William Thompson (confidence man)
William Thompson was an American criminal and con artist whose deceptions caused the term "confidence man" to be coined.
Operating in New York City in the late 1840s, a genteely-dressed Thompson would approach an upper-class mark, pretending they knew each other, and begin a brief conversation. After initially gaining the mark's trust, Thompson would ask "Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?" Upon taking the watch (or, occasionally, money), Thompson would depart, never returning the watch.
Thompson was arrested and brought to trial in 1849, in a case that made newspaper headlines across the country. The New York Herald, recalling his explicit appeals to the victim's "confidence," dubbed him the "confidence man." Per the Oxford English Dictionary, the first known use of the term was printed in The New Orleans Picayune.
The Thompson case was a major inspiration and source for Herman Melville's 1857 novel The Confidence-Man.
References
William Thompson
William Thompson may refer to:
Academics and scientists
Soldiers
William Thompson (poet)
Rev. William Thompson was an 18th-century English poet.
Life
William Thompson was the son of Rev. Francis Thompson, vicar of Brough in Westmoreland, NW England, who died in 1735; William's date of birth is not known. William Thompson studied at Queen's College, Oxford, which his father had also attended, and graduated with a Master of Arts in 1738, afterwards becoming a fellow of the college.
Thompson became rector of Hampton Poyle with South Weston in Oxfordshire. He published his collected poems in two volumes in 1757.
Work
He is best known for the long poem Sickness (1746), which discusses various illnesses including melancholy, fever, consumption, and variola. Other poems include Epithalamium, Nativity, and Hymn to May, as well as a panegyric to Alexander Pope.
Footnotes
William Thompson (philosopher)
William Thompson (1775 – 28 March 1833) was an Irish political and philosophical writer and social reformer, developing from utilitarianism into an early critic of capitalist exploitation whose ideas influenced the Cooperative, Trade Union and Chartist movements as well as Karl Marx. Born into the Anglo-Irish Ascendancy of wealthy landowners and merchants of Cork society, his attempt to will his estate to the cooperative movement after his death sparked a long court case as his family fought successfully to have the will annulled. According to E. T. Craig, this decision to will his estate to the cooperative movement was taken after a visit to the pioneering Ralahine Commune.
Life
Born in Cork, William was the son and heir of one of the most prosperous merchants of that city, Alderman John Thompson, who held, amongst other offices, that of Mayor in 1794. William inherited the small trading fleet and landed estate near Glandore, West Cork after his father's death in 1814. Rejecting the role of absentee landlord commonly led by those of a similar situation, William based his living quarters on the estate and despite many travels, invested much time with the tenants on the estate introducing agricultural innovations, services and education for children aimed at improving the welfare and prosperity of the families present.
