Restored period voices perform real London murder trials, 1674–1913. Part One lays out the evidence and rests the Crown's case. You lock in your verdict. Part Two brings the defence, the jury's decision — and what happened next.
Two o'clock in the morning, Fenchurch Street. A lodger lying awake hears whispering in the entry, then a child crying somewhere below — then nothing. Two days later the night man's drag brings up the body of a three-month-old girl. Her mother swears she handed the child, alive, to the one man in the house who swears he never left his bed.
Heard exactly as the court heard it in 1743 — the indictment, the witnesses, the prisoner conducting her own defence. Then the question falls to you, before the jury of 1743 gives their answer.
A full-cast performance of the real courtroom record — judge, witnesses, and the accused in their own words. The Crown rests. No verdict. Not yet.
Guilty or not guilty? Death, transportation, or the fine? Lock in your verdict in the app and see how the rest of the jury is leaning — before Thursday.
The defence, the jury's decision, the sentence — and the part the courtroom never heard: what happened next, from the archives.
Everything the episode can't say out loud — synced transcripts, the cast, the map of a vanished city, and your standing record as a juror.
The printed Proceedings scroll with the audio, line by line. Tap any archaic term — house of office, night man, the Compter — for a plain-English gloss.
Who's lying? Every witness, the victim, and the accused — ages, trades, and what their testimony hangs on.
Seal your verdict in wax before Part Two. Track your accuracy against the jury of history — and against every other listener.
The crime scene, the gallows, the prisons — pinned on a period map of London, with a toggle to the same streets today.
One letter a week: the new case, the evidence to weigh, and the verdict you missed.