The New Newgate Calendar

On this date in 1921, the villain in the Case of the Ragged Stranger went to the gallows in Chicago. Then-24-year-old World War I veteran Carl Wanderer... read more »

James Randall had bought a packet of what he believed to be tobacco from someone, possibly a dock worker, at one of the many pubs in and around the City... read more »

Brazilian Communist guerrilla Helenira Rezende was summarily executed in the field on this date in 1972. “Preta” to her comrades, she was a... read more »

One of the most recognisable names in the Whitechapel murder case is that of Dr George Bagster Phillips, H Division’s divisional surgeon. Dr Phillips... read more »

It was an ordinary weekend in the autumn of 1904,  and the Dover police were about to have the relative peace broken by William Hoffman. “I... read more »

Ellen Dunn was sitting at her desk in the evening, doing her household accounts. She had her receipts and an account book open in front of her, and a bag... read more »

This day’s post arrives to us via George Wallace: American Populist, and it concerns not the pugilistic Wallace but a previous Alabama governor,... read more »

Mao Zemin, younger brother of Communist leader Mao Zedong, was executed on this date in 1943. A party cadre since 1921, the non-chairman Mao served a variety... read more »

There are plenty of cases of fraud that came before the Metropolitan Police courts in the Victorian period. From individual attempts to extort money from... read more »

From the New York Times, September 27, 1879: ANTHONY BLAIR HANGED TEN THOUSAND SPECTATORS TO SEE HIM DIE — THE HISTORY OF HIS CRIME. Nashville, Tenn.,... read more »

Naomi Klein, 2007,“The Shock Doctrine”, London, Allan Lane. I am grateful to Halima Nawaz for challenging me to read Klein’s “The... read more »

I am a little late in getting this up today because I’ve been working on the final draft of my new solution to the Jack the Ripper mystery. All the... read more »

On this date in 1714, Geczy Julianna was executed in the marketplace of Gyor as a traitor. “The White Woman of Locse” — which is also... read more »

William Helps was standing watching the concourse at Ludgate Hill railway station when a gentleman attracted his attention. Helps was a station inspector... read more »

On this date in 1788, Pennsylvania highwaymen-cousins Levi and Abraham Doan(e) were hanged on Windmill Island, Philadelphia.* A whole clan of outlaws turned... read more »

Frank and the fabulously named Tirquinia Keeling were drunk, and soon quite disorderly. It was a Monday night in Septemebr 1890 and the pair were wandering... read more »

By Ashley Borrett, PhD student at the University of Hull When I started my PhD back in 2013, I had a clear idea of what I wanted to research but had limited... read more »

By Cassie Watson; posted 23 September 2018. Crime historians are familiar with some of the more widely reported cases of delayed or failed executions that... read more »

Interior of the London Pavilion Music Hall (c.1861) There is tendency for people to act differently when they are away from home. We let our hair down... read more »

Original Dublin broadsheet via James Kelly’s Gallows Speeches: From Eighteenth-Century Ireland: THE LAST SPEECH, CONFESSION AND DYEING WORDS OF CATHRINE... read more »

Prompted by a facebook post from the Police historian Neil Bell I decided today to go back to 1862 to see if there was any hint of that year’s big... read more »

On this date in 1882, Jack Chatman hanged in Louisiana’s Bossier County for murder. The attached, racist article is from the New Orleans Times=Picayune... read more »

This story is both sad and dramatic as it concerns a man’s very public attempt at suicide. Most of the cases that I’ve written about previously... read more »

A sobbing 17-year-old* Alireza Molla-Soltani was publicly hanged at dawn on this date in 2011 in Karaj for slaying an Iranian muscleman. Yoked: the murder... read more »

Since 1908 we have had separate courts for juvenile defendants and even before then there was a recognition that young children at least needed to be dealt... read more »

On this date in 1821, Brazil’s saint of freedom was martyred by the Portuguese. Francisco José das Chagas, fondly remembered as Corporal Chaguinha,... read more »

Old postcard of Smirke’s Westgate Bridge, with steamboat passing under In 1806, an Act of Parliament was passed which facilitated the building... read more »

I have just completed the final draft of my ‘Ripper’ solution book and its now off with my co-author for his last amendments. We have to do... read more »

On this date* in 1442, Vietnamese writer, commander, and politician Nguyen Trai died for regicide. The Confucian scholar (English Wikipedia entry | the... read more »

We cadge today’s entry from the August 1950 Kansas Historical Quarterly; the article “Legal Hangings in Kansas” by Louise Barry can be... read more »

For many people arriving in London in the 1880s the capital was a stopover en route to somewhere else; for many European Jews that ‘somewhere else’... read more »

On this date in 1682, the boyar Ivan Andreyevich Khovansky went from being the power behind the throne to one of the skulls under it. A veteran military... read more »

So, Cabbies, how long would you wait for a fare to come back and pay you? John White drove a hansom cab in 1856 (cab no. 3,264) and he had a fairly regular... read more »

The execution of legendary German bandit and mass-murderer Peter Niers took place in Neumarkt on this date in 1581 … or at least, it started on... read more »

An Edwardian trial used legislation from larceny to witchcraft to prosecute a husband and wife palm-reading team… In 1904, an ordinary looking,... read more »

When Mr and Mrs Thomas French began to notice money was missing from the till they scratched their heads for an explanation. The couple ran the Chequers pub... read more »

An account by the Ordinary of Newgate Samuel Smith … in fact, A True Account of the Behaviour, Confessions, and last Dying Speeches of the Condemned... read more »

Deal porters on the London Docks There was plenty of violence in nineteenth-century London. Much of it was drunken and most of the perpetrators and women... read more »

The implacable Duke of Alva/Alba bloodily suppressing the Low Countries’ revolt against Spain claimed the head of Flemish nobleman and poet Jan van... read more »

William Brennan made a robust defence of his actions when he appeared before Alderman Lawrence at Guildhall Police court in September 1848. The City of... read more »

Prison records reveal fascinating, complex and often tragic human stories. Delving into almost any prisoner’s life will reveal points of interest,... read more »

Roberto Giron and Pedro Castillo, peasants who raped and murdered a four-year-old girl, were shot at the Guatemalan town of Escuintla on September 13,... read more »

I grew up in Finchley in North London. It was then (and is now) a multi-cultural  suburban centre with a busy high street, a couple of nice parks,... read more »

The imperial eunuch An Dehai was beheaded in Jinan on this date in 1869. He was so much the favorite that it’s been clained that the redoubtable... read more »

All sorts of things come up in the reports of cases at the Metropolitan Police courts. These really were quite diverse in the areas they covered; while... read more »

Ernest Harrison, Sam Reed and Frank Howard, confessed to the murder of Washington Thomas, an aged, respectable colored man. Thomas was employed in a tobacco... read more »

On Wednesday the 6 September 1883 the assistant medical officer at the Highgate Infirmary on Dartmouth Park Hill ordered that Eli Sparksman be discharged.... read more »

On September 10, 1941, the German authorities occupying Norway martyred two labor activists. The Third Reich occupied Norway in the spring of 1940, adding... read more »

In October 2007 the charity Help for Heroes was launched. On its front page its makes this powerful statement: ‘Today, seven people will be medically... read more »

In the early morning hours on this date in 1943, Jarmila Zivcova, her husband Vaclav Zivec, and their friend Ruzena Kodadova were beheaded in Berlin. These... read more »