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]. 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" 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. $2,500. * Abraham Prescott was found guilty of the murder of Sally Cochran in two separate trials held in Concord in September 1834 and September 1835. Despite a well-crafted insanity defense, he was sentenced to be hanged on December 23, 1835, in Hopkinton, New Hampshire. The execution was postponed to January 6, 1836. The verse account in this broadside presents the murder as a crime of passion: "Oh! lust, accursed lust! 'twas this for which I did the deed; Forfeiting heaven, and life, and bliss, Forfeiting all I need." See McDade, The Annals of Murder 769. OCLC locates 7 copies (American Antiquarian Society, Brown, Dartmouth, Harvard, Peabody Essex Museum, University of Michigan, Yale).
Price: $2,500.00
Book number 66538