£12
ISBN: 978-1-905335-09-1

Jack Sheppard was a famous criminal. His short career ended when he was hanged in 1724, aged 21. But before he was at last brought to the gallows at Tyburn, watched by a cheering crowd, his spectacular and daring escapes from prison had brought him fame and popularity.

In this celebrated novel, Harrison Ainsworth tells his story and sets it against the background of 18th-century London – a world where criminality, drunkenness and prostitution existed alongside wealth and elegance. Over it all broods the satanic figure of Jonathan Wild, criminal mastermind and trusted government agent.
William Harrison Ainsworth was born in Manchester in 1805 and for a while was one of the most celebrated novelists of his time, rivalling Dickens. His two “Newgate Novels”, Rookwood telling the tale of the highwayman Dick Turpin and Jack Sheppard, brought him great fame and wealth. But they brought scandal too: Ainsworth was accused of glamorising crime, and when a condemned man claimed to have been inspired by Jack Sheppard to commit murder, Ainsworth’s career as a novelist of realism came to an abrupt end.

With the original illustrations by George Cruikshank.