Trial of Mary Blandy

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Various. Trial of Mary Blandy

Trial of Mary Blandy

Table of Contents

PREFACE

APPENDICES

MARY BLANDY

INTRODUCTION

LEADING DATES IN THE BLANDY CASE

THE TRIAL

AT THE ASSIZES HELD AT OXFORD FOR THE COUNTY OF OXFORD. TUESDAY, 3RD MARCH, 1752

The Indictment—

Evidence for the Prosecution—

The Prisoner's Defence[12]—

Evidence for the Defence—

Charge to the Jury—

APPENDICES

APPENDIX I

PROCEEDINGS BEFORE THE CORONER RELATIVE TO THE DEATH OF MR. FRANCIS BLANDY

I.—Depositions of Witnesses

II.—Verdict of Jury

III.—Warrant for Committal of Mary Blandy

APPENDIX II

COPIES OF ORIGINAL LETTERS IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM AND PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, RELATING TO THE CASE OF MARY BLANDY

APPENDIX III

A LETTER FROM A CLERGYMAN TO MISS MARY BLANDY, NOW A PRISONER IN OXFORD CASTLE; WITH HER ANSWER THERETO. AS ALSO MISS BLANDY'S OWN NARRATIVE OF THE CRIME FOR WHICH SHE IS CONDEMNED TO DIE

APPENDIX IV

MISS MARY BLAND'S OWN ACCOUNT OF THE AFFAIR BETWEEN HER AND MR. CRANSTOUN, FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THEIR ACQUAINTANCE IN THE YEAR 1746 TO THE DEATH OF HER FATHER IN AUGUST, 1751, WITH ALL THE CIRCUMSTANCES LEADING TO THAT UNHAPPY EVENT

APPENDIX V

LETTER FROM MISS BLANDY TO A CLERGYMAN IN HENLEY

APPENDIX VI

CONTEMPORARY ADVERTISEMENT OF A LOVE PHILTRE.[28]

APPENDIX VII

CONTEMPORARY ACCOUNT OF THE EXECUTION OF MARY BLANDY

APPENDIX VIII

LETTER FROM THE WAR OFFICE TO THE PAYMASTER-GENERAL, STRIKING CRANSTOUN'S NAME OFF THE HALF PAY LIST

APPENDIX IX

THE CONFESSIONS OF CRANSTOUN

I.—Cranstoun's Own Version of the Facts

II.—Captain Cranstoun's Account of the Poisoning of the Late Mr. Francis Blandy

APPENDIX X

EXTRACT FROM A LETTER FROM DUNKIRK ANENT THE DEATH OF CRANSTOUN

APPENDIX XI

LETTER FROM JOHN RIDDELL, THE SCOTS GENEALOGIST, TO JAMES MAIDMENT, REGARDING THE DESCENDANTS OF CRANSTOUN

APPENDIX XII

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE BLANDY CASE

I. CONTEMPORARY TRACTS

II. CONTEMPORARY NEWSPAPERS AND MAGAZINES

APPENDIX XIII

DESCRIPTION OF SATIRICAL PRINT, "THE SCOTCH TRIUMVIRATE."

Отрывок из книги

Various

Published by Good Press, 2019

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How far matters went at this time we do not know, for Cranstoun left Henley in the autumn and did not revisit "The Paradise" till the following summer. Meanwhile Captain D—— returned from abroad, but unaccountably failed to communicate with the girl he had the year before so reluctantly left behind him. Mary's uncles, "desirous of renewing a courtship which they thought would turn much to the honour and benefit of their niece," intervened; but Captain D——, though "polite and candid," declined to renew his pretensions, and the affair fell through. Whether or not he had heard anything of the Cranstoun business does not appear.

According to Miss Blandy's Own Account, it was not until their second meeting at Lord Mark Kerr's in the summer of 1747 that the patrician but unattractive Cranstoun declared his passion. She also states that in doing so he referred to an illicit entanglement with a Scottish lady, falsely claiming to be his wedded wife, and that she (Mary) accepted him provisionally, "till the invalidity of the pretended marriage appeared to the whole world." But here, as we shall presently see, the fair authoress rather antedates the fact. Next day Cranstoun, formally proposing to the old folks for their daughter's hand, was received by them literally with open arms, henceforth to be treated as a son; and when, after a six weeks' visit to Bath in company with his gouty kinsman, the captain returned to Henley, it was as the guest of his future father-in-law, of whose "pious fraud" in the matter of the £10,000 dowry; despite his shrewdness, he was unaware. Though the sycophantic attorney would probably as lief have housed a monkey of lineage so distinguished, old Mrs. Blandy seems really to have adored the foxy little captain for his beaux yeux. Doubtless he fooled the dame to the top of her bent. For a time things went pleasantly enough in the old house by the bridge. The town-clerk boasted of his noble quarry, the mother enjoyed for the first time the company and conversation of a man of fashion, and Mary renewed amid the Henley meadows those paradisiacal experiences which formerly she had shared with faithless Captain D——. But once more her happiness received an unexpected check. Lord Mark Kerr, a soldier and a gentleman, becoming aware of the footing upon which his graceless grand-nephew was enjoying the Blandys' hospitality, wrote to the attorney the amazing news that his daughter's lover already had a wife and child living in Scotland.

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