The New Newgate Calendar

On this date in 1731, rebel Alejo Calatayud was beheaded in present-day Bolivia. A silversmith of mixed Spanish and native lineage, Calatayud (English... read more »

Just who Samuel Sharp really was, the police court report of The Morning Post was not sure. Sharp had also been heard to call himself Thomas... read more »

Calais, c.1830 by J.M. Turner Towards the end of January 1830 a flustered man rushed into the Bow Street Police Court in some distress. He gained an audience... read more »

On this date in 1944, the Japanese shot 44 civilians on the Andaman Islands as possible spies. (cc) image from Mike Behnken This breathtaking Indian Ocean... read more »

(Thanks to Rev. Dr. Jeff Hood — “pastor, theologian, activist, writer” — for the guest post, which originally appeared on his own... read more »

In early 1838 a man appeared at Marlborough Street Police Court charged with embezzling ‘sums of money’ from Countess Nelson. This caught my... read more »

Launceston was proclaimed a municipality by an Act of Parliament on 30 October 1852, 47 years after it was founded. Seven Aldermen were elected to the... read more »

From the Savannah Daily Gazette, Feb. 5, 1820: From the August Chronicle 2d inst. EXECUTION: On Friday last two negro men, named Ephraim and Sam, were... read more »

  Mr. and Mrs Philips were well known to their parish officers and to the local charity groups that attempted to intervene in the lives of London’s... read more »

This date in 1697 marked the end for a pathologically burglarious ex-soldier. As heavily as we exploit it, the Newgate Calendar can be a bit shaky when... read more »

It’s the final day of my Corset Crime Week (every blog – in fact, every newspaper, and every nation – should have one). To mark... read more »

  Louis Rateau was a serial thief. A self-declared chemist of no fixed abode he was charged at Marylebone Police Court of stealing overcoats in January... read more »

One of the Netherlands’ most infamous traitors, Anton van der Waals, was shot on this date in 1950. An electrician with a misfiring career, van der... read more »

In the second of this week’s stories involving a corset proving itself to be the superhero of the early 20th century, by preventing crime, a... read more »

In 1862 a series of attacks in London (starting with one on Hugh Pilkington MP ) by robbers who grabbed their victims from behind and throttled them, initiated... read more »

A sheikh, and six others much less exalted hanged this morning in Kuwait. Garnering most of the headlines, Sheikh Faisal Abdullah al-Jaber al-Sabah —... read more »

Philip Manuel, 61, a miner from Gwennap in Cornwallhad, it seemed, a history of violence. Sometime before the case that follows, he was bound over for... read more »

Edward Devanny was a 50-year-old tailor from Burnham in Buckinghamshire, who came a cropper in 1938 when he broke into a bra factory and stole some ladies’... read more »

Historical work on the role of the eighteenth-century justice of the peace (by Peter King, and myself) has revealed the important work they did in mediating... read more »

Dutch New Amsterdam’s council minutes give us today’s remarkable story, of the chance condemnation and chance deliverance of an Angolan Our... read more »

We are delighted to share this post by Krista Kesselring, Professor of History at Dalhousie University. It originally appeared on the Legal History Miscellany... read more »

In January 1838 a young lad named Charles Scott was placed in the dock at Queen’s Square Police Court accused of damaging trees in St James’... read more »

Lima, Peru on this date in 1639 celebrated a huge auto de fe featuring 72 prisoners. Of these, 12 were executed at the stake, one of whom had the consolation... read more »

  Earlier this month we lost Jill Saward, one of the vociferous and determined campaigners for the rights of victims of sexual assault. Jill was the... read more »

We return today to one of our occasional sources, the gallows broadsheets in James Kelly’s Gallows Speeches From Eighteenth-Century Ireland —... read more »

George Miles was an unhappy man. In January 1860 PC 569 from the City police was patrolling London Bridge when he saw Miles ‘leaning forward on the... read more »

This is one of the finest Georgian Inn complexes remaining in Australia. Built in 1826 by John Williatt as the Patriot King William the Fourth Inn, this... read more »

The Eagle Pub (Grecian Theatre Music Hall, c.1841) Reginald H. Burkett of 1 Field Court, Gran’s Inn Road was that most ‘pooterish’ of... read more »

(Thanks to Robert Elder of Last Words of the Executed — the blog, and the book — for the guest post. This post originally appeared on the Last... read more »

(Thanks to Meaghan Good of the Charley Project for the guest post. -ed.) On this date in 1905, John Johnson was hanged for the murder of Patrolman Dennis... read more »

in 1880 Henry Bird ran a music shop at 56 Berwick Street, Soho, London. One afternoon Henry Everest turned up at his shop with an order for a double... read more »

Savannah’s Wright Square got its haunt (and concomitant reputation as “the hanging square”) on this date in 1735 when domestic servant... read more »

August 1818 I follow the dressmaker as she slips quietly out of the house and heads towards the coastal path that will take her to Yarmouth Gaol. She has... read more »

Apologies in advance for the convoluted puns in the title but sometimes it is very hard to resist! 1856 was the year which saw the passing of the County... read more »

On this date in 1573, Gilles Garnier was burned at the stake as a lycanthrope. Detail view (click for the full image) of The Werewolf, or the Cannibal... read more »

Anyone with brothers or sisters is familiar with the petty arguments and jealousies that we grow up with, and I’m sure most parents are aware that... read more »

UPI photographer Andrew Lopez won the Pulitzer Prize for his photographs of Jose Cipriano Rodriguez, a corporal of the deposed Batista dictatorship, going... read more »

This week my second year undergraduates at Northampton are exploring the topic of juvenile crime. In particular they are looking at the notion that ‘delinquency’... read more »

As America says goodbye to a president who promised but  failed to close Guantánamo, and prepare to inaugurate one who says he wants to “load... read more »

On this date in 2014, Ohio very clumsily executed Dennis McGuire for raping and stabbing to death an eight-months pregnant woman in 1989. For no reason... read more »

Preamble: In December, the Carceral Archipelago team – including Clare Anderson, Kellie Moss, Katie Roscoe, Carrie Crockett, Lorainne Paterson, Anna... read more »

Mr Lushington, the notoriously harsh magistrate who presided over Thames Police Court during the 1880s, was said to have little toleration of domestic... read more »

January 15 is the feast date, and the 1648 execution date, of the Catholic protomartyr of China — St. Francis Ferdinand de Capillas. The pride of... read more »

One of the joys of writing a blog based on the reportage of the summary court system in 19th-century London is the discovery of bits of social history... read more »

An impressive Colonial townhouse, this stone building of two storeys, Bellkirk,  was built as the manse for the nearby Presbyterian church of Saint... read more »

January 14 was supposed to be the hanging day in 1884 for the Sioux Crow Dog — but instead of being executed he was busy making caselaw. A sub-chief... read more »

In January 1867 three young boys were charged at the Marylebone Police Court, with begging. Churchill Long was 11, his brother Stephen 10 and their friend... read more »

On this date in 1973, Morocco shot 11 officers for a regicidal mutiny. Amekrane (left) with the coup’s leading spirit, Mohamed Oufkir Their deaths... read more »

In January 1877 Mr Fletcroft Fletcher had come up to London from his estate at Ash in Kent for the cattle show. Having completed his business in the capital... read more »

Iceland last used the death penalty on January 12, 1830 with the beheading of farm servants Agnes Magnusdottir and Fridrik Sigurdsson. Only threadbare... read more »