Old Bailey (I)

choi

Amanda Vickery, Bringing the Voices of the Old Bailey to Life. BBC, July 15, 2010 (blog)
www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/radio4/posts ... _old_bailey_to_life
(“Beneath the tip of the iceberg of literacy, lies the hulking majority who could not record their struggles and successes on paper for posterity. But there was one special place where the words of the poor and the illiterate were recorded verbatim - the criminal court. * * * It [London] was Europe`s biggest capital, a heaving city of migrants”)

My comment:
(a) The quotation explains why the trial transcripts are very helpful. Once in a blue moon I go to the basement of law libraries and read centuries-old English court cases, which were just one or two paragraphs explaining judge reasoning but presented no facts. Today I finally learn where to find trial transcripts in London, this is exciting. In state courts of United States, trial courts routinely destroy case files of old cases, and appellate courts only keep the briefs but destroy trial transcript. In federal courts, an appellant may order transcripts (for hearings and/or the trial), which becomes part of district court record (and stored in warehouses permanently).
(b) Amanda Vickery
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_Vickery
(1962- ; professor of early modern history at Queen Mary, University of London)
(c) Amanda presented several series in BBC, dealing with various aspects of Old Bailey. Here is one.

Voices From the Old Bailey: Sexual Subcultures. BBC Radio 4, Series 2: Episode 2 of 4.
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b012ww6h
(i) Click the “Episodes” in the blue horizontal bar above her photo to see table of contents of her two series.
(ii) castrato (n; plural castrati; Italian, from past participle of castrare to castrate, from Latin):
“a singer castrated before puberty to preserve the soprano or contralto range of his voice”
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/castrato
(iii) “[The episode] Recorded on location in Lincoln's Inn, where barristers have been beavering away for centuries. But outside their chambers, this was one of the naughtiest places in London - a notorious gay cruising ground, and site of the 'bog-house', the public toilets which were a place of assignation.

assignation (n): “an appointment of time and place for a meeting; especially :  tryst <returned from an assignation with his mistress — W. B. Yeats>”
www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assignation