Description
Broadside (250 x 330mm) printed on 1 side in 2 columns. Sometime folded in 3, old creases from prior folds, 5mm split to one crease, blank verso a little soiled.
To the Printers of the Kentish Gazette[…]
- [s.l.]: [s.n.] 1802
£150
Notes
An anonymous letter commending the probity and social standing of the organisers of the newly-formed Society for the Suppression of Vice. The writer defends the society against allegations in the Times of December 4th 1802 that the Society did 'pay a profligate and needy wretch to suborn to crimes in order to prosecute', and highlighting their success in prosecuting a man 'grown grey in his infamous and detestable trade... and had for years exhibited his abominable trash against the wall of Privy Garden, Whitehall'.
The Society for the Suppression of Vice was formed in 1802 against 'profanation of the Lord's Day and profane swearing; publication of blasphemous, licentious and obscene books and prints; selling by false weights and measures; keeping of disorderly public houses, brothels and gaming houses; procuring; illegal lotteries [and] cruelty to animals' per their 1803 publication 'Address to the Public', and persisted long enough to harangue Richard Burton for his unexpurgated Arabian Nights in 1885, petering out soon after.
We can find no trace of this broadside in any library catalogues.
