by Alexander Smyth (Author), Randal L. Hall (Editor)
On January 14, 1806, Sidney Hanson was raped by John Deskins on a rough gravel path in the woods in Tazewell County, Virginia. In the early nineteenth century, trials for rape were rare. Scanty court records typically lacked the detail needed to reconstruct the lives of those involved and evaluate the social and physical setting of the crime. Yet the events on that fateful day in 1806 would be the exception.
In A Rape in the Early Republic, Randal L. Hall reproduces the complete
Author Biography
Randal L. Hall is associate professor of history at Rice University and editor of the Journal of Southern History. He is the author of several books, including Mountains on the Market: Industry, the Environment, and the South, and Lum and Abner: Rural America and the Golden Age of Radio.