A Correct Copy of the Trial and Conviction of Richard Johnson

A first edition copy of the trial transcript of Richard Johnson.

• A correct copy of the trial & conviction of Richard Johnson for the murder of Ursula Newman, on the 20th Nov. 1828, by shooting her with a pistol loaded with buck shot or slugs, nine of which entered her body; together with the charge of the court, and the confession of the prisoner of his entention to have added suicide to the horrid and appalling murder for which he is to suffer an ignomenious death, and his letter to a friend in Philadelphia previous to his conviction.
• New York: by Christian Brown, n.d., [1829].
• Includes a woodcut illustration of the murder on title page.
• Original stitching, entirely uncut as issued.

Johnson had been living with Mrs. Newman for several years. He had urged her to marry him, and, although she had had a child by him, she refused to wed him, nor would she even acknowledge that the child was his. Apparently distracted by this and business worries, Johnson shot and killed her. He was hanged on Blackwell’s (now Welfare) Island at the same time as Catherine Cashier.