designedly thrown overboard by smugglers when chased by a gang engaged
in pressing afloat. Occasionally the brandy checked the pursuit; but
more often it gave an added zest to the chase and so hastened the
capture of the fugitive donors.

To the unscrupulous outsider the opportunities for illicit gain
afforded by the service made an irresistible appeal. Sham gangs and
make-believe press-masters abounded, thriving exceedingly upon the
fears and credulity of the people until capture put a term to their
activities and sent them to the pillory, the prison or the fleet they
pretended to cater for.

Their mode of operation seldom varied. They pressed a man, and then
took money for "discharging" him; or they threatened to press and were
bought off. One Philpot was in 1709 fined ten nobles and sentenced to
the pillory for this fraud. He had many imitators, amongst them John
Love, who posed as a midshipman, and William Moore, his gangsman, both
of whom were eventually brought to justice and turned over to His
Majesty's ships.

The role adopted by these last-named pretenders was a favourite one
with men engaged in crimping for the merchant service. Shrewsbury in
1780 received a visit from one of these individuals--"a Person named
Hopkins, who appeared in a Lieutenant's Uniform and committed many
fraudulant Actions and Scandalous Abuses in raising Men," as he said,
"for the Navy." Two months later another impostor of the same type
appeared at Birmingham, where he scattered broadcast a leaflet, headed
with the royal arms and couched in the following seductive terms:
"Eleven Pounds for every Able Seaman, Five Pounds for every ordinary
Seaman, and Three Pounds for every Able-bodied Landsman, exclusive of