Broadside entitled 'Trial and Sentence'

Commentary

This trial report begins: 'A Full and Particular Account of the Trial and Sentence of ANDREW EWART, who is to be Executed at Edinburgh, on Wednesday the 19th March next, for Murder, and his Body to be given for Public Dissection.'

The National Library of Scotland's collection includes another, similar, broadside recounting the trial and sentence of Andrew Ewart. Whilst most of the information appears to be the same on both sheets, this particular one describes in more detail the events immediately leading up to the murder of Henry Pennycook (or Pennycuick). On watch in Liberton churchyard, Ewart fatally wounded his friend, Pennycook, after mistaking him for a body-snatcher.

Reports recounting dark and salacious deeds were popular with the public, and, like today's sensationalist tabloids, sold in large numbers. Crimes could generate sequences of sheets covering descriptive accounts, court proceedings, last words, lamentations and executions as they occurred. As competition was fierce, immediacy was paramount, and these occasions provided an opportunity for printers and patterers to maximise sales.

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