The New Newgate Calendar

William Luker, The Mansion House Police Court, (c.1891) Sometimes, in order to understand exactly what is going on in a historical courtroom... read more »

On this date in 1622, Jesuit Charles Spinola was martyred in Nagasaki. He was the son of both Spanish noble stock and the spirit of missionary martyrdom... read more »

Poor Eliza Taylor. East End women had, by all accounts, a hard life. Poverty was rife, childbirth dangerous, work hard to find and poorly paid, and husbands... read more »

On this date in 1659,* the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb disposed of his primary competition … his older brother Dara Shukoh or Shikoh. These two sons... read more »

Building London’s underground railway, c.1866 Ellen Childs believed she was doing a good thing when she knocked a ladder over a parapet onto what... read more »

On this date in 1306, Scottish patriot Simon Fraser was drawn and quartered in London. This Norman-descended lord was one of the side-switching nobles... read more »

The butcher of female genitals, Baker Brown - he of the infamous clitoridectomy and other related procedures - has often been mentioned on these pages.... read more »

It was half-past midnight on the morning of Friday 7 September 1888 and police constable Henry Matthews (of H Division, Metropolitan Police) was walking... read more »

On this date in 1960, a goon went to the San Quentin gas chamber for his violent retort. On the evening of December 30, 1958, George Albert Scott was exiting... read more »

  What does it mean to be a prisoner? Most of us today would cite confinement within bars or walls as a defining characteristic. But this was not... read more »

The Bramhall stocks in Cheshire – image from the Stockport Image Archive, taken from Wikipedia This weekend sees the annual Heritage Open Days take... read more »

When the Rev. Henry Burton, vicar of Atcham near Shrewsbury received a letter asking for his help he was immediately suspicious. Whether this was because... read more »

William Birt was supposed to be the first person to be hanged on the gatehouse roof of the new Gloucester Prison, which opened in the summer of 1791.... read more »

Mrs Ada Wigg was clearly at her wits end when she presented herself at the North London Police Court in early September 1898. She said she needed the magistrate’s... read more »

On this date in 1594, Thomas Merry (Merrey, Merrye) and his sister Rachel were executed at Smithfield — Thomas for the robbery-motivated bludgeon... read more »

‘No equally powerful body will exist in England outside Parliament, if power is measured by influence for good or evil over masses of human beings’.... read more »

One hundred years ago today, a Bolton private (formerly lance corporal) named James Smith fell to his countrymen’s guns on Belgian soil during World... read more »

James Coburn was electrocuted on this date in 1964 in Alabama’s “Yellow Mama”. He’d been condemned for a Dallas County robbery... read more »

A bit of publicity on the local news always helps, and it was an item on the television about a ghost being spotted by staff at a former Somerset prison... read more »

The Kind Hearted Policeman by  L Huard (1864). This was the image of policing the Met were keen to promote but it did not always reflect the reality... read more »

Perhaps on this date in 1653 — it is, at any rate, the date saluted by a festival that honors him — the peasant Sakura Sogoro was crucified... read more »

Fetter Lane, Farringdon c.1880 I have discussed the tragedy of suicide on this blog before because it features quite regularly in the pages of the London... read more »

Irish revolutionary Tom Williams was hanged at Belfast’s Crumlin Road Gaol on this date in 1942. A plaque at 46 Bombay Street in Belfast marks the... read more »

London’s Adelphi Theatre in 1840 In his memoirs, the famous, Glasgow-born detective Allan Pinkerton noted that in his adopted America in the 19th  century,... read more »

A curious case today, where the intention of the prosecutor may well have been something quite different than it at first appeared. The defendant was a... read more »

On this date in 1914, Captain Frédéric Henri Wolff became the first French soldier fusillé pour l’exemple during World War I.... read more »

This Article was originally written for the British Association of Victorians and published on Monday. To see it in all its glory go here   An unnamed... read more »

  Stepney Green in the Victorian Period This is what might be described as a ‘cautionary tale’ for the readers of the Morning Post. William... read more »