The witch of New York The trials of Polly Bodine and the cursed birth of tabloid justice
Book - 2024
In this first narrative history of Polly Bodine, the first American woman put on trial for capital murder from 1844-1846, a constitutional lawyer and crime historian shows how dueling trial lawyers, ruthless newsmen and shameless hucksters turned her case in America's formative tabloid trial.
- Subjects
- Genres
- True crime stories
- Published
-
New York :
Pegasus Crime
2024.
- Language
- English
- Main Author
- Edition
- First Pegasus Books cloth edition
- Physical Description
- xx, 315 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color), maps ; 24 cm
- Bibliography
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 273-275) and index.
- ISBN
- 9781639363919
- Author's Note on Sources
- The Docket Sheet
- Prologue: Christmas Night 1843
- Part I. A Fallen Woman
- 1. Islands in the Stream
- 2. Sex and the 1840s City
- 3. Incendiaries
- 4. Low-Speed Chase
- 5. They Would Hang Her Without Judge or Jury
- 6. Confessions of the Sun
- 7. The Living Jury of the Nation
- 8. Dream Teams
- Part II. The Staten Island Trial
- 9. Poe Cracks the Case
- 10. The People v. Mary Bodine
- 11. Ghosts of Granite Village
- 12. Trial by Water
- 13. Breaking News
- 14. Consciousness of Guilt
- 15. Playing the Jew Card
- 16. Sisters
- 17. The Man in the Spanish Cloak
- 18. The Runaway Juror
- 19. Undue Prejudice
- Part III. The Manhattan Trial
- 20. Barnum's Witch
- 21. Eldridge Street Jail
- 22. Trial by Fire
- 23. Mayor Harper
- 24. The Weight of the Baskets
- 25. Gala Night at the Park Theatre
- 26. To Conceal the Circumstances of Her Pregnancy
- 27. The Opposite Counsel
- 28. Cruel and Unbecoming Curiosity
- 29. Judge Edmonds's Charge
- 30. April Thunderstorms
- 31. The Hanging of Polly Bodine
- 32. Witch Trial Interlude
- 33. The Appeal
- 34. Six Thousand Jurors
- Part IV. The Newburgh Trial
- 35. National Police Gazette
- 36. Whitman's Sympathy
- 37. George Washington Camped Here
- 38. Fragment of the Mother's Dress
- 39. Orange County House v. United States Hotel
- 40. The Gangs That Infest New York
- 41. Judgment Night
- 42. Polly Bodine in the Popular Imagination
- Epilogue: Another Prison
- Afterword: Lawyers Will Not Save Us
- Acknowledgments
- List of Illustrations
- Select Bibliography
- Notes
- Index
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Review by Kirkus Book Review