...The first building on the site [of St George's Hall] was an infirmary that housed a lunatic asylum, close to the location of the courtroom in the Hall – the courtroom where Judge Fitzjames Stephen lost his mind. What may have entered his head overnight that turned him from sympathising with Florence Maybrick to condemning her as a poisoner? He used opium, and perhaps he dreamed of her curious comment that “James took arsenic not to pale his skin” – which Victorians often did – “but to excuse his inhuman pallor.” How could this have driven the judge mad?...



...It’s a photocopy of a crude handbill, which I deduce is early Victorian, advertising a mock trial at the York Hotel in Williamson Square. The title is Jack My***** and his Miraculous Stalk: The “Cellary” Champion Caught on the Hop in Whitechapel...

(...the York Hotel contained a mock courtroom that satirised contemporary scandals until the trial of Jack My***** saw the players and the hotel manager prosecuted for obscenity.)