The Lawbook Exchange has released their Catalogue 110 of Recent Acquisitions. Law Books & Manuscripts, America, Great Britain & Europe, 15th to 20th centuries. In other words, you may find anything related to law in the West since the dawn of printing. Much of what you will find goes way back in time, others from the more recent past. There are technical law treatises, accounts of sensational crimes and trials (mostly murders), and issues of concern to laymen. Some of these were the printed versions in the days before TV of what Judge Whoever is providing us for afternoon entertainment. There is something for everyone. With a focus on the sensational, here are a few selections.
No one particularly enjoys paying their bills, but John Pegsworth went to the extreme to avoid payment. Pegsworth bought a suit from John Holliday Ready, a tailor. Since he didn't bother to pay for it, Ready took him to court. Pegsworth agreed to make payments to clear the debt, but then came up with a better idea. He stabbed Holliday. Here is a broadside account of what happened next – A Full and Correct Account of the Trial & Sentence of John Pegsworth, For the Wilful Murder of Mr. John Holliday Ready...on Tuesday, January 10th, 1837. He was convicted and sentenced to death. While this doesn't specifically say the sentence was carried out, we can assume so since Pegsworth died in the same year as the trial. Item 47. Priced at $1,750.
James Greenacre was hanged for the murder of Hannah Brown after authorities found a crucial piece of evidence - Mrs. Brown's head. Greenacre planned to marry her for her money, but his helpful mistress had a quicker solution. She told Greenacre to kill Mrs. Brown, dismember her, and hide her body parts in various places. Then they would take her money and escape to America. The plan failed when Mrs. Brown's head was discovered in a canal. This 1837 broadside is titled Confession of Greenacre to the Murder of Mrs. Brown. This is another case where the year of the trial and of the defendant's death coincided. Greenacre was hanged while Sarah Gale, the mistress, was transported to New South Wales. She kept her head while others were losing theirs. Hopefully, the lady liked her new habitat as she lived for another half century. Item 49. $1,750.
Lest you think all of these murder trials are strictly of lowbrow appeal, here is one where 40,000 people came to witness the execution, among them Charles Dickens and William Makepeace Thackery. The killer was Francois Benjamin Courvoisier, and his biography, so to speak, is Life, Trial, Confession And Execution of Lord W. Russell, published in 1840. Considering his entire life story fits on a broadside, and it is virtually all about his trial and execution, we can presume there wasn't much else of note in his life. Courvoisier probably made a mistake by picking an MP as his target. That will get you extra scrutiny. He tried to make the crime look like a robbery. Couvoisier was Russell's valet, and in another blunder, he hid some of the stolen items in his room. When detectives found them, Couvoisier immediately became their prime suspect. His execution was a major event, attended by 40,000 including the aforenamed celebrities. Part of the show was that the executioner, William Calcraft, used a short drop that slowed the rate of strangulation while he pulled on their legs or climbed on the victims' shoulders to snap their necks. Item 41. $1,850.
Here is a murder case with a different outcome. Answering questions the right way may be the means of surviving the trial. This broadside is headed Particulars of The Most Horrible Murder! Of an Old Greenwich Pensioner, Named Bailey, Who was Stabbed in the Heart, by James Ward, Another Pensioner, published in 1834. Ward was Bailey's roommate. A doctor testified that Ward was under the influence of a severe fever which must have altered his mental state. When asked how the knife was so clean, Ward responded, “why, I licked it cleaned with my tongue.” He was found not guilty by reason of insanity. Item 48. $1,750.
Ward could have used the care of Dorothea Dix. She spent many years advocating for people like him. She spent some time in Europe and became connected to social reformers. One of those causes was mental hospitals. On returning America, she visited some in Massachusetts and, appalled by conditions, began to advocate for reform there too. She started her advocacy in Massachusetts but later took her message to authorities in several more states. She was very much responsible for getting people to see the mentally ill were not criminals and needed to be treated in a humane setting. Item 91 is her Memorial of Miss D. L. Dix, to the Honorable the General Assembly in Behalf of the Insane in Maryland, published in 1852. Her memorial led to the Maryland General Assembly passing a bill to buy land and build an asylum for the mentally ill. Item 91. $500.
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