Alone in the Dock
There, in front of the prisoner as she was brought up from the cells to the court room dock, were Messrs. Poland and Montagu Williams for the prosecution. At the lawyers’ table with them were Sir John Holker and Mr. Mead, her defence team. It was very crowded in the learned pit as the hospital’s Treasurer and its Governors were represented by Mr. Baggalley and his team; and the medical staff, not to be outdone, were represented separately by Sir Hardinge Gifford.
Looking up, the prisoner saw the reporters packed into the public gallery. The newspaper industry had expanded rapidly as massive new technology had shifted the printing process to a scale unimaginable only a few years earlier.
The Applegath printing press, as used by ‘The Times’ and by the ‘Illustrated London News’. Date: 1851
The public loved its news, especially crime, and the many Dailies and Weeklies carried much detail of the Old Bailey trials. News from the premier publication The Times of London was syndicated to the local provincial papers who reprinted the stories the next day helped by their rapid transit in the ever-expanding railways.
Illustration depicting London paper boys chasing a train to make a sale to passengers. Dated 19th century
Old Lady by the Sea 