Criminal trials in England dating back to the 18th century, including the infamous Jack the Ripper suspect, are to go online for the first time Monday, a British website said.
Criminal trials in England dating back to the 18th century, including the infamous "Jack the Ripper" suspect, are to go online for the first time Monday, a British website said.
The website said it is publishing 1.4 million documents on trials, verdicts and sentences including executions handed down to criminals in England and Wales from the late 18th through the 19th centuries.Files include the trial of Roderick McLean who attempted to assassinate Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle with a pistol in the late 1800s, according to genealogy website Ancestry.co.uk.
Other legendary criminals include Dr Thomas Neill Cream, hanged in 1892 for poisoning several people and who allegedly confessed to being Jack the Ripper, although he was in prison at the time of some of the gruesome killings.
The fate of Isaac "Ikey" Solomon, considered to be the inspiration for author Charles Dickens' character Fagan in "Oliver Twist," is also recorded.
"This collection will be of great use to social historians as they contain a variety of in-depth information about crime and criminals in England and Wales during a period of great poverty, change, and ultimately, reform," managing director of the site Olivier Van Calster said.
The documents include 900,000 sentences of imprisonment, 97,000 transportations, some to British colonies at the time such as Australia, and 10,300 executions, including a boy aged just 14.
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Being caught at night with a blackened face was also a capital offence, because authorities assumed that the accused was a burglar.
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"These registers testify to the fact that crime and punishment was and always will be a controversial subject," said Van Calster.
"They also highlight the often colourful nature of crime, and in particular how creative criminals could be, even in less sophisticated times."
Source-AFP
TAN