De Quincey: On Murder
1 ON THE KNOCKING AT THE GATE IN MACBETH. (1823) ➜
2 ON MURDER CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE FINE ARTS. (1827) ➜
3 SUPPLEMENTARY PAPER ON MURDER CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE FINE ARTS. (1839) ➜
4 POSTSCRIPT. (1854) ➜
5 MURDER AS A FINE ART (SOME NOTES FOR A NEW PAPER) ➜
6 THE AVENGER (1872) ➜
1: Thomas De Quincey: Miscellaneous Essays, Mass. 1851
2-4: Thomas De Quincey: Miscellanies. Selections Grave and Gay, from Writings Published and Unpublished, Edinburgh 1854
5: Thomas De Quincey: The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey. ed: Alexander Japp, London 1891
6: Thomas De Quincey: The Avenger, Boston 1873
Explanatory Notes (1)
The paper on "Murder as one of the Fine Arts" seemed to exact from me some account of Williams, the dreadful London murderer of the last generation; not only because the amateurs had so much insisted on his merit as the supreme of artists for grandeur of design and breadth of style; and because, apart from this momentary connection with my paper, the man himself merited a record for his matchless audacity, combined with so much of snaky subtlety, and even insinuating amiableness in his demeanour-but also because, apart from the man himself, the works of the man (those two of them especially which so profoundly impressed the nation in 1812) were in themselves, for dramatic effect, the most impressive on record: Southey pronounced their pre-eminence, when he said to me, that they ranked amongst the few domestic events which, by the depth and the expansion of horror attending them, had risen to the dignity of a national interest. I may add, that this interest benefited also by the mystery which invested the murders; mystery as to various points, but especially as respected one important question, Had the murderer any accomplice? (2) There was, therefore, reason enough, both in the man's hellish character, and in the mystery which surrounded him, for this Postscript to the original paper; since, in a lapse of forty-two years, both the man and his deeds had faded away from the knowledge of the present generation; but still I am sensible that my record is far too diffuse. Feeling this at the very time of writing, I was yet unable to correct it; so little self-control was I able to exercise under the afflicting agitations, and the unconquerable impatience of my nervous malady.
(2) Upon a large overbalance of probabilities, it was, however, definitively agreed amongst amateurs that Williams must have been alone in these atrocities. Meantime, amongst the colourable presumptions on the other side, was this:-Some hours after the last murder, a man was apprehended at Barnet (the first stage from London on a principal north road), encumbered with a quantity of plate. How he came by it, or whither he was going, he steadfastly refused to say. In the daily journals, which he was allowed to see, he read with eagerness the police examinations of Williams; and on the same day which announced the catastrophe of Williams, he also committed suicide in his cell.