Abr'm Prescott's Confession of the Murder of Mrs. Sally Cochran...
"Oh! Lust, Accursed Lust! 'Twas This for Which I Did the Deed" [Broadside]. [Murder]. A Private Individual at the Bar. Abr'm Prescott's Confession, Of the Murder of Mrs. Sally Cochran of Pembroke, N.H.--June 23, 1833. [Concord, NH.?]: S.n., 1836. 17" x 11-1/2" (43.2 x 29.2 cm) broadside. Two columns of verse in twenty stanzas within woodcut ornamental border, text headed by large woodcut vignette of a coffin. Light browning and a few minor stains, faint horizontal and vertical fold line, chipping to edges, section lacking from bottom margin, just touching bottom right corner of border, a few tears along fold lines with no loss to text, later repairs to verso. $1,950. * Abraham Prescott was convicted of the murder of Sally Cochran following two separate, highly publicized trials held in Concord, New Hampshire, in September 1834 and September 1835. Despite a robust and well-crafted insanity defense mounted by his counsel, Prescott was sentenced to death. Originally scheduled to be hanged in Hopkinton, New Hampshire, on December 23, 1835, his execution was delayed, and he was ultimately executed on January 6, 1836. This rare broadside features a verse account that explicitly frames the murder as a crime of passion, capturing the sensationalized public sentiment of the era: "Oh! lust, accursed lust! 'twas this / For which I did the deed; / Forfeiting heaven, and life, and bliss, / Forfeiting all I need." OCLC locates 7 copies (American Antiquarian Society, Brown, Dartmouth, Harvard, Peabody Essex Museum, University of Michigan, Yale). See McDade, The Annals of Murder 769. Burt, American Murder Ballads 66-67.
Price: $1,950.00
Book number 66538