Highwayman highway robbers as heroes. Originally they were admired by many as bold men who confronted their victims face-to-face and were ready to fight for what they wanted. The most famous English robber hero is the legendary medieval outlaw Robin Hood. Later robber heroes included the Cavalier highwayman James Hind, the French-born gentleman highwayman Claude Du Vall, John Nevison, Dick Turpin, Sixteen String Jack, William Plunkett and his partner the "Gentleman Highwayman" James MacLaine, the Slovak Juraj Jánošík, and Indians including Kayamkulam Kochunni, Veerappan and Phoolan Devi. In 17th- through early-19th-century Ireland, acts of robbery were often part of a tradition
Dick Turpin a chandler and grocer named Peter Split, at Woodford. Although the identities of the perpetrators are unknown, Turpin may have been involved. Two nights later they struck again, at the Woodford home of a gentleman named Richard Woolridge, a Furnisher of Small Arms in the Office of Ordnance at the Tower of London. In December Jasper and Samuel Gregory, John Jones, and John Wheeler, attacked the home of John Gladwin (a higler) and John Shockley, in Chingford. On 19 December Turpin and five other men raided the home of Ambrose Skinner, a 73-year-old farmer from Barking, leaving with an estimated