A crisis in England’s penal system in the 1700s will be explored through the exploits of an Irish-born criminal at a Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies (CCCS) free public seminar tomorrow (Thursday 7 August).
Dr Simon Devereaux from UQ’s School of History, Philosophy, Religion and Classics will present Patrick Madan: One Man’s Odyssey through England’s Penal Crisis 1774-1784 at 2pm in Room 402, 4th Floor, Forgan Smith Tower at St Lucia campus.
Dr Deveraux will examine the case of Patrick Madan, a London criminal renowned for his repeated convictions and escapes from penalty in the late 1700s.
Convicted for robbery in 1774, Madan escaped from hanging after an accomplice confessed. He subsequently escaped, or attempted to escape, from Newgate Prison, from an African-bound convict ship and from Africa itself.
Dr Devereaux will explore how Madan’s case was cited in the mid-1780s in two famous penal treatises as evidence that the English penal system was in urgent need of reform.
A lecturer in Modern British History, Dr Devereaux was a CCCS Faculty Fellow in 2002. He has co-edited two books on the British penal system and his book Criminal Justice and English Governance 1750-1810 will be published by Palgrave.
Media: For further information please contact Andrea Mitchell, Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies, (telephone 3365 7182 or email a.mitchell@uq.edu.au)
