Book bound in the skin of a 19th-century Suffolk murderer goes on display
A second copy of a book bound in the skin of a notorious 19th-century murderer is now on display at a Suffolk museum.
However, Horrible Histories creator Terry Deary has told the Guardian that the volume is a 'particularly sick' artefact which 'shouldn't be on display'.
William Corder was convicted of murdering his lover, Maria Marten, in what became known as the Red Barn Murder of 1827.
Corder was publicly executed the following year before being dissected. Some of his skin was used to bind a book about his trial which was passed to Moyse's Hall Museum in Bury St Edmunds in the mid 1930s.
However, a second copy of the book – believed to feature Corder's skin on its spine and corners – was discovered last year on a bookshelf of the museum's office, and is now on display alongside the original book. The second copy is believed to have been donated around 20 years ago.
The case has spawned many film, radio and stage versions. 'The murder continues to be interpreted and reinterpreted in popular culture to this day,' said Daniel Clarke, heritage officer at West Suffolk council.
'The facts have been blurred into near obscurity' with nearly 200 years of the tale's retelling, states the museum's website. Corder reportedly proposed meeting Marten at the Red Barn in Polstead, Suffolk, and eloping to Ipswich from there. He was later found guilty of murdering Marten at the barn.
Deary, whose books have sold tens of millions of copies, said that the conviction was based on circumstantial evidence, and that Corder is a 'very misunderstood man'. The displayed skin-bound books are 'very disrespectful to Corder's memory'.
'I feel guilty because I have played Corder,' said Deary, who is also an actor. 'I've got photographs of me threatening poor Maria Marten with a gun.'
Deary has written a novel due to be released next year – titled Actually, I'm a Corpse – based on this experience, in which the hero plays Corder before realising 'how badly the poor man's been maligned'. He said that he would like to 'restore Corder's reputation'.
Clarke said that the museum does not 'deal with this as a salacious artefact but as a window into the past'. Items connected to the murder are positioned opposite a late 18th-century gibbet cage, used to display hanging corpses.
Sign up to Bookmarks
Discover new books and learn more about your favourite authors with our expert reviews, interviews and news stories. Literary delights delivered direct to you
after newsletter promotion
Together, the objects allow discussion and interpretation of the Bloody Code – laws that imposed the death penalty for many crimes – said Clarke.
'Do we think all books bound in skin should be on display? That would be debated on a case-by-case basis,' said Clarke. 'In this instance, it is a stark and emotive set of artefacts that give us the chance to discuss the anatomising of the criminal corpse. Uncomfortable history, yes, but if we are to learn from history we must first face it with honesty and openness.'
Deary previously wrote six stories for the museum. However, he said that displaying the books is 'just a step too far', likening it to a 'freak show'.
'We're buoyed that [Deary] continues to write about the murder within his books as it is hugely important to our understanding of the past,' said Clarke.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Independent
a day ago
- The Independent
What the Trump administration doesn't get about the ‘fake news' media
It was the summer of 1997 – a few months after a notable marathon libel case in which our crime correspondent, Duncan Campbell, had successfully defended his exposé of suspected corruption at Stoke Newington police station. Around four in the morning, I was jolted awake by a burly policeman in the bedroom. We were living in Highbury, North London, and I soon worked out that the house was swarming with police officers, along with their dogs. It turned out that a burglar had smashed through our front door in the middle of the night. The police eventually left and, as the last one disappeared up the path, he said to me: 'You're the editor of the Guardian, aren't you? You might like to know we're all based at Stoke Newington nick.' My heart may have missed a beat. Duncan had, after all, just vanquished five of his colleagues in court. But I was wrong: as the copper tugged his dog into the van and drove off, he said: 'Tell your Mr Campbell to keep digging.' That was the thing some people struggled to understand about the way Duncan – who died recently – worked. You could expose bent cops and be in favour of the police. You could be dealing with the Met Commissioner as chair of the Crime Reporters' Association in the morning and have a drink with a bank robber in the evening. Of course, with Duncan, it went further, as anyone who attended one of his publishing parties would know. There would be chief constables, great train robbers, judges, barristers, old lags and old hacks. The art was to work out which was which. Everyone trusted Duncan – except Mr Justice French in the Stoke Newington trial. In the previous 33 months, the police union, the Police Federation, had fought and won no fewer than 95 libel cases in a row. They were called 'garage actions' because coppers would use the guaranteed settlement money for home extensions. If Mr Justice French had had his way, the score would have been 96-0. But Duncan went into the witness box to give evidence. The jury, like everyone else, trusted Duncan. It cost him a huge amount in sleepless nights and anxiety, but the stand he took did his colleagues in the British press a considerable favour. It was now much safer to write about police corruption; it was a game-changer. Duncan died within a week of another reporter, Andrew Norfolk, whose reporting on child-grooming gangs for The Times was similarly widely lauded for its courage and integrity. At a time when trust in the media is underwater, it's heartening to be able to celebrate the best among us. Duncan wrote about the world of crime like no other reporter could even dream of. How he did it, no one could quite explain. Nick Reynolds, son of the great train robber Bruce, told me: 'You know, most villains hate journalists. I mean, the whole point of it is to try and do something and get away with it and be discreet. But somehow, through his integrity, approach, sense of humour, diligence, and demeanour, he managed to get the Golden Pass to the underworld, and they all respected him. ' Freddie Foreman, who killed people for the Krays, loved him. Mad Frankie Fraser, who extracted the teeth of his victims with pliers, adored him. But so did lawyers and police officers who cared about the truth. He was very proud of the website he created, Justice on Trial, which ran until 2017 and covered numerous miscarriages of justice. He took an interest in so many. The Miami Five, the Craigavon Two, the Shrewsbury 24, the Birmingham Six, the Cardiff Three. The Torso murders, George Davis, and Gary McKinnon. Kiranjit Ahluwalia, who had been sentenced to life for killing her abusive husband. They and many, many more had reason to thank Duncan for swimming against the tide and taking the time and trouble to investigate their cases. But most of the time, when people think about journalists, they don't think of the Campbells and Norfolks. They don't think of the risks that reporters take in covering events in the Middle East, or Ukraine, or even, as a new Amnesty International report highlights, in Northern Ireland, where there have been 71 attacks or threats against journalists since 2019. When journalists are not being attacked physically, they are under attack verbally. It is now routine White House policy to denigrate, mock, discredit and delegitimise the so-called legacy media. The objective seems plain: if Donald Trump can persuade you that the New York Times is fake news, you might not believe them the next time they investigate his affairs. The White House press secretary is 27-year-old Karoline Leavitt, who believes that Donald Trump won in 2020 and who used her very first briefing to (falsely) claim that $50m a year of US taxpayers' money was going to fund condoms in Gaza. It's unclear whether she has any journalistic experience, although she did once apply for an internship at Fox News. This week, she took it upon herself to lecture the BBC on editorial standards, tearing into a report about deaths in Gaza and claiming the BBC had been forced to retract its claims. This was fantasy stuff, as the BBC's Ros Atkins demonstrated in a devastating three-minute film the following day. But, as the old cliche goes, Truth often takes some time to get its boots on. GB News presenters, for example, chortled with glee at the 'humiliation' of the BBC seemingly without lifting a finger to interrogate whether any of Leavitt's claims were actually, you know, true. Atkins works for BBC Verify, which GB News owner, Paul Marshall, incidentally wants closed down. Truth, lies – who cares? So journalism is struggling today. Which is why it's worth pausing to remember and celebrate the best rather than dwell on the worst. We said farewell to Duncan on Tuesday. He himself was a veteran of reporting on the funerals of the villains he'd known, including gangland figures such as Charlie Richardson and Ronnie Kray, as well as the Great Train Robbers, Buster Edwards and Ronnie Biggs. Though with one, Peter Scott, a noted jewel thief who died bankrupt and penniless in 2013, it was Duncan himself who ended up organising his funeral at Islington cemetery. He arranged it at 10.15 in the morning: 'There was a discount for the early hour,' he recalled. The undertaker demanded the deceased's occupation. 'Cat burglar,' said Duncan, who also chose the music for the ceremony. The coffin disappeared to the old gospel song, Steal Away. It helps to have a sense of humour if your life is spent covering crime. Not to mention today's White House.
Daily Mirror
a day ago
- Daily Mirror
Coronation Street's Maureen Lipman shares reason she may not wed
Coronation Street star Maureen Lipman, who plays Evelyn Plummer on the soap, has opened up about her relationship with fiancé David Turner, but the couple may not make it down the aisle soon Coronation Street icon Maureen Lipman has opened up about her hesitations to walk down the aisle with her recent fiancé, despite announcing their engagement last year. The BAFTA-nominated actress, who first found love with her late husband Jack Rosenthal in 1974, was left devastated by his death in 2004 and later expressed her aversion to marriage following the loss of her partner Guido Castro in 2021. Yet, it seems the Corrie star had a change of heart about romance after David Turner asked for her hand in marriage. In a candid Guardian interview, Dame Maureen reflected on what life has taught her, stating: "Life is trying to teach me to stop worrying about the bags under my eyes and concentrate on someone else." While she's keen to focus on her relationship with David, she expressed uncertainty about their nuptials. She revealed: "David has 9,000 cousins, I've got four, so heaven knows how we'll manage to actually have a wedding. We may just be engaged for as long as we've got." Beyond her personal revelations, Dame Maureen has cemented her status as a beloved figure in British entertainment, gracing both stage and screen in some of the nation's most prestigious productions, reports Leicestershire Live. Before joining the cast of Coronation Street as Evelyn Plummer in 2018, Dame Maureen was already a seasoned actress with roles in Doctor Who and The Pianist, and even earned a BAFTA nomination for her role as Trish in the beloved film Educating Rita. This year marks her seventh year on the cobbles, but recently she announced a brief break from playing Tyrone Dobbs' grandmother on the ITV soap. Despite becoming a regular in 2018, Dame Maureen had a short stint on the show back in 2002 as a different character. Last year, viewers saw Evelyn make the brave decision to return to university to study law. Keen to immerse herself fully in the university lifestyle, she told her friends and family on the street that she would be leaving her Weatherfield home to live in student halls. Coronation Street will be back on screens tonight (Friday, June 6) at 8pm on ITV.
The Guardian
2 days ago
- The Guardian
Sudoku 6,921 hard
Click here to access the print version. Fill the grid so that every row, every column and every 3x3 box contains the numbers 1 to 9. To see the completed puzzle, buy the next issue of the Guardian (for puzzles published Monday to Thursday). Solutions to Friday and Saturday puzzles are given in either Saturday's or Monday's edition.
