Justice Welch

The best description of the "March to Finchley" was written by Justice Welch. It is far too long to quote, and some of its paragraphs could not be transferred to these polite columns. Justice Welch was perfectly qualified to recognise and appreciate the details of the scene depicted by his friend. Originally a grocer in Museum Street (then Queen Street), he had risen to be High Constable of Westminster, in which character he was known to all London as the guardian of the malefactors who were carted to Tyburn for execution. Long after Tyburn ceased to be the gallows spot, men remembered him riding sternly behind the fatal cart, on a white horse, dressed in black, with a nine-storey George the Second wig, highly powdered, and carrying in his hand a black baton tipped with silver. This office was not Welch's zenith, for on the departure of Henry Fielding to Lisbon he succeeded him as the chief magistrate for Westminster.

(Newspaper cutting of c. 1900)

Report of death of Mr John Welch

MANUFACTURER DEAD.

Mr John Welch, head of John Welch and Co, Whitehall Bleachworks, Chinley, died last night at his Llandudno residence, aged 62.
     He built the big works at Chinley several years ago, and thus was the industrial pioneer of this growing district. Recently he purchased Whitehall and adjoining estates. He employed several hundred workpeople. He was a prominent Conservative and a charitable man. Councillor Tom Welch and Lieutenant Harry Welch are sons.

(Newspaper cutting of c. 1900)