Trial of Rev Joy Hamlet Fairchild, On a Charge of Adultery with Miss..
"In All, He Might Have Had 15 or 20 Connections with Me" [Trial]. Fairchild, Joy Hamlet [1790-1859], Defendant. Weeks, James E.P., Reporter. Trial of Rev Joy Hamlet Fairchild, On a Charge of Adultery with Miss. Rhoda Davidson. [Boston]: Boston Daily Times, 1845. 32 pp. Main text in parallel columns. Octavo (9" x 6"). Stab-stitched pamphlet with untrimmed edges bound into recent stiff wrappers with quarter buckram spine, small typed title label to front cover. Light wear to spine ends and corners of wrappers, moderate toning, light foxing to some leaves. Ex-library. Tiny inkstamp to bottom margin of p.2. A well-preserved copy. $450. * At head of text: "Times" Report, the first of three editions published by the Boston Daily Times. One of several publications about this celebrated, notorious case, consuming much contemporary print. Fairchild allegedly seduced a young woman, Rhoda Davidson, of Edgecomb, Maine, while she was a domestic in his family. She had a child, and nominated Fairchild as the father. Fairchild claimed that rival ministers had defamed him by calling him an habitual libertine and adulterer. This pamphlet includes witnesses' testimony, including that of Miss Davidson. "In all, he might have had 15 or 20 connections with me." The pamphlet closes with the verdict of Not Guilty; "the audience burst out in involuntary applause, which was immediately checked." Another, earlier issue does not include the jury verdict, the pamphlet noting that deliberations were ongoing. Accounts of this case are scarce. OCLC locates 3 copies of our account (American Antiquarian Society, Harvard Law School, New Hampshire Historical Society). Cohen, Bibliography of Early American Law 13693.
Price: $450.00
Book number 66215