Rare. OCLC records copies at BL and New York Public Library only.
“I heard a young woman - an impudent wench!
Outwit all the wigs of the bar and the bench…“
A very rare verse satire on the libel trial of Mary Ann Tocker who was the first woman to represent herself in court in Britain. This comic verse account was printed 11 days after the trial.
Mary Anne Tucker in an anonymous letter to The West Briton newspaper on the 6 June 1817 accused her former lodger, Richard Gurney, of corrupt behaviour as elected Vice-Warden of the Stannaries [Cornwall and Devon], a lucrative judicial post. Gurney, a dissolute gambler, had also neglected his duties, save for demanding money from suiters before settling cases in the Stannery court nor had he paid any rent or a promised secretarial salary to the Tuckers. Mary Anne took full responsibility for the letter and exposee, while her brother, the co-author, was forced to apologize in print, and Gurney took up an indictment for criminal libel, punishable by fine and/or imprisonment, against her alone.
The trial took place in Bodmin on the 4 August 1818 with Mary Anne choosing to represent herself. The Judge instructed the jury to bring a verdict of guilty but was surprised when after half-an-hour of deliberation they found Mary Anne not guilty.
The trial caused a public sensation and was taken up by many of the radicals of the day - a summary of the trial was published by William Cobbett, then in exile in America. The trial also became a touchstone for future female lawyers.
Provenance: Edward Hailstone (1818-1890), solicitor and antiquary. Large circular leather and gilt bookplate on the front pastedown (with some off-setting on to the front flyleaf. B. Bradford, signature dated “May 1943” on the front pastedown. E. Donald Smart, book label on the front pastedown. Jim Edwards, book collector, small book label on the front pastedown.
