In 1928, an opinion piece in The Sketch newspaper debated what people liked to read in the press. The author noted:

‘Out of every hundred persons reading their morning newspapers, I estimate that at any one moment, at a rough computation, five are reading the political leaders, ten the general news incorporating finance and gossip, fifteen the middle-page ‘stunt’ articles on ‘Should husbands live at home?’ and similar vital topics, and thirty the sporting page, mainly racing. The remaining forty are reading the pages devoted to the performance and prosecution of crime.’

Crime reporting was a vital part of the newspapers, and it was the crime section or stories that grabbed a good number of readers. This was seen, in the 1920s, to be a bit odd, for the British were not generally ‘violent tempered’ – in fact, they were perceived to be rather ‘kindly’. When people committed crime in Britain, they were seen to only ‘make a half-hearted attempt at it’, and although there were lots of detective and crime novels, their criminal geniuses were often foreigners.

Yet the British remained deeply interested in crime, and one opinion was that they were so because of a deep psychological desire to commit crime, a desire that was either repressed or even unconscious, but there nevertheless. By reading about crime – both fictional crimes, and real ones as covered in the press – readers were vicariously enjoying the tales of those braver than they, those who were doing what they secretly yearned to do.

Another theory, though, was that readers were attracted to stories that were rather alien to them – they were so unlike what they would do themselves that they found themselves intrigued by them. They were particularly intrigued by complex stories involving planning, cunning and kill: forgeries, illegal marriages, subtle poisonings – all created excitement, and an escape from the mundanity of most people’s lives. As the 1920s opinion writer noted, the strange country of crime was attractive: ‘It is hostile, it is dangerous, it has some revolting inhabitants, but it thrills with the thrill of unforeseen and sometimes terrible adventure.’

Reading about crime, therefore, was akin to being a tourist in a country that they had never visited before: all around was intrigue, excitement, different people and different behaviour. It was strange, new, but most of all, exciting.

Ongoing fascination
This fascination with crime was nothing new, and it remains today. True crime books abound; documentaries and podcasts about crime are incredibly popular. We can today get our crime fix from many different sources, immediately, and act as amateur detectives ourselves. Previously, our ancestors had to look to more limited sources, but they still contained exciting tales. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, penny novels offered a literate population the chance to escape; an abundance of newspapers, both provincial and national, did the same. Further back in time, a broadside offered an often poetic or moral take on a crime and the criminal who committed it; these, and news-sheets, would have been read out by a literate member of a community to those who could not read, thus ensuring that a wide number of people learned of the events.

But our ancestors also had a more visual means of indulging their fascination with crime. They could attend a trial (or gather outside for a glimpse of the accused when there was no room inside), or watch an execution. Prior to the 1860s, of course, hangings were public, and there are numerous stories of crowds attending, with all classes represented. The poorer members stood to watch, jostling for a good position; those with more money might pay for seats closer to the ‘action’, or for a window-view, with enterprising locals charging for access to their homes with a view of a scaffold. The hangings were the opportunity for entertainment and for crime themselves, prostitutes and pickpockets being known to gather there.

When William Brophy was executed in Kilkenny on 4 August 1852, having been convicted of what was termed ‘the Ballymack murder’ – the murder of Joan Dooly – it was said that ‘upwards of 3000 persons are said to have assembled to witness the revolting spectacle, which was more than double the number who attended the recent execution of the much more remarkable culprit, John Walsh, alias Shawn-na-Sheoge’. John had been executed at Kilkenny four months earlier, for the murder of Thomas Bell.

It was clear that what the press thought was an interesting crime and criminal was not necessarily who the public became fascinated by. Three days later, a 22-year-old farmer’s son, Francis Berry, was hanged at Armagh for the attempted murder of Meredith Chambre. It was noted that ‘there was an immense crowd in front of the gaol, whose morbid curiosity was evidently sickened by the appalling spectacle, for a thrill of horror was manifested when the victim presented himself.’

What might account for the popularity of some hangings compared to others? In the case of Brophy, the case involved several factors that made it ‘interesting’. Brophy and his wife Margaret had lived in a lonely cabin on the road between Ballymack and Kilcoran in the far west of Kilkenny, not far from the border with Tipperary. He had killed a poor female pedlar, leaving blood along the path from where the body had been found to his own front door. There were bloody prints on the kitchen floor, and straw in another room that was saturated with blood. The dead woman, known as Joany, was a widow from Ballycallan who the locals knew for her visits to the area to sell tobacco, snuff and fruit. She had earlier been taken ill and had left her basket of goods – her sole means of making a living – at Brophy’s cottage. She had then been taken into the local poor law union hospital – and it was believed that while she was away, Brophy had sold her goods. When she was well enough, she tried to get them back, and so Brophy had killed her, hitting her on the head with a spade until her skull was smashed. Brophy was therefore a hard-hearted murderer, taking advantage of a poor, vulnerable woman, and the public accordingly wanted to see him dead.

John Walsh, however, had murdered another man rather than a woman – his brother-in-law, in fact – and had made numerous attempts to kill himself, which would not have endeared himself to a Catholic population who believed that only God had the power and right to end a life. His suicide attempts may also have been seen as an act of cowardice, trying to avoid the shame of a public hanging, and this, too, may have made people more revulsed than interested in him.

The Great Wen
In London, in particular, the goriest, most unusual, or shocking crimes attracted great crowds when the alleged perpetrator went on trial. When the public read about these crimes in the newspapers, with the dates given as to when the individual would be tried, they would queue for a seat in the public gallery. The desire of both men and women to participate in this way was commented on by the press throughout the 19th century and well into the 20th.

In 1923, for example, the crowd that had waited all night outside the Old Bailey in the hope of getting admitted to the public gallery the following morning was described in one local paper as ‘idle persons’ with nothing better to do; but they were still deemed better than the ‘groups of fashionably-attired women’ who came in to the gallery to listen to criminal cases. Women who were interested in attending trials were considered to be ‘morbid minded’, and there was concern that they were turning ‘the most important criminal court in the country’ into a theatre or cinema.

There were undoubtedly complex class and gender issues at play here; the lower classes were regarded as being fascinated by crime, perhaps because they were seen as more likely to be involved with crime themselves.

It was also more acceptable for men to be interested in crime, whereas women should be occupied with lighter issues rather than concerning themselves with murders and alibis. Yet such disapproval ignored the fundamental reasons why individuals of both genders and all classes were so interested in crime. It offered escapism, interest, something outside the onlookers’ usual experience. It challenged them intellectually, it got them interested in a world outside their own.

In a way, it was a form of education as well as entertainment, and perhaps that is why we continue to be interested in crime, just as our ancestors were.