A Grim Almanac of Kent

About the Author

W.H. Johnson, a former headmaster and schools inspector, has written many articles and books on local history, crime and criminals including Sussex Murders, and A Grim Almanac of Sussex. He won the South East Prose Prize in 1991.

Product Description

This guide unveils a sinister, macabre, or horrifying occurrence for every day of the year, and presents readers with 365 graphic, spine-tingling, and dramatic events. The wicked, the mad, the foolish, and the unfortunate parade through the pages: poachers, witches, rioters, plague victims, highwaymen, smugglers, and the condemned awaiting their fate. There are accidents, explosions, suicides, and shipwrecks. The author takes us into prisons and workhouses, into the slums of Maidstone and the cold cottages of the rural poor, and even onto the scaffold. Included are the likes of George Joseph Smith doing away with his brides in the bath; the respectable Stauntons who starved heiress Harriet to death; Frances Kidder who drowned her stepdaughter; and an old man's murder which remained unsolved until an incredible confession 11 years later. W.H. Johnson's new book is generously illustrated with a range of engravings, photographs, public notices, and original documents. This chronicle of all that is grim and ghastly is an entertaining and readable alternative history of Kent.