The Pop-Gun Plot

Abstract

The so-called Pop-Gun Plot involved five members of the London Corresponding Society: John Smith, a bookseller, of Portsmouth Street, Lincoln’s Inn Fields; George Higgins, a chemist’s shopman, of Fleet Market, nowadays Fleet Street; Paul Thomas Le Maitre, a watchmaker, of Denmark Street, Soho; Thomas Upton, also a watchmaker, of Bell Yard, Temple Bar; and Robert Thomas Crosfield (1768–1802), of no fixed abode. Although all were arrested after an investigation by the Privy Council, Crosfield alone faced the ordeal of a trial for high treason. Parkinson appeared for the defence both before the Privy Council and at the trial.