Broadside entitled 'Shocking Depravity!'

Commentary

This crime report, sourced from the 'Glasgow Free Press' newspaper, begins 'Full and authentic account of the most Shocking Case of Depravity on record in the annals of this Kingdom, which took place in the vicinity of Airdrie, on Sabbath morning, the 2d June instant, by six Monsters in the shape of human beings !'. This broadside was published by Menzies, in Edinburgh.

Written in the usual outraged and indignant tone of crime-related broadsides, this example tells of a couple on the way home from Airdrie who were assaulted in a premeditated attack by six men.The husband was seized by two men masquerading as police constables, and taken towards the jail. Four apparently public-spirited gentlemen then offered to walk the woman home, but instead they assaulted her.

Broadsides are single sheets of paper, printed on one side, to be read unfolded. They carried public information such as proclamations as well as ballads and news of the day. Cheaply available, they were sold on the streets by pedlars and chapmen. Broadsides offer a valuable insight into many aspects of the society they were published in, and the National Library of Scotland holds over 250,000 of them.

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