The Old Bailey Proceedings Online

A new website, The Old Bailey Proceedings Online, provides a fully searchable, digitized collection of the transcripts of every trial heard at the Old Bailey, England’s central criminal court, from 1674 to 1913. It includes the records of more than 210,000 criminal trials, covering over 110,000 pages of text. This includes some of the most sensational criminal cases in history, such as Oscar Wilde’s trials for gross indecency.

You can search the text of the proceedings by keyword, defendant’s name, offense, verdict, punishment, and time period. Advanced search allows you to search using additional information, such as gender, occupation, and crime location. You can also browse the proceedings by date. In addition to the texts of the trials, the site provides 195,000 digital images, as well as contemporary maps, images of the courtroom, and information on the historical and legal background of the Old Bailey court.

J. Fusaris