Claude du vall biography of william

"The Gallant Highwayman"

Claude Du Vall (aka Du Val, Duval or Duvall)  was a gallant and courteous rogue, probably the most dashing highwayman ever to haunt the roads of England.

He was known as a “true gentleman of the road” and "an eternal feather in the cap of highway gentility."

He was born the son of a miller in Normandy in 1643.

Claude du vall biography of william

By the age of fourteen he was working as a stable-boy in Rouen, where he was hired by a group of English royalists to tend their horses, and when Charles II was restored to the throne, Duval returned to England as a footman to a nobleman.

He had evidently learned gentlemen's manners along the way and by 1666 he was mentioned by name as a highwayman. He was fashionably dressed and gallant, loved by ladies of all classes, and never used violence on his victims. His haunts included the northern approaches to London, especially Holloway, between Islington and Highgate.

The most famous episode of Duval's career was written