In 1852 William Sparrow, William Maggs, and Robert Hurd were charged with the murder of Sarah Watts at Woodlands, neear Frome, Somerset, England. The following account of the trial was published in the Somerset County Gazette on April 10, 1852
Rape, Robbery and Murder near Frome
March 15, 2008 at 4:00 am (Genealogy)
Tags: Crime, Frome, Hurd, Maggs, Murder, Somerset, Sparrow, Watts
A Railer punished
October 10, 2007 at 4:00 am (Genealogy)
Tags: Crime, Dorset, Hancocke, Maiden Newton, Randell, Whetcombe
The Social History of the People of The Southern Counties of England in Past Centuries by George Roberts was publish in 1856. The following incident occurred in my home village of Maiden Newton in 1631.
Dorset Prison Life in the 19th Century
August 6, 2007 at 4:14 am (Genealogy)
Tags: Crime, Genealogy, History
A prison sentence today has been cynically likened by some people to being at Butlins when compared with the austere conditions of penal servitude in the 19th century. Assuredly, conditions were a lot harsher then, and nobody living at the time would likely have doubted that one stretch in prison was an effective deterrent against recidivism. But what would conditions have been like in the county goal at Dorchester during the period from about 1800 to 1950?
Read J. Graham-Wilson’s account of those conditions based on documentary research at Dorset Ancestors.
No mercy shown in the prison ships era
July 30, 2007 at 7:00 am (Genealogy)
Tags: Crime, Genealogy
“He was only nine years old, the son of a Cowgate tailor, certainly a little tearaway and deemed old enough to be taught the errors of his ways.”
Sandra Dick reports in the Scotsman on the crimes which could cause draconian penalty of transportation to Australia in the 1800′s
A Robber Shot
July 15, 2007 at 1:18 pm (Uncategorized)
Tags: Blatch, Crime, Gilbert, History, Sweetapple
William Henry Blatch was born in 1792 the son of James Blatch and Elizabeth Sweetapple. On March 3, 1881 he married Marianne Sweetapple at Andover, Hampshire, England. The couple lived in the Hampshire village of Nutley, and it was here that on the night of November 4, 1833 that William discovered and shot a burglar. The following is an account of the inquest reported in the Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette on Thursday, November 14th, 1833.
