Main content

Fugitive slaves, Victorian justice

A suspicious detective, a kind-hearted magistrate and public support for escaped slaves. All part of a story of a Victorian court case told by New Generation Thinker Oskar Jensen.

The trial of sisters begging on the streets of South London led to donations sent in by Victorian newspaper readers and an investigation by the Mendicity Society. New Generation Thinker Oskar Jensen, from Newcastle University, unearthed this story of the Avery girls in the archives and his essay explores the way attitudes to former slaves and to the reform of criminals affected the sisters' sentencing.

Producer: Ruth Watts

Ten New Generation Thinkers are selected each year to share their research on radio as part of the scheme run by 大象传媒 Radio 3 and the Arts and Humanities Research Council. You can find a collection of discussions, essays and features from academics who have been part of the scheme over the past ten years on the Free Thinking programme website.

You can hear more from Oskar in a Free Thinking programmes called Victorian Streets, Busking and Billy Waters. His book Vagabonds: Life on the Streets of Nineteenth-century London is out now.

Available now

14 minutes

Broadcast

  • Thu 6 Apr 2023 22:45

Death in Trieste

Death in Trieste

A 1760s murder still informs ideas about aesthetics, a certain sort of sex, and death.

Watch: My Deaf World

Watch: My Deaf World

Five compelling experiences of what it is like to be deaf in 21st-century Britain.

The Book that Changed Me

Five figures from the arts and science introduce books that changed their lives and work.

Download The Essay

Download The Essay

Download all the episodes from the series and listen at your leisure.

Podcast