, mingling, whining and dining, and so
26:34
Speaker 1: people are eager to really buy into the story because
26:38
Speaker 1: if she's telling the truth, even if there's doubt in
26:40
Speaker 1: their minds, if she's telling the truth, they are now
26:43
Speaker 1: socially connected to a princess. So if she's restored to power,
26:48
Speaker 1: Let's say they need a favor. Let's say they have
26:50
Speaker 1: a son who needs a high paying position at a company.
26:54
Speaker 1: Let's say they need some land grants. Let's say they
26:56
Speaker 1: need to uh gosh, I don't know, he's an army
27:00
Speaker 1: for whatever they want to do, whatever that might be.
27:03
Speaker 1: You know, old rich people, they got things armies can do.
27:07
Speaker 1: That is absolutely true. There is a third advantage that this, uh,
27:13
Speaker 1: this part of American or colonial society sees, and that's
27:17
Speaker 1: you know, I can pay you, princess, since we are
27:20
Speaker 1: such very good friends. The typical let's call it an
27:25
Speaker 1: administrative fee, not a bribe, but the typical administrative fee
27:29
Speaker 1: that would be expected in order to have myself or
27:34
Speaker 1: relation of mine, uh granted a position maybe on the court,
27:39
Speaker 1: may be associated with it, uh somehow, with some government
27:43
Speaker 1: oregan or body. As soon as you return, and we
27:46
Speaker 1: know that will be soon. So they saw this as
27:49
Speaker 1: an investment in many ways. They were they they were
27:54
Speaker 1: actually giving This is where the con part comes in.
27:57
Speaker 1: They were actually giving Prince Susannah currency. They were they
28:03
Speaker 1: were giving her cash money, money. Yes, they speaks just
28:07
Speaker 1: as strongly three years ago as it does today. Um,
28:11
Speaker 1: but also gifts. Uh. You know, I imagine places to stay,
28:15
Speaker 1: access to carriages, you know, a nice a nice bedroom
28:19
Speaker 1: for a week, or wardrobe, all that stuff. Um. Here
28:22
Speaker 1: have a horse, Yeah, why not? We've all been in
28:25
Speaker 1: that situation. Here do you look? Take this horse, this
28:27
Speaker 1: one for me, which not even a princess, whichever one
28:31
Speaker 1: you want. Then you make me feel like one Christopher
28:34
Speaker 1: taking Christopher. I learned it all from Casey Pegrob. But
28:38
Speaker 1: you know what, the these sorts of Shenanigans are increasingly
28:44
Speaker 1: difficult to pull off over time over time. And so
28:47
Speaker 1: she went all over the colonies. This wasn't just Virginia,
28:50
Speaker 1: this wasn't just Maryland. She was in Georgia, she was
28:52
Speaker 1: in the Carolina. She met the governor of North Carolina.
28:55
Speaker 1: I mean, this is like high level, high level stuff.
28:57
Speaker 1: She has access. But people have questions, that's right, and
29:01
Speaker 1: they want to be very careful with the manner in
29:05
Speaker 1: which they pose these questions to someone like Princess Susannah
29:09
Speaker 1: Carolina Matilda, sister to the queen family of Macklenburg. Strelits
29:15
Speaker 1: nailed it. Not only but she had a couple other
29:18
Speaker 1: aliases too. She also went by the Marquiones de Waldegrave.
29:22
Speaker 1: She was also known as the Princess of Cronenberg. No
29:25
Speaker 1: association with the director that we know of, that we
29:27
Speaker 1: know of, Yes, it's very fair. Yeah. She would use
29:31
Speaker 1: these names on different occasions, and she would, as you said,
29:36
Speaker 1: travel widely. She was meeting tremendously influential people, and folks
29:42
Speaker 1: were starting to ask questions because in these circles there
29:46
Speaker 1: would be people who speak German. Yeah. And if she
29:49
Speaker 1: was supposedly from Germany, raised in Germany, yeah, Um, how
29:54
Speaker 1: come you don't speak German? Right she refused to perhaps
29:58
Speaker 1: because of the quarrel, yeah, or she was in the
30:01
Speaker 1: new in the new world, speaking a new language. Um.
30:04
Speaker 1: But even then she spoke perfect English, flawless English. You
30:08
Speaker 1: know why because she was English. Oh yeah, that's rule Kaiser.
30:13
Speaker 1: So's a moment for me. But yeah, people people were saying,
30:16
Speaker 1: last weird because I have been speaking English for decades
30:21
Speaker 1: and decades and decades. I grew up speaking German and
30:24
Speaker 1: I still have a little bit of an accent, you
30:27
Speaker 1: know what I mean? So why is she flawless with it?
30:30
Speaker 1: And then there was another question that seems very obvious
30:34
Speaker 1: to us in retrospect. That's it's the one where everyone thinks,
30:38
Speaker 1: wait a minute, does Queen Charlotte have a sister? Right?
30:43
Speaker 1: Why haven't I heard of her? Maybe maybe she's able
30:46
Speaker 1: to turn it around and and really play on people's insecurities.
30:49
Speaker 1: And so maybe I wasn't important enough to know about
30:52
Speaker 1: the Queen's sister. Yeah, Or maybe you're not. Yeah, maybe
30:57
Speaker 1: you're not as plugged in as you want other people,
31:00
Speaker 1: let this dinner party to believe. And so people probably
31:04
Speaker 1: for some time that strategy is effective in people are
31:07
Speaker 1: reticent to voice their concerns because they don't want to
31:11
Speaker 1: seem to be the odd personality. Might I also suggest that, um,
31:16
Speaker 1: maybe men act a little dumb in the presence of
31:19
Speaker 1: someone who might be a princess. I think that is
31:22
Speaker 1: an excellent suggestion, having not, to my knowledge at this
31:25
Speaker 1: point in life, interacted with a princess. I I can't
31:29
Speaker 1: speak from experience, but I feel like that is. I
31:33
Speaker 1: feel like that is unfortunately a very astute observation. Men
31:37
Speaker 1: can be dumb no way. So you're right though, that's
31:42
Speaker 1: a that's a good point. That's one that a lot
31:43
Speaker 1: of historians don't talk about. Well, it's it's not necessarily
31:46
Speaker 1: brought up. It's not like all these people who are
31:48
Speaker 1: giving her gifts are described as as suitors particularly, but
31:53
Speaker 1: knowing men, knowing that sort of patriarchal society that was
31:56
Speaker 1: in place at the time, I have to imagine that
31:59
Speaker 1: some of these people who are wealthy landowners in the
32:02
Speaker 1: colonies meeting a single young princess applying her with gifts,
32:07
Speaker 1: might have some motives of marrying into royalty or other motives. Yeah. Absolutely,
32:15
Speaker 1: And and men will do dumb things, yes, when they
32:18
Speaker 1: have those motives. Absolutely. I mean, I would say people
32:22
Speaker 1: in general. But in this situation, it's only fair to
32:25
Speaker 1: note that that trend toward thickheadedness is is probably accelerated
32:31
Speaker 1: in men. But the scam didn't hold. The scam did
32:34
Speaker 1: not hold because speaking of men, we have to reintroduce
32:39
Speaker 1: a character that briefly appeared earlier in the tale of Mr.
32:43
Speaker 1: W Duval, who it turns out is not happy about
32:48
Speaker 1: Sarah Wilson as he knew her, and maybe not that
32:51
Speaker 1: dumb of a man, because eventually, after a couple of
32:53
Speaker 1: years passed, he hears a description of this princess. He
32:57
Speaker 1: hears talk and he probably has oh that wow, a
33:01
Speaker 1: princess in the colonies. That's interesting. What does she look like?
33:04
Speaker 1: And they say this is what she looks like? And
33:06
Speaker 1: he says, I know someone who looks like that, Yes,
33:10
Speaker 1: and it's Sarah Wilson. And he has been trying to
33:13
Speaker 1: find this the one that got away. Literally, so it
33:17
Speaker 1: is autumn of seventeen seventy three. Remember she's been on
33:20
Speaker 1: the runs since seventeen seventy one ish, uh, And and
33:25
Speaker 1: he's he's been looking for her, actually since seventeen seventy one.
33:28
Speaker 1: I have I have here in front of me from
33:30
Speaker 1: the Pennsylvania Gazette, published on October eleven, seventeen seventy one,
33:35
Speaker 1: advertisement for a runaway slave. And uh, this is what
33:41
Speaker 1: William Daval wrote in the newspaper back in seventeen seventy one.
33:44
Speaker 1: It took out an ad run away from the subscriber
33:47
Speaker 1: a convict servant maid named Sarah Wilson, but has changed
33:51
Speaker 1: name to Lady Susannah Carolina Matilda, which has made the
33:54
Speaker 1: public believe that she was his Majesty's sister. And here's
33:58
Speaker 1: where we get into the realized and what she looked like.
34:01
Speaker 1: She has a blemish in her right eye, black rolled hair,
34:04
Speaker 1: stoops in the shoulders, makes a common practice of writing,
34:08
Speaker 1: and marked her clothes with a crown and a bee.
34:10
Speaker 1: Whosoever secures the said servant woman or takes her home,
34:14
Speaker 1: shall receive five pistols besides all costs and charges. So
34:20
Speaker 1: if you find Sarah Wilson, all your expenses are paid
34:23
Speaker 1: when you get five pistols. What a deal, five pistols.
34:26
Speaker 1: And I should say I'm going to applaud myself for
34:29
Speaker 1: reading that, because this is an old timey advertisement from
34:32
Speaker 1: an old timey newspaper. And it's got those medial s
34:35
Speaker 1: s which are such a pain. They look like an
34:38
Speaker 1: f they do look like that's without the crossbar um.
34:41
Speaker 1: They go all the way back to old English um.
34:44
Speaker 1: And I'm glad that they're gone now, you know, the
34:47
Speaker 1: thank you, thank you, movable type. We don't need all
34:50
Speaker 1: those weird looking says that make everything sound like an
34:54
Speaker 1: act of Congress's Yes, Yeah, it's true. Those are are paid.
35:00
Speaker 1: And I applaud your recital there, Christopher, I applaud Casey
35:04
Speaker 1: for cutting out all of my flubs. Love. Well, that's
35:12
Speaker 1: the thing. You use a curvy S at the end,
35:16
Speaker 1: but not at the beginning. So if it looks like
35:18
Speaker 1: the word flub is flawed, but the word flubs would
35:21
Speaker 1: to us look like flaps. And we can only hope
35:23
Speaker 1: that old man Willie d was going through the same
35:26
Speaker 1: process as he was writing this advertisement. So um, I
35:31
Speaker 1: really really hope at some point there's some sort of
35:32
Speaker 1: merchandise out there that people can have a bumper sticker
35:35
Speaker 1: or a little a little pin or some just gaudy
35:39
Speaker 1: T shirt they can wear that says, you know, I
35:41
Speaker 1: am a proud, ridiculous hiftorian. That's great, Casey, do you
35:46
Speaker 1: like that one? I love that Ideatorians. Yeah, medials for everyone,
35:51
Speaker 1: Casey on the case. We'll put it to a vote
35:54
Speaker 1: to let us know what you think about these. What
35:57
Speaker 1: are they called medial? A medial? Yeah, it's it's also
36:01
Speaker 1: known as a long S because the short S is
36:03
Speaker 1: the short, round one or curvy or you know, just
36:07
Speaker 1: an S. A as we would say, I like the
36:10
Speaker 1: I like the depths of resentment that are that are
36:13
Speaker 1: emanating across the table. You didn't have to read this,
36:17
Speaker 1: so I might we do have another bit of old
36:21
Speaker 1: timing newspaper right here. I may pass it to you
36:23
Speaker 1: and uh and put you to the teft. We've created
36:28
Speaker 1: a monster, but it's monsters to know, Monthter, Monthter. That's
36:37
Speaker 1: fun to say. Actually should get back on track. So
36:40
Speaker 1: they're on the hunt. Yeah, the word is out. And
36:43
Speaker 1: in addition to publicizing this advertisement and appeal in offering
36:48
Speaker 1: this reward, he sends he being uh, Willie sends one
36:53
Speaker 1: of his employees, a man named Michael Dalton, to retrieve Sarah.
37:00
Speaker 1: Alton has uh, you know, he has a certain set
37:04
Speaker 1: of skills Liam Neeson style. We can only assume because
37:07
Speaker 1: he does eventually track the princess down to a plantation
37:12
Speaker 1: in Charleston right after she left. So he is hot
37:17
Speaker 1: on her wake, hot on her trail. And then he
37:21
Speaker 1: doesn't give up. He follows the clues Carmen San Diego style,
37:25
Speaker 1: and he finds her to neighboring plantation. He captures her.
37:30
Speaker 1: He takes her back to that estate in Bush Creek,
37:33
Speaker 1: Frederick County, and that's in Virginia, yes, Yeah, that's in Virginia.
37:38
Speaker 1: Is that the end of the story. She just gets
37:40
Speaker 1: captured and she goes right back into servitude. Yeah, Sometimes
37:43
Speaker 1: things just and I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I mean, right, well,
37:52
Speaker 1: you still have to take some time to name the
37:55
Speaker 1: pony before before you ride it out, and I would
37:57
Speaker 1: I would advise something heavy on the FS and theses.
38:01
Speaker 1: But this is not the end of the story, is it, Christopher.
38:04
Speaker 1: You know it's not. There's there's more scamming ahead, as
38:08
Speaker 1: as may not be so surprising with miss Sarah Wilson.
38:11
Speaker 1: So Sarah is on the plantation, she's working at this point.
38:15
Speaker 1: It's s though, but Devall is not at home because
38:19
Speaker 1: he has left the plantation to fight in the militia
38:22
Speaker 1: for the American War of Independence, yes, which we now
38:26
Speaker 1: know as the Revolutionary War. And while he is gone,
38:33
Speaker 1: a very very strange coincidence scurs. This is the kind
38:37
Speaker 1: of thing you can't write in fiction because no one
38:40
Speaker 1: will believe you. Yeah, it seems like this seems like
38:44
Speaker 1: a really unsatisfying end to things because it's just so improbable.
38:48
Speaker 1: But according to the historical record, this is what happened
38:52
Speaker 1: another either enslaved person or servant girl also by the
38:57
Speaker 1: name of Sarah Wilson, crosses paths with Sarah Wilson. That
39:03
Speaker 1: you and I and the listeners now, and this is
39:05
Speaker 1: very vague. We want to want to let all of
39:08
Speaker 1: our fellow listeners know, we are very well aware that
39:12
Speaker 1: this is incredibly vague. Somehow our Sarah Wilson, the former princess,
39:19
Speaker 1: is able to switch I guess, bodies or make make
39:24
Speaker 1: people confuse the new Sarah Wilson for her. And then
39:29
Speaker 1: during this confusion, while her owner is away, while this
39:34
Speaker 1: creep the vall Is way, she escapes and this time
39:38
Speaker 1: she heads north. Yeah, the southward direction did not work
39:42
Speaker 1: out so well for her in the past when she
39:44
Speaker 1: was a princess. So she splits. She goes north. She
39:47
Speaker 1: leaves Sarah Wilson the second in place of Sarah Wilson.
39:50
Speaker 1: The first too bad for Sarah Wilson. The second. I guess.
39:53
Speaker 1: We think this is the end of her story, although
39:55
Speaker 1: maybe she was already going to be on that plantation anyway.
39:58
Speaker 1: And uh, Sarah Juan was like, oh, oh no, that's
40:00
Speaker 1: Sarah Wilson over there. Are you looking for Sarah Wilson.
40:03
Speaker 1: That's Sarah. Hey are you named Sarah Wilson And she says, yeah,
40:06
Speaker 1: that's me. And then she's like, well, I'm just gonna
40:09
Speaker 1: walk away as you guys go talk to her. And
40:14
Speaker 1: you know, there's just a lot of this like convincing
40:17
Speaker 1: people and and gift of gab. You know, you've got
40:20
Speaker 1: to really be a smooth talker. Um. This reminds me
40:23
Speaker 1: of the story a little bit of that that bridge. Yeah, yeah,
40:28
Speaker 1: tab Or Bridge, right, the two French marshals who decided
40:33
Speaker 1: to con their way across the Danube. Yeah. You You
40:37
Speaker 1: and Noel had a really great episode about this and
40:39
Speaker 1: thanks man. Yeah, you know, ridiculous historians. If you have
40:41
Speaker 1: not listened to that episode, go dig it up. I mean,
40:44
Speaker 1: we kind of just gave you the surprise ending. But
40:47
Speaker 1: it's still a great story regardless. There's all sorts of
40:50
Speaker 1: weird boasting and French chest puffery and uh, you know,
40:54
Speaker 1: almost bombings and Hungarian Confusion and which, by the way,
40:59
Speaker 1: really a band name. I think Hungarian Confusion that is
41:02
Speaker 1: an excellent band name, my friend. I'm hang on, sorry
41:06
Speaker 1: everybody listening, I'm going to write that down. Okayn's actually
41:11
Speaker 1: just filing for analysis right now. Yes, revolution, but Sarah Wilson.
41:20
Speaker 1: She is not confused about what she's doing. She heads
41:24
Speaker 1: out of Virginia, goes north, and at least for the
41:27
Speaker 1: foreseeable future, lives a somewhat normal life. Still has a
41:32
Speaker 1: lot of her money, which she again like, where where
41:37
Speaker 1: does the money go? Where does she keep it? Are
41:39
Speaker 1: there secret bank accounts? Does she have secret pockets? Has
41:43
Speaker 1: she literally buried boxes of coin? Maybe she has just
41:47
Speaker 1: like a lot of hair, just like a huge head
41:51
Speaker 1: of hair, and there's just like envelopes of money in there.
41:54
Speaker 1: Who could be I mean, at the time, it may
41:58
Speaker 1: have been a sound investments. Yeah, you know, some money
42:02
Speaker 1: sewn into the lining of a coat or something like that. Anyway,
42:05
Speaker 1: she's got all this money, and she ends up all
42:07
Speaker 1: the way up in New York. She actually meets a
42:10
Speaker 1: young military man named William Talbot or alternatively Sterling. Oh
42:15
Speaker 1: is that right? Well, it is sometimes it differs, depends
42:18
Speaker 1: on the source. But yeah, she meets this. She meets
42:20
Speaker 1: a nice young man and he is a military man.
42:25
Speaker 1: He's a officer in the light Dragoons. And the war
42:29
Speaker 1: transpires spoiler alert. This part of the North American continent
42:34
Speaker 1: becomes a country we call the United States today. Part
42:37
Speaker 1: of it, Okay, you're familiar with its work. And the
42:40
Speaker 1: couple decides to stay in this new country. What are
42:44
Speaker 1: they doing. Probably they're they're avoiding arrest for Sarah to England.
42:50
Speaker 1: But they also she uses her money. Maybe maybe she
42:53
Speaker 1: did this, Maybe she kept jewelry and then sold the jewelry.
42:58
Speaker 1: That might have happened, but she used is this money
43:01
Speaker 1: that she has acquired to set up her husband as
43:05
Speaker 1: a businessman, and they live, as far as we can
43:09
Speaker 1: tell from the record, they live, uh happily. Ever after,
43:13
Speaker 1: they have a lot of kids, and they set up
43:17
Speaker 1: their residence in the Bowery in New York, which at
43:20
Speaker 1: the time was a quiet, nice neighborhood. M kind of
43:23
Speaker 1: a happy ending for her. It is, especially we can
43:26
Speaker 1: consider how close she came to very very terrible things.
43:30
Speaker 1: I don't know. It also reminds me in a way.
43:33
Speaker 1: You remember that Disney film Pinocchio, right the stories. So
43:37
Speaker 1: as a kid, I thought Pinocchio was really cool until
43:41
Speaker 1: one of my friends later on, years and years later,
43:45
Speaker 1: pointed out to me that Pinocchio has this horrible lesson
43:50
Speaker 1: for children in terms of morality. Tell me about it. Well,
43:53
Speaker 1: I'll keep it brief, but Pinocchio from his beginning is
43:58
Speaker 1: told to do the following kind of things or not
44:01
Speaker 1: do these things, so that he can ultimately become self
44:05
Speaker 1: actualized and be a real boy. He breaks all of
44:07
Speaker 1: those rules or those commandments or whatever, and then at
44:10
Speaker 1: the end he gets the reward. Anyway, that's true. So
44:14
Speaker 1: did Sarah Wilson have a moment? We we can tell.
44:18
Speaker 1: One thing we can tell that differentiates her from other
44:20
Speaker 1: con artists is that when she got to a good spot,
44:25
Speaker 1: she stopped. There are other con artists who just can't
44:28
Speaker 1: give up the game. Well, there was a point though,
44:31
Speaker 1: you know. And and this is where I'd like more
44:33
Speaker 1: detail about her life. Um, And I mean this to
44:36
Speaker 1: me seems ripe for some Hollywood tale, and I'd love
44:39
Speaker 1: to see this turned into a film and really dig
44:42
Speaker 1: into the story. But there was a time before she
44:44
Speaker 1: met her husband, after she escaped Virginia where she she
44:47
Speaker 1: had this little side escapade. And there's not a lot
44:50
Speaker 1: that I could dig up about this, but she she
44:53
Speaker 1: teamed up with this um, with this criminal who was
44:57
Speaker 1: known by the alias of Tom Bell. He was uh.
45:00
Speaker 1: He was an irishman um also known as Patrick O'Connor,
45:04
Speaker 1: but they kind of worked together for a while, and
45:07
Speaker 1: he introduced himself to people as Mr Edward Augustus Montague,
45:11
Speaker 1: a gentleman of fortune and betrothed lover of Princess Susanna
45:15
Speaker 1: Carolina Matilda. So I maybe maybe the princess came back
45:21
Speaker 1: after her her flight from Virginia and before she settled
45:24
Speaker 1: in New York. Maybe there's this this sort of interim
45:26
Speaker 1: of her flirting again with this world of intrigue and
45:30
Speaker 1: a scam, and I don't know much about it. We
45:34
Speaker 1: we don't know, like we as a species don't know
45:37
Speaker 1: much about this part of her life, which makes it
45:40
Speaker 1: by far one of the most intriguing and fascinating. We
45:45
Speaker 1: don't know much about Patrick O'Connor nor his alias Tom Bell,
45:49
Speaker 1: but we do know that they did for for a
45:53
Speaker 1: brief time. She did go into a two person con act,
45:58
Speaker 1: and who knows, maybe they really were betrothed. I don't know.
46:03
Speaker 1: I mean, he was a fairly well known criminal at
46:05
Speaker 1: the time. I mean, this could be the sort of
46:06
Speaker 1: thing where maybe they pulled off one last heist and
46:09
Speaker 1: she got out of the life. It's a sort of
46:11
Speaker 1: you know, like a like a Danny Ocean kind of
46:13
Speaker 1: situation where she teams up with this acclaimed crime guy,
46:18
Speaker 1: she gets what she needs, and um, you know she
46:21
Speaker 1: has her happily ever after. You also have to wonder
46:25
Speaker 1: whether the man who ultimately became her husband knew about
46:30
Speaker 1: her stint as a princess knew Did she tell him
46:34
Speaker 1: her true, true, true story or did she say like,
46:37
Speaker 1: maybe I'm an orphan and this is my family fortune
46:41
Speaker 1: and I love you, I don't want to talk about
46:43
Speaker 1: my past. Let's start a new life together in the Bowery.
46:46
Speaker 1: And then maybe he just went head over heels Christopher.
46:50
Speaker 1: Maybe he was just like, well, I'm in love and
46:54
Speaker 1: being a dude, I'm kind of dumb and I do
46:57
Speaker 1: need some money. And I do and I do need
47:00
Speaker 1: eats them as you said, cash money. Oh, speaking of
47:03
Speaker 1: cash money, Bennett is I I thought this might be
47:06
Speaker 1: a good way to wrap up because I this is
47:09
Speaker 1: a little off topic, but it's related to some some
47:11
Speaker 1: royalty and some cash money. I wanted to get your
47:13
Speaker 1: opinion and ridiculous historians. If you have any advice for me.
47:18
Speaker 1: I got this email from a Nigerian prince. Okay do
47:21
Speaker 1: you tell? And he's asking for some money. Okay, should
47:25
Speaker 1: I help him out? Um? How much money is he
47:28
Speaker 1: asking for more than I've got? Oh? Okay? Uh, then
47:33
Speaker 1: without having a doctorate in finance, I would advise you
47:38
Speaker 1: depending on how much. Well, first, how much time do
47:40
Speaker 1: you have? I don't have enough time. Spoiler alert, I'm
47:46
Speaker 1: not giving this guy any money. But that's But the
47:48
Speaker 1: thing is, you know, we're talking about this weird scam
47:51
Speaker 1: of someone putting themselves forth as royalty, and it it
47:54
Speaker 1: sounds like the sort of thing like, oh, this is
47:56
Speaker 1: just a thing that you know, those historical routes back
47:59
Speaker 1: in the day fell for. It's going on still. Um.
48:03
Speaker 1: I in preparing to come chat with you guys here,
48:07
Speaker 1: I did a little digging and there was a report
48:09
Speaker 1: last year from the Security Services a d T. In
48:12
Speaker 1: two thousand eighteen alone, people in the United States fell
48:15
Speaker 1: prey to the Nigerian scams and other sort of email
48:19
Speaker 1: uh scams like that where people are just asking for
48:21
Speaker 1: money to the tune of more than seven hundred thousand
48:24
Speaker 1: dollars last year alone, um and it averaged out to
48:28
Speaker 1: about two thousand, one hundred dollars per person. So, this
48:32
Speaker 1: this scam of royalty, this desire to buy into a story,
48:37
Speaker 1: this ability to be hoodwinked. Um. You know, I think
48:41
Speaker 1: it's just baked into humanity. It's just who we are.
48:44
Speaker 1: We want to believe, we want to help um and
48:48
Speaker 1: if someone says there are prince or a princess, Hey,
48:51
Speaker 1: why not? Well, and it gets our our inner fox boulder.
48:55
Speaker 1: I want to believe what I was going to advise
48:59
Speaker 1: you to do off record, again, not being a doctorate,
49:01
Speaker 1: just between you, Casey, me and the millions of us listening.
49:06
Speaker 1: You're not recording this case right, this is all off
49:08
Speaker 1: the record, person perfect. I just don't want this out
49:11
Speaker 1: in the world. That would be embarrassing. I've read accounts
49:15
Speaker 1: of people who essentially scammed the scammers, which is on
49:19
Speaker 1: the murky side of unethical pranking. What are you talking that?
49:23
Speaker 1: That is fighting the fight? Well, the idea is, you know,
49:26
Speaker 1: they'll say stuff like, sure, you've contacted me, I do
49:30
Speaker 1: have this money. I will give you this information, but
49:33
Speaker 1: first I want to know, uh first, seeing to prove
49:36
Speaker 1: something in good faith or whatever. And I've found situations
49:40
Speaker 1: wherein someone convinced the scammer or someone who knows the
49:46
Speaker 1: scammer to get a tattoo or to write essays about
49:50
Speaker 1: Harry Potter and things of that nature. So if you
49:53
Speaker 1: have the time and the inclination, and you don't feel
49:58
Speaker 1: particularly guilty about trolling people who are trying to steal
50:03
Speaker 1: from you, then then I would advise to find I
50:06
Speaker 1: would advise you find the funniest prank to pull. We'll
50:09
Speaker 1: check back in. We'll check back in, and perhaps, Christopher,
50:13
Speaker 1: one day you will be known to as as a
50:17
Speaker 1: genius of the con because one of the most American
50:23
Speaker 1: things about about the way we treat con artists here
50:27
Speaker 1: in the US is that they are often begrudgingly admired,
50:32
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. The idea of this this um,
50:36
Speaker 1: slick talking, clever individual violating social norms and getting away
50:42
Speaker 1: with it, it's it's imprinted into our DNA. And that's
50:46
Speaker 1: why the Providence Rhode Island Gazette and Country Journal in
50:49
Speaker 1: January of seventeen seventy four noted that Sarah Wilson is
50:53
Speaker 1: quote the most surprising genius of the female sex that
50:57
Speaker 1: was ever obliged to visit America. Let's just walk past
51:03
Speaker 1: that blatant, you know, misogyny. There. They're basically saying, smart
51:07
Speaker 1: for a woman, because they're being jerks. But what they're
51:10
Speaker 1: also doing, and when I think is more important for
51:13
Speaker 1: our purposes here, is they are phrasing the intelligence of
51:19
Speaker 1: this person. They're saying, this is one of the smartest
51:22
Speaker 1: people in this country. Too bad they're not a politician
51:26
Speaker 1: or you know, a philanthropist. Can't win them all, can't
51:29
Speaker 1: win them all. But I feel like this was a
51:33
Speaker 1: big win for Casey Nolan, Spirit and I to have
51:38
Speaker 1: you over on the show, and we hope that you
51:41
Speaker 1: enjoyed this episode. We want to hear from you. Let
51:44
Speaker 1: us know some of your favorite historical cons other than
51:49
Speaker 1: the Trojan Horse, other than that one. You know, that's
51:53
Speaker 1: that's sort of like going to karaokeme plane, don't stop
51:56
Speaker 1: believing and and whatever we want to call this con
51:58
Speaker 1: of you. So how being convinced to let me sit
52:01
Speaker 1: in here and chat with you guys? I feel like
52:04
Speaker 1: I've scammed everyone. Hey, yeah, that's a Hey, that's a
52:07
Speaker 1: good question. Is your name Christopher, isn't it? I don't know, Casey.
52:11
Speaker 1: I believe him. He's just got such a such an
52:14
Speaker 1: amicable air about him. You know, no comment alright, just
52:18
Speaker 1: just call me princess. Oh wow, you guys are in
52:21
Speaker 1: on this together. Well, here's hoping that I don't get
52:25
Speaker 1: scammed out of millions of dollars. But if I do,
52:28
Speaker 1: I'm glad it was from you too. Thank you, as
52:31
Speaker 1: always to our super producer, Casey Pegram. Thank you to
52:34
Speaker 1: Alex Williams, who composed our track. Thank you to Gabe,
52:37
Speaker 1: our research associate. Christopher. We often thank you on this show,
52:42
Speaker 1: so it's a little strange that you're here now. I'm
52:44
Speaker 1: really glad to thank you in person. Thanks for coming on, man,
52:47
Speaker 1: you're welcome. Thank you for having me Bannon, and thanks
52:49
Speaker 1: for having me ridiculous Historians. And stay tuned for our
52:53
Speaker 1: next episode, Whearing Christopher and I will explore not a
52:59
Speaker 1: not a come No, things are going to get a
53:01
Speaker 1: little grimeier grammar Grammar Grimer, just a little dark, little gross,
53:09
Speaker 1: so fun, still ridiculous. Stay tuned for more podcasts from
53:21
Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast,
53:24
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.